The landscapes in Scotland are known worldwide. The Highlands are rugged, the islands of the Inner Hebrides, the dramatic coast of the North Coast 500. Yet the way you see these places is to transform everything that you will bring home with you on the trip. Hotel-to-hotel travellers encounter postcards, beautiful, framed, and separated by glass, gift shops and strictly controlled viewpoints, they are the preserve of hotel-to-hotel travellers. Something different is experienced by road travellers. They can sense how the weather changes in twenty minutes and it is no longer sun but sleet. They listen to the remarkable silence of a glen where all other human beings are miles away.
Start in Edinburgh
Start in Edinburgh. The medieval panorama of the city, topped by the castle on its volcanic crag, is rightfully renowned. There is the Royal Mile, Holyrood Park, and the Georgian charm of the New Town, and these cannot be overlooked. However, when you get out of the pavement, the magic is the real thing—especially for RV travelers who are searching for the freedom of the open road. And when you pass the Forth Road Bridge and the city is growing smaller in the rearview mirror. When the motorway passes and the individual roads come on. When you are in a village where the sole direction you have is a signpost to a village name you have never heard of.
Experience of Scotland
A campervan will change the whole experience of Scotland. The North Coast 500 is no longer a road to be covered within a fixed number of days but a choice of actions to make at the time. The Isle of Skye is a place to spend until sunset instead of rushing home to catch the last ferry or the last meal at the hotel. An empty lochside bedroom of your own at night, no time to check out in the morning, no expensive mini-bar.
Morning staff
The utilitarian advantages are massive. No check-out time means no morning stuffing of your baggage. There is no hurry to a train schedule which implies that you do not forget any opinion you had due to being late. A lack of overpriced hotel restaurants implies that you can enjoy local seafood served in a van that is parked on the road and watch the sunset over the Cuillins. You would like to spend an hour more with the Old Man of Storr to wait till it clears up? You find a secret beach off Durness which is not listed in any guide book? Park up and stay. The weather and your own curiosity are all that limits you.
Scottish campers
Numerous Scottish campers will say so: the finest memories are not on the agenda. They are spontaneous events. Getting up to find mist floating over a mirror-loch and no other soul in sight. Sausaging on a small handheld stove when the sky is pink and gold across a valley that is like the end of the world. A rainbow at Glencore, which to you and your hotel concierge cannot be booked. A chat with a farmer who recounts you the storm of 1953 when you are both sipping tea in dissimilar mugs.
Financially viable to travel
It is also financially viable to travel by campervan as explained in bunkcampers.com. Accommodation and transport are bundled to one price, and in Scotland this can save that of forty and more per day than hotels and car rentals. The saved money can be used to have more meaningful experiences: a boat ride to see sea eagles, a tasting in a small distillery, one more week on the road since you are not ready to go home yet. Campervans provide the security and adventure that other types of travel cannot compete with to individual travellers, couples, or small families. You never lack your own space. You will never have to share a wall with a snoring stranger.Â
Scotland rewards
Scotland rewards the slowers. The landscapes do not get to be consumed efficiently. They are meant to be taken in the long run. The open road is not simply a means of going through Scotland; it is a means of hearing Scotland, especially for those who choose to travel in a camper van, where every bend in the road becomes part of the experience. And the land, and the weather, and the people have much to tell you, should you have the opportunity to slow down and listen.
