July 1, 2025
I bought a new raincoat. It’s not often you get excited about a raincoat, but I loved it, from one of my favorite brands in Stockholm, Stutterheim. Rain was a sure thing in Scotland, but I was excited for the rain. Bring on the rain, Scotland.
The First Days – Edinburgh
“We need to find a proper Scottish pub”
We met our friends Colleen and Jordan in Edinburgh, landing around 13:00, with plans to meet for a boozy lunch upon arrival at the hotel. (Because what else do you do after 10+ hours of travel but start drinking?)
In most of our European travel, we use the Amsterdam airport lounge to freshen up and look alive so we can hit the ground running.
The weather was beautifully sunny.
How lucky we were.
Edinburgh
We had lunch at a French-ish place. I was hoping for a proper pub, since it was my first time in Scotland (I can name Bhutan, UAE, Oman, China, Burma, Vietnam, and 65+ more countries to my “been” list, including the UK, but Scotland was new for me. The other three had all been at least a few times, and Colleen and Jordan were veterans.)
The plan for dinner was a proper pub with fish and chips.
Edinburgh is an endlessly charming and beautiful city. It’s as picturesque as advertised, including the Royal Mile (the Royal Mile is one of the most beautiful streets with cobblestone, historic architecture, colorful shopfronts… lots of souvenir shops and fashion brands, and scenic views of the castle).
But if you want to walk the Royal Mile AND find it beautiful, get up early to beat the massive crowds. It’s a little less beautiful when you’re weaving in and out of tourist groups.
Outside the Royal Mile, Edinburgh is a cool, real city, especially if you get into the neighborhoods like Stockbridge (our favorite). The neighborhoods are fun to walk through and be in. Finally, I found my proper pub with an endless supply of fish and chips (Namely at Scran & Scallie). The warnings started (from Colleen): “pace yourself with the fish and chips, it’s everywhere, and at every meal.”
As pretty as it is, Edinburgh is probably what we like to call “a two-day town.” Especially when the rest of Scotland is calling out to you.
For hotels, the big dog is the Balmoral, which has views of the castle and is close to the Royal Mile. Frankly, it’s pretty, but a bit overpriced. There are plenty of chains around (such as the W, Intercontinental and Kimpton), but chains are usually never our first choice. A few other quirky choices are the Gleneagles Townhouse (which we preferred) and 100 Princes. Also, Hotel du Vin (which also has a Glasgow outlet) has a nice Scottish hospitality feel.
Score for the first few days:
Fish & Chips: 2
Rain: 0
To the Highlands and Inverness:
“Let the bad Scottish jokes begin”
There were four of us on this trip, with a driver at our disposal so we could enjoy the journey.
The plan: to circumnavigate Scotland, hitting some new places for the rest of our group. We headed north over the Forth Bridge toward Dunkeld, Pitlochry, then toward Inverness.
Highlights of this part of the trip were the Highland Chocolatier (Iain Burnett), exploring the pretty little cities with lunch on the river (yes, fish and chips) and the Culloden Battlefield and Clava Cairns.
First WTF for our group: Why are we going to a chocolate shop in Scotland? When you think of the best chocolate in the world, Scotland is usually not the first place mentioned. (Note: if you’re in this area, it is worth it. It’s so OMG good, I ordered more when I got home.)
Second WTF: The TV series Outlander. Apparently, we were the only people to visit this area of Scotland that are not obsessed with Outlander. We knew the actual history of the Culloden Battlefield, but apparently, the Outlander storyline was more popular. None of us had seen or heard of the series Outlander, of course.
Which led to the first of many typical Scottish jokes, usually centered on men joking about women. The premise of this only makes sense with an Outlander background and came from our battlefield tour guide. The joke was about a husband bringing his wife to touch the same stones that sent Claire (the lead character) back in time to the 1700s. After the tour, the disappointed husband wondered why his wife, too, didn’t disappear. It was much funnier with the thick Scottish accent, followed by a big hearty laugh.
From there, off to Inverness, which is not known as one of the most beautiful towns in Scotland, but it’s a lovely little town and a great jumping off point for visiting the Highlands. Our hotel, the Ness Walk, was right on the riverbank, with great outdoor space for our own post-dinner, self-induced whisky and chocolate party.
And I buried the lede. It was another beautiful Scottish day, not a cloud in the sky.
