Island Hopping Scotland - Loch Lomond

There are two Camping and Caravanning Club sites at Loch Lomond (greedy or what?), Luss on the west side and Milarrochy Bay on the east. Because Luss is situated immediately off the A82 Glasgow road, it is an ideal, and very beautiful, stopping off point. The only trouble was, one night was not enough and we didn’t want to leave! This site is incredibly popular, and booking well in advance is essential. The decision had been made some weeks earlier that this was to be the last campsite stop in Scotland and a pitch had therefore been booked. A good job too, as the site was completely full that evening.


On arrival, we were amazed to be allocated a loch-side pitch with stunning views through the shoreside shrubs down to our own private beach, and across the loch to the mountains. The friendly Warden walked us down and guided us onto the grass pitch and we parked sideways on to the Loch, with the 'van door opening straight onto the view – absolute bliss.

The village of Luss is very pretty, and is a model village, having been built on the wealth of slate. An untaxing circular walk of about an hour (map available from Reception) goes through the village, across ancient woodland, past the old slate mines and gives a good feel for the area.

Being at the side of a main road, there is some road noise, however, this is more background than intrusive. Midges? Yes, a few around at dusk, but our well practiced trick of pulling the awning out and lighting incense sticks made sitting outside comfortable.

Tomorrow, the journey south would continue, but for tonight, a leisurely evening meal of seafood from the Loch Fyne shop, cooked on the outdoor griddle and a cold bottle of Chablis whilst soaking up that fabulous view, ended yet another wonderful day.

Scottish Island Hopping - Kintyre to Inveraray

So, having caught an earlier ferry from Islay back to Kintyre, we could now travel a little further towards home, before pitching up for the night. Loch Gilphead Caravan Park looked very nice and was our original choice when we thought we were catching the 3:30 pm ferry (no bookings taken for stays of one night - just turn up), however, we pushed on towards Inveraray. The choice of sites in this area was not great, and we’d seen an advert for Argyll Caravan Park earlier in some tourist information.

Now, due to bad experiences in the past, we would not normally choose a site on the basis of an advert, preferring to use the internet and word of mouth to find a site that suits us. We drove straight past this site once, because from the road it looks like a huge static park, however, not finding anything further along, we turned back and asked at Reception whether they had touring pitches. They did, which were located right through the site at the other end. This site was OK, but expensive at £18.00 night and we were pitched in an area that felt like a concrete car park. Granted, we DID have views of Loch Fynne, however, this was over a stretch of brown smelly weed and stagnant water, with millions of midges in attendance. I think tourers tend to use this site for just one night because when we woke the next morning, everyone else had gone – it was like the Marie Celeste! However, for a convenient stop-off on the journey south, its adequate if pricey.

Inveraray is well worthy of exploration, however, there was no parking to be had for our motorhome as the town was full of tourists - Japanese, American and Australian mainly. Inveraray Castle has a huge car park, and parking is free, and it’s about a 5 minute walk down the drive into the town from there. The castle itself is fantastic and should be visited if time allows. We didn’t have very long to explore the town, as we wanted to stop off at the Loch Fyne shop a short drive away. Parking at the restaurant/shop was no problem and we stocked up on fresh fish, sea food and gifts at the fabulous shop, which is very similar in style to the Farm Shop at Chatsworth House.

Our destination for our penultimate night was the Camping and Caravanning Club site at Luss, Loch Lomond, a site we’d stuck our nose into last year whilst walking round the Loch and really, REALLY liked the look of. We were not disappointed..............

Islay to Kintyre - The Journey Home Begins

A word of warning at this point about the importance of re-
confirming ferry bookings. Our departure plans from Islay back to Kintyre Peninsula were changed by a text message the day before from CalMac advising that the ferry was departing at 14:00 hours, not 15:30 as booked (luckily, there is a good signal on Islay). A motorhome nearby had not left a contact mobile number, and only discovered by chance from us about the time change. Had he turned up for the 15:30 pm ferry, it would have been long gone, with the next one leaving 48 hours later.

But that’s not all. We got talking to a couple on the ferry back to Kintyre, who should have been going on to Oban, where their car was, but that journey had been cancelled and no onward arrangements were offered to get them back. Luckily, they’d persuaded friends to meet them and drive them the 70 mile trip to Oban!!! Apparantly, CalMac were one ferry down due to pre-winter maintenance, and some services were being changed or cancelled at short notice. Goodness knows what happens to those folks who are not contactable! It’s therefore advisable to make sure the CalMac office has a mobile number, AND that you ring to re-check the ferry well in advance of the return journey.

