Paid collaboration with Bailey of Bristol
After driving through stormy weather from England to Scotland we woke to much more settled weather. It meant that we could spend the morning exploring the area where we had parked overnight. We met two brothers who were retired and were hiking the West Highland Way, after chatting for a while we got back in the van and headed towards Glen Coe.
Glen Coe is always a favourite of ours and we love working our way onto the road that leads to Glen Coe and those epic mountain views. We turned off the main road towards Glen Etive as we know of a fantastic overnight parking spot that we wanted to stay at before heading further north the next day.
We spent the afternoon hiking in the Glen Etive forest. It is the first time we have actually hiked this far into the forest and it is a magical place to be. The forest floor is covered by a thick layer of moss which gives an emerald colour to the forest. We could hear the calls of Stags around us and we felt like trolls could be hidden by the thickness of the trees. Imagine the forbidden forest in Harry potter but much greener. We had to jump over streams and work our way up over hills before deciding to turn back. We had driven many hours the day before and wanted to have a relaxed afternoon before carrying on up North.
It was late afternoon by the time we got back to our van and we were ready for some lunch before calling it a day and recovering some of our energy before carrying on tomorrow.
After leaving Glen Coe we drove our Bailey of Bristol Motorhome along a secret road to get some epic photos of it and us with Buachaille Etive Mòr in the background. It really is our favourite mountain in Scotland and with the sun shining and blue skies above we had to take some photos. Normally it has a layer of cloud obscuring the peak as it did the day before.
Our next destination was Fort William to fill up the fuel tank before carrying on to Eilean Donan Castle, another iconic Scottish location. Since our last visit 3 years ago a new visitors centre and cafe has been built. It has been done well but we felt the new structure obscured the castle a little bit. This is something we noticed a lot more during this Scottish adventure. There are so many more tourist buildings and infrastructure being built. Whilst it can be a good thing we did feel that some remote looking locations now lose that feel as they often have a modern tourist building sitting right next to them, which we thought was a bit of a shame.
We arrived at low tide and sneaked down a secret way onto the slippery rocks to take photos of the castle. We then had some lunch in the car park before carrying on our journey. We started to drive the Wester Ross Coastal Trail which is now unavoidably part of the North Coast 500. We drove west around Loch Maree before stopping at Victoria Falls. The falls themselves are a short walk from the car park and have a raised wooden viewing area. You can also follow the trail to hike up and above the falls. We considered staying overnight in this car park. We did decide against it though and headed a little further down the road to an overnight parking location with views across Loch Maree and the mountains on the other side.
The next morning we woke to another day of beautiful sunshine and we decided to hike the shorter trail at Beinn Eighe National Nature Reserve. It was the UK’s first National Nature Reserve and is incredibly beautiful walking through the woodland with mountains on either side. There are also plenty of opportunities to spot wildlife in the area.
We hiked back to the van and carried along the main road stopping at another parking area for a quick view of Slioch which is a summit on the Northern banks of Loch Maree. There were a few clouds rolling about but we did get a view of the mountain before heading further north to Gruinard Beach where we planned to have lunch. When we arrived we parked up and noticed a deer on the hill side foraging. We walked round and found an area where we wanted to take some photos of the beach but the light was not working for us and we decided to enjoy the view before heading to our final destination of the day Ullapool.
We found that one of the local hotels allowed motorhomes to park up in one of their car parks behind the hotel. It was perfect for us as we quickly wanted to explore the town and grab a few supplies from the town before darkness arrived. The hotel only allows 5-6 vans to stay for free which is amazing, they even have a couple of electric hookups for a small fee.
We walked along the seafront and watched as a ferry pulled away and off to the Isle of Lewis, the final run of the day. There was a nice evening sunset and it turned out most of the shops were already closed. We scouted where we wanted to go in the morning and made our way back to the van.
After collecting fresh supplies from the shops when they opened we carried on towards Achmelvich Bay. There are two beaches there and a holiday park set back from Achmelvich Beach. There is a tight mountain road leading to the beaches. There are lots of passing places but with several nervous drivers who froze when we were coming towards them it made the route challenging. The car park from the beach is also very narrow to get into. We found a space large enough for us and left the van to explore the bay in beautiful sunshine.
Both beaches are very beautiful and you can climb the hills around them for great views. They are white sandy beaches with clear turquoise water. The tough journey was worth it every difficult pass for the views. We actually preferred the second beach, it was quieter and the prettier of the two in our opinion.
We sat on the hills of the beaches taking photos and flying the drone for a while before hiking above the main beach and then heading back to the van. This was the furthest north we were heading on this adventure before working our way back down south. We left Achmelvich just as the sun was begging to set. We drove back through the mountains and watched as the sun was starting to make the mountains glow. We stopped off at a viewpoint to photograph a mountain called Suilven. We had another 3 hours of driving ahead of us as we worked our way down to Loch Ness where we planned to stay for the evening.
We were heading back down to England as our Scottish adventure was coming to an end and with Wales going into lockdown and the threat of England and Scotland introducing further restrictions it was time to head home. We did have another quick stop in Glen Coe and Glen Etive to take more photos in the morning as the weather was so great. It was difficult to actually pull ourselves away and drive the many many hours home.