Current Score:
Fish and Chips: 4
Rain: 0
Scottish whisky and chocolate: 10
A new winner has been declared
Ness Walk
Inverness and Loch Ness to the Isle of Skye
“Looking for Nessie” tied with “Our Breaking Point”
Near Inverness, we took a boat ride on Loch Ness with an 80-something radar engineer who had lived on the lake since he was a child. The series of stereotypical Scottish jokes continued with authority. Our boat driver/guide had non-stop colorful, hilarious stories, and seemed like a character made up for a movie.
The lake was like glass because it was, yet again, another perfect, 23-degree (75 Fahrenheit), cloudless day.
From there, we began the exploration over to the Isle of Skye.
The highlights along the way included a visit to the Eilean Donan castle (seen in multiple movies) and the lovely little town of Portree.
Eileen Donan Castle
Portree
The Isle of Skye is dramatically beautiful and impossible to capture in photos. There are more castles to visit (Dunvegan), but we spent more of our time outside because, again, the weather was perfect. Our favorite places and visits were the Fairy Pools and Talisker Bay (with a tasting at Talisker Distillery, of course) and the hike to the Old Man of Storr. The entire island is spectacular, including exploring the north.
I wrote that Portree was lovely.
It probably would have been even lovelier without two nights. It is small, and the restaurant options are mediocre fish and chips, followed by more fish and chips.
We finally reached our breaking point, so much so that Jordan (a classically trained chef and restaurant owner) ventured to the market (the equivalent of a 7-Eleven) to find anything that resembled actual food with vegetables and made our dinner on the hotel’s outdoor fire pit.
This easily became the best meal on the trip, and one of the only meals that included vegetables.
And I finally wore my raincoat. Because it was raining? No. Because it got chilly at night by the fire pit, and it looked too cool not to wear.
Score:
Fish & Chips: 2
Rain: 0
Scottish Whisky: 47
(By the way, the scoring system is completely arbitrary, but it represents the general vibe.)
To the West and Loch Lomond:
“Where are the damn cows?”
In addition to the promised rain and fish and chips, the guarantee of Scottish highland cows comes with a trip to Scotland. So far, we’ve only spotted a few from the car, which doesn’t count.
Fish & chips: check, whisky: check, rain: not so much, cows: not really, not yet.
After a few days on the Isle of Skye, we took the ferry from Armadale to Mallaig to explore the west coast. Yet another few days of beauty best described with the overuse of superlatives.
Highlights were Glencoe, Glenfinnan (which included the famous Harry Potter bridge, yet another reference lost on us…. I tried to watch the first Harry Potter movie about 10 times and the furthest I made it in was 30 minutes), the city of Oban and the Oban Distillery, and finally the damn cows.
Our lovely hotel on the Isle of Eriska (appropriately named the Isle of Eriska Hotel) gave us a true sense of Scottish countryside.
From here, we made our way to Loch Lomond, an easy drive to Glasgow, but a world away. The lakes in Scotland are nothing short of amazing.
We loved our stay at the Cameron House right on Loch Lomond.
Score:
Fish & Chips: 0 (I finally found a pizza. It wasn’t good, but it wasn’t fish and chips)
Rain: 0
Scottish Whiskey: 0 (we finally found good wine and Amaro for after dinner)
My raincoat: 2 (I started wearing it to breakfast, just to show it off)
Back to the City:
We opted for some time in Glasgow (even though Edinburgh gets all the attention) and had a great stay in the West End of the city, with some walking through the city centre, the Cathedral and the not-to-be-missed Necropolis.
Our faves in the city were the hotel One Devonshire Gardens by Hotel du Vin, and eating at The Clarence (one of many great restaurants by the group that also has the well-known Brett).
We also had a fun dinner with Colleen and Jordan’s in-laws, lifelong Scotspeople, in which we fully appreciated in Scotland that the F-in-heimer (also known as the F word) is actually a comma/form of punctuation, used liberally in every sentence. Even by Grandma.
Yes, after several days off, we went for one last fish & chips and one more whisky tasting (I hate Scottish whisky BTW), so it was back on the leaderboard.
Score:
Fish & Chips: 3
Rain: 0
Scottish Whisky: 2 (but it was balanced with good wine and Port)
My raincoat: 0
(It was actually hot in Glasgow and Edinburgh)
Guess what? No rain, all sunshine for the entire trip. I think incessant rain is just a rumor the Scots started to keep tourism in check.
The other piece of advice is to visit Scotland in May, FYI.
F-in Cheers, mate