Islay - The Whisky Isle

Until recently, there was just one campsite on Islay – Kintra Farm, 3 miles out of Port Ellen. Then, in 2007, another site opened – Port Mor Centre and Campsite at Port Charlotte. We can’t comment on Port Mor campsite because time did not permit us to visit it, however, a fellow motorhomer staying at Kintra Farm spoke very highly of it.

We use the internet extensively for researching our motorhoming holidays, and had seen some amazing images of Kintra. We chose it because pitching is possible right up to the beach and the views looked abolutely stunning. They were, and more.

This is without doubt one of the most beautiful and natural locations we have ever camped in our motorhome. The wide, sweeping, windswept beach is right in front of your door and the white sandy beach is just a step away. After checking in at the farmhouse, you make your way slowly over the solid grass-covered sand dunes to pick a pitching area of your choice. There were just a handful of fellow campers whilst we were there: a few tents and a couple of other motorhomes but we did not see any caravans in the two and a half days we were there.

Now, it has to be said that the facilities are basic, the welcome is brusque and the list of do’s and don’ts is very long and strictly enforced. A strange situation is that the site has no facilities for chemical toilet disposal. Apparantly the septic tank cannot cope, and there is an essay in the advance information emailed out that they are not a dumping station for campers who have stayed elsewhere. So the tone is pretty much set from before you arrive. We were only there for a couple of days, so it wasn’t a problem, but I have no idea what you would do if you wanted to stay there for a week or more. Now, I thought that it was a minimum requirement that campsite had to provide a CDP?

On the subject of water, this comes out of the taps brown and has to be boiled. We'd filled up before arriving, and had plenty on board to last us, but campers may wish to take an ample supply of bottled water for drinking purposes.

We paid £15.00 per night in September for our motorhome with no hook-up, to include showers and use of kettle, however, any other electricity used is charged for – ie mobile phone charging or hair-dryer!! Dogs are tolerated, and, disappointingly, there is a 4 mile circular walk from the site, on which dogs are not allowed. That put me in a right bad temper, I can tell you.

Once pitched up, we spent our time walking on the 10 mile beach, or just soaking up the amazing views. It was extremely windy whilst we were there, so sitting outside for any length of time was not pleasant and having planned to do the walk above, Plan B was a linear walk back down the single track road towards Port Ellen, and down towards Mull of Mu, which took us about three hours and is well worth doing.

We wished we'd booked longer on this site, and we would have loved more time to explore Islay, however, a text message from CalMac meant we had to adjust our return journey arrangements ................

Kintyre to Islay

There are two things I don’t like – walking up hills or getting up early. So an 05:00 hrs start on holiday made me pretty grumpy. However, if we wanted to catch the 07:00 hrs ferry from Kennecraig (Kintyre) to Port Ellen (Island of Islay), it had to be done. Generally in summer there are two ferries a day from Kennacraig to Port Ellen - 07:00 hrs and 09:45 hrs, but not every day, so careful checking of timetables is essential. The 09:45 ferry was fully booked on the day we wanted to travel, with several on the waiting list, and no chance of a large motorhome sneaking on, so 07:00 hrs it was. And we are pleased we did this, because it gave us the whole day in Islay.

The crossing is 2.5 hours, the first part of which is an extremely picturesque cruise down West Loch Tarbert. Approaching the end of the Loch, the Paps of Jura were clearly visible, and to the east the Island of Gigha.

On arrival at Islay, driving was a doddle, and we able to park almost anywhere wiithout worrying – unusual in a 23 foot motorhome. Rather than going straight to the campsite, we decided on the spur of the moment to do a bit of a whisky trail. Now, not being a whisky drinker myself (although I kept that quiet on the tour), I did not expect to be enthralled by a distillery visit, but I have to say it was incredibly interesting. If you believe the guidebooks, distillery tours are by appointment only and should be pre-booked, but we decided to turn up and blag it, and sure enough, tours run regularly thoughout the day.

Our first stop was Lagavulin, and we had the tour all to ourselves. It took much longer than the usual hour, because we met the Head Distiller halfway round, got inside information, and ended up sampling of the whisky at various stages of its short fermentation process (when it’s more like a weak beer, apparantly). The statistics are mind-boggling. Millions of litres of water and thousands of tonnes of barley are used every year at this distillery alone. Multiply that by the eight distilleries on Islay, and that’s a phenomenal amount of raw materials producing this amber nectar annually. Once made, it then has to be stashed away for 10, 16 or more years just sitting maturing in bonded warehouses.

