Scotland – Week One

After a bout of flu and a relaxed Christmas with our families, on Boxing Day 2025 we set off on our annual Scotland trip, this time we had over five weeks to enjoy and explore. 

With no real plans, except to meet with our friend John (a fellow full-timer) for New Year in the Torridon/Loch Maree area, lets see what we can find to explore.

 Over the next few weeks, I will be posting blog posts of our weekly travels from our trip.

Week One

Friday 26th December 2025 – 229 miles

Armed with lots of Christmas dinner leftovers and yummy goodies we made tracks early. Todays aim was to get as far north as we could in daylight with as few stops as possible. 

We managed a good drive with very little traffic and only a couple of toilet breaks before we arrived at Ardgartan Visitor Centre, this is a park we have used on previous trips, it is quiet and tucked away just nicely a few miles away from the shores of Loch Lomond. 

We made it here before last light and decided to settle down with a fire and a game of cards under torch light.

Saturday 27th – 42 miles

This morning we went for a walk around the forestry tracks to ensure the dogs had stretched their legs before moving on. 

With a much shorter drive today we wanted to take it slowly, and take in the views as we ventured further north. 

We took a pit stop at The Green Welly Stop in Tyndrum, to us this place marks the unofficial beginning of the highlands. It is a good place to stretch legs, get fuel, do washing, take a look around the shop or eat in the café. This time we just had a wander around to break up the drive. 

We continued along the A82 up to Glencoe Mountain Resort, again a stopover we have used before. It’s a really useful place to stay with water, bins, toilets and paid showers if needed as well as being a beautiful place to stay all for just £5 a night (absolute bargain).

It was much busier here than when we have previously been, most likely due to it being a Saturday night between Christmas and New Year. We had hoped to find snow by now, although really cold and frosty, no snow yet. 

Sunday 28th – 86 miles

We woke up to a beautiful crisp morning (see below), got ourselves ready for the day and moved the lorry over to the water tap to get our tanks filled up. This took a while as the tap had frozen over night, a little warm water fixed that. 

We needed to get some food shopping in today to fill the fridge and cupboards so we could avoid big towns for a while, so off we went to Fort William where we visited Morrisons and Lidl. 

At this point we hadn’t decided where to head to along route, with a couple more days before we were due to meet with John, we found a spot on the map we hadn’t used before. We continued along the A82 before heading along Loch Garry on the A87, we turned off at Shiel Bridge and followed the Old Military Road up to the Ratagan Pass Viewpoint. 

We were greeted with stunning views over Loch Duich and a beautiful sunset.

Monday 29th – 39 miles

We planned a short drive for today, taking in the scenery. We passed the beautiful Eilean Donan Castle before turning away from the A87 at Auchtertyre to continue north. We didn’t plan to visit Skye this trip as we had only been there back in September. 

We took the road down to Lochcarron and Shieldaig, enjoying a couple of stops to enjoy the views, everywhere was so frosty, it looked like a frozen wonderland. 

We were hoping to stop at Torridon for the night, but when we arrived it was already full, so we continued on for a couple of miles to Coire Dubh car park (in Glen Torridon valley) which provided us with a much better view than we would have had at Torridon.

Tuesday 30th – 16 miles

We wanted to make the most of this park up while we were here, so we tootled off for a walk down to the nearby loch and through the valley, it was a super cold and icy morning (Rich grew icicles on his beard), but such a beautiful place to explore. If I ever had to settle somewhere, I’d want it to be like this!

After a brew and a warm up in the lorry we set off once again. We stopped in Kinlochewe to grab some bread and milk to keep us topped up before heading west along Loch Maree to meet with John at a park up next to the loch with views of Slioch.

We settled down with the fire on, had a good chin wag with John and a cosy hot chocolate. We were planning to spend a few days here now with the hopeful forecast of snow due to arrive in this area.

Wednesday 31st – 0 miles

Today was a spend time altogether, us and John, and cooking a stew outside using our Petromax rocket stove. 

We had to set up a tarp between our lorry and John’s van as it had started to rain (still no snow).

Once our stew was ready we all sat in the lorry enjoying food, banter and card games. None of us enjoy staying up late, so we were tucked up in bed by 9pm as usual! 

Thursday 1st January 2026 – 0 miles

We Spent our New Years Day working on our website and getting more products added to our online shop. Not an exciting day, but with the weather not being very pleasant we thought we’d catch up on some necessary work.

Friday 2nd – 31 miles

It started snowing!!!!

We got up early with excitement and drove (in the dark) carefully back down to Glen Torridon as there was heavier snow forecast there. 

It was absolutely worth heading down early to see the dogs playing in the snow. We went back out for another walk down to the loch, see how the view has changed!!

The dogs even went for a swim!!! Absolute nutters.

We were considering staying in the Coire Dubh car park but with the snow due to come in thick and fast, and knowing the road would become impassable, we took ourselves back to the spot next to Loch Maree, which is right next to a road more likely to get ploughed and gritted. 

That is it, our first week in Scotland, look out for the week two blog next week, where I will share some of my tips for travelling in a very wintery Scotland.

Kate

xx