We left the ‘van in Lagavulin’s car park (after checking that was OK) and walked up the narrow road to Ardbeg – 20 minutes away, which has a café with outdoor tables, where we could sit with our little dog. The food here is fantastic and well worth a visit even if you are not interested in whisky. Ardbeg has a mascot called Shorty – a very pushy Jack Russell who is clearly used to getting his own way. He took great interest in our Jack Russell, Holly, until she saw him off, following which he turned his affections to a more timid little dog on the next table and amused everyone for the next hour with his antics (except the owners of said timid JR).

Last stop was Laphroaig, where there is a large car park, and we just stuck our nose into the Visitor’s Centre and Shop and picked up some little souvenirs. Time was getting on and we needed to get the the campsite, so we headed for the wide, windswept beauty of the site at Kintra Farm, 3 miles out of Port Ellen....... more about our stay in the next blog........

Island Hopping Scotland - Day Trip to Gigha

The small island of Gigha - not pronounced Gig-Hah, but Gee-ahh, (not to rhyme with pier) is well worth a trip. Five minutes drive up the road from Muasdale is the tiny hamlet of Tayinloan, where the ferry departs every day to Gigha. We discovered that this runs every hour, except between 12 noon and 2 pm, when we turned up at 12:05 pm to see the ferry hairing off at high speed. Never mind, instead of having lunch on Gigha as anticipate, we had a very pleasant meal at the MacDonald Arms Hotel just down the road from the ferry port.

It’s really not worth taking the car over to Gigha. It costs about £36 and there is only one road of approx 5 miles. It’s best to take bikes, but we weren’t sufficiently well organised to do that, however going as a foot passenger (approx £5.00) is a good alternative. We only had 2 hours there, because the last ferry back on a Sunday departs at 4:30 pm, and we didn’t want to be stranded overnight, but still had a good stroll round and got a feel for this lovely island.

The Isle of Gigha has a total population of approx 150 people, and has been community-owned since 2002. One of the must-see attractions is the Achamore Gardens (honesty box entry) and we had plenty of time to walk to and have a look round the beautiful gardens – and dogs are allowed!

We’d just missed a music festival which was finishing as we arrived on the island, as evidenced by dead tents, sleeping bags, bin liners and other detritus scattered around. Camping is possible on Gigha – there is a field in front of the Gigha Hotel, but pre-booking is required with the Hotel. As we waited for the last ferry to arrive, the heavens opened and we took shelter in a very, er, basic waiting room in a shed. Meanwhile, our ‘van was back at Muasdale and a bottle of wine was chilling in the fridge.

Kintyre Continued

The Kintyre Peninsula is almost an island, and is well worthy of further exploration. It attracts many walkers and nature lovers, and the Kintyre Way is a recently-designated long distance walk, which, by co-incidence, a friend of our was doing, using the Jura Apartment at Muasdale Touring Park as their base. Now this is an 89 mile waymarked walk, which sounds “easy” however, experienced as he was, by day three he had to pull out due to a blister severe enough to need medical treatment, and instructions not to do anymore walking that week, so it’s not an activity to be undertaken by the inexperienced. Apparantly, what finally did him in was walking over a boggy peat surface, which acted as a suction on the walking boots, leading to the horrendous blister.

The main town on Kintyre is Campbeltown, approx 17 miles from Muasdale, where there is an excellent range of independent shops as well as takeaways, the ubiquitous Co-Op and a surprisingly largeTesco Metro. We decided we HAD to visit the Mull of Kintyre, but to be honest, were a little disappointed. “Oh Mist Rolling in from the Sea” sums up the day we visited, and we could very little. The drive down to the Mull is 7 miles on a single track road, which is a spectacular drive (there are plenty of passing places clearly marked with black and wide striped poles) but it would have been crazy to take the motorhome down. There’s a small car park at the end – for approx 10 cars, and from there you continue on foot to the lighthouse, down an EXTREMELY steep hill. We ventured about half way then decided we could see what we needed from there, thank you very much.

The small east coast fishing village of Carradale is worth a visit, but our favourite place was Southend, in the south, where seals were close to the shore and totally unfazed by humans. There are prehistoric caves to explore too, where stoneage man (and woman) would have lived pretty cold, wet and miserable lives.

A must-do trip on the Kintyre peninsula is the circular drive round the coast road, stopping off at places of interest on the way, and this is do-able either in a day or, as we did, in bite-sized chunks.
What we noticed most about Kintyre was the sheer peace, quiet and lack of other people - wonderful! We had most places to ourselves, and it was rare to meet anyone else.

No trip to the Kintyre Peninsula is complete without a visit to Gigha, so the day before we left, we took a day trip as foot passengers across to this small island, which is owned by it's residents ..........

Scottish Island Hopping - Kintyre Peninsula

It was the aerial view shot of Muasdale Touring Park that sowed the seed, and when Alison emailed a picture taken of a motorhome on the beach, that was it – our main destination for our summer holiday was decided. Of course, as earlier postings tell, we island hopped either side of Muasdale, but spent several nights on this small ocean-side site to explore the Kintyre Peninsula

thoroughly. A quick search for available pitches showed that Muasdale had limited vacancies for early September, and so the rest of the holiday was arranged around those dates.

Alison and Adrian have owned Muasdale for about 5 years, having decided on a lifestyle change from accountancy, and have been developing the business since. In addition to the touring park, they have the Jura Apartment and 4 static caravans for hire. We had a good nose around the Jura Apartment between lettings – a fine Victorian property, furnished true to the period, on the first floor of the large “extension” to the original house. Alison and Adrian’s winter project is creating a downstairs apartment ready for the 2008 season, which will make their letting portfolio complete.

The 10 pitch touring field immediately over the road is right next to a white sandy beach and turquoise sea, with lovely sea views (weather permitting) across to the islands of Cara, Gigha and Islay, with the Paps of Jura visible on clear days. All sorts of wildlife can be spotted with patience, including seals, and Alison is happy to share her knowledge of the flora and fauna of the area. The weather was not kind whilst we were there, in fact we were confined to barracks on our first day because of heavy rain. It picked up the next day, and we even had a pretty sunset, although we were assured that glorious sunsets are the norm, not the exception.

Alison told us, without any hint of boasting, that they own both the grass AND the beach, up to the high tide mark, so I suppose their land ownership ebbs and flows (so to say). Unusually, camp fires are allowed on the beach, and as we had taken our own firepit, logs and axe, (our motorhome has a large garage), we had a campfire on several evenings. Beachcombing for driftwood is encouraged, and the local shop, just 5 minutes walk away, sells peat logs. Campfires are great, but in the romance of it all, you forget how much they smoke, and with a dodgy wind, we filled the campervan with smoke on several occasions – boy how that smell lingers.

With Adrian’s help we had pre-booked a small hire car from the Vauxhall Garage in Campbeltown, which meant we could tour the Kintyre Peninsula, and beyond, over the next few days............

Scottish Island Hopping in a Motorhome?

We’d not planned to go Island Hopping in Scotland, but that’s what we ended up doing. Island hopping in a 23 foot motorhome? A crazy idea? Were we mad? No! It’s dead easy. So here’s the story.

Originally, the plan was to drive from Derbyshire to the Kintyre Peninsula and back, taking in various stops both ways. Then a friend asked had we thought of taking the ferry from Ardrossan to Brodick, and another from Lochranza to Claonaig? Where to where? Who was Brodick and what was Claonaig?

A visit to the excellent Caledonian MacBrayne Ferries Website, and online ordering of their brochure made things a little clearer. We ended up chosing Island Hopscotch 16 ticket (£220 for up to 10m motorhome and 2 passengers) – Arran – Kintyre – Islay, which took us from Ardrossan to Brodick, Lochranza to Claonaig, Kennecraig to Port Ellen, and Port Askaig to Kintyre. Sounds confusing? Yes, a bit, but all will become clear in future blogs.

One hiccup occurred, resulting in us having to change our return journey plans at short notice - we mistakenly thought the Hopscotch ticket got us back to our starting place of Ardrossan – uh-uhh - not true – it only got us back to Kintyre Peninsula. That’s what happens when you don’t read the small print. So instead of retracing our steps, we travelled back via Inveraray and Loch Lomond, down through Yorkshire, and back to Derbyshire - seeing places we would otherwise have missed. All done in two weeks – and it felt like we’d been away for a month.

And what an absolutely amazing holiday experience it was. We will be writing about it in bite-sized chunks in the next few blogs.