We’ve been coming to Scotland on Holidays for the past 16 years, my wife even longer than that! As with nearly all the sports and activities I’m now addicted to, the catalyst was my Wife. As part of a family of adventures and sporting enthusiasts there was little point resisting when I joined the clan and so I joined in and learnt a heap of new skills and opportunities.
We’ve holidayed all over the UK, but there is something special about Scotland that keeps pulling us back, not to mention no trip to the land of shortbread and mountains has ever disappointed. With our own family now we are learning there is even more adventures to be had as we take our 6 year old avid explorer on new and old adventures.
We would traditionally come up (we’re Bristolians so it’s a fair old way up) over the Easter holiday period, staying in a chalet or cottage with family and friends. This is pre us youngsters having kids ourselves, ah the good old days of being young and worry free. It was one of the highlights of the year, pack every toy we had into whatever the vehicle of the time was and get up to the highlands as fast as we can for an action packed two weeks. You are probably wondering what an earth does he mean by ‘every toy’, well that is the beauty or Scotland there are endless things you can end up doing. We are kayakers, skiers, climbers, mountain hikers, mountain bikers, and love our food! I’ve lost count of the number of different variations that Easter trip has taken.
On my first ever trip up with the group it snowed constantly for a week, luckily by this point I’d had a few lessons and done two European ski trips. So we spent the fortnightly exploring Nevis range, Glencoe and the Cairngorms range, to date it’s still probably some of the best powder skiing I’ve ever done! On a later trip it rained the entire time we were there, so the skies stayed packed away and we spent the holiday exploring as many new white water rivers in our kayaks as we could. Then we’ve had trips where it hasn’t snowed, hasn’t rained so we’ve enjoyed days of mountain biking at Nevis Range, Wolftrax and even doing some all day bike treks. There is so much to do up in the highlands that it’s impossible not to have a good time.
Climbing centres are a dime a dozen in the UK, so you’d think the centre in Kinlochleven would be no highlight, surprise even the climbing centre has a trick up its sleeve. Along with being a generally great climbing centre with a good range of lead and top roped climbs, it has an excellent cafe with soft play for the little ones, but the party trick - it has an indoor ice climbing wall!
Even if you’re not the adrenaline junkie adventures like us, there are dozens of Castles, Lochs, Whiskey Distilleries and view points to keep you busy for years to come. Don’t forget the Highland Wildlife park nesting in the rolling Cairngorm hills, one of the very rare zoos where you can see Polar Bears! Easily one of my favourite zoos to visit, with a fantastic range of breeding programs for endangered species such as the Polar Bear, Snow Leopards and of course the Wild Cat (aka the grumpy house cat). I’ll never forget a freezing cold trip during our Easter 2018 visit, dragging my then 7 month pregnant wife to the far side of the park to sit and hope to catch a glimpse of the parks newest addition, a polar bear cub! It was worth the wait for the cutest, fluff ball of a polar bear you cold ever imagine to come bounding out of its den to play.
Our top tip for this latest trip is to get annual membership with the Royal Zoological Society. We regularly visit the Bristol Zoo Project and have annual membership, that membership also includes other UK zoos, including the Highland Wildlife Park, Edinburgh Zoo and Chester Zoo. Once you’ve visited two of these Zoos you’ve paid what the membership would have cost, so it is well worth it. Chester Zoo this trip was our a first time visit for us and it made a perfect Saturday activity to break up the drive from Bristol to Scotland.
Chester Zoo, rated as one of the best Zoos in Europe, and after a day of exploring we can confirm it is well worth a visit.
Mountain Biking and Zoo days
A new chapter for us in how our holidays to Scotland now look. With a young child, and the original gang of adventures that joined us on our trips either with their own children or off on other new adventures, we’ve had to re-invent what a Scotland holiday looks like. We’ve had such a blast and it echoes the underlying tone of this article, Scotland will always deliver the goods as it has something for everyone!
So with 6 year old in tow and our latest campervan complete and ready to take us on adventures we’ve just completed 9 nights of sleeping in the van whilst touring southern Scotland and as far as the Cairngorms. Our itinerary for this trip you ask? Mountain biking and visiting Zoos for a week over the November half term period. As i mentioned earlier Chester zoo made a fantastic break in the travel up and the Highland Wildlife Park made a super mid week break. Unfortunately we didn’t make it as far as Edinburgh Zoo due to parking the campervan being a little tricky. So 9 nights away and 8 days of activity, with 2 of those days being Zoo visits we’ve spent all of the other days on the bikes at various different trail centres and nature rides.
The Seven Stanes, is a collection of Scottish biking centres that we’ve never got around to visiting on our many trips, Glentress was our first stop and it did not disappoint! With a green run that our 6 year old was happy to cycle up and then speed down through the weaving woodland trail more than once it was well worth the visit. Not to mention the scrumpy warm food in the cafe and the onsite showers perfect when on a campervan road trip and only staying at few campsites. Mabie was our second 7 Stanes centre that we visited, a centre feeling more remote to the likes of Glentress with no bike shop or showers. Mabie consists of big looping trails ranging from Green to Red levels, with the occasional technical section thrown in. Our 6 year old was happy to do the 10km Green loop and finished with the biggest smile a parent could ever want!
Wolftrax, sitting amongst the tress just past Loch Laggan Wolftrax is one of our absolute favourite biking centres and one we’ve visited many times before in the past. It’s been five years since we were last here and boy has it changed, but as with most things Scottish it’s changed for the better. With a new green trail perfect for the little one to do a loop, a new blue trail with sweeping fast burms and the classic upper and lower red sections it was a fantastic day and one we’re planning to return to. Also, another top tip for the campervaners out there the cafe serves a good selection of warm meals between 10 and 4 each day, for £3 you can get a shower token to warm up and clear of the trail mud. Then you can also park in the car park for one night for a small fee.
Cairngorm Ski Centre, One of the best sunset views of the trip followed by a night of being rocked to sleep by the high winds. The centre is in its infancy when it comes to Mountain Biking, being primarily focused as a Ski Centre for many years. They now have newly introduced dedicated single track mountain bike routes with two magic carpets to get you so far up the hill. This was absolutely perfect for building our boys confidence with single track down hill in bite size chunks. We must have gone up that magic carpet over a dozen times!
There is a longer blue run that you can cycle up to, and it does have a couple of red sections off it to enjoy. Although these runs are short, and at the time feeling very loose with the top layer of gravel still abundant.
Finishing with a Bang!
To wrap a fantastic week in the Scottish country side we decided to spend our penultimate night on a campsite in southern Scotland. Newbridge Country Park, handily placed a very short drive from both Mabie and Aye cycling centres (7 Stanes). This was a perfect way to wrap the holiday with hot showers, a full recharged van and a meal out in the local hotel only 10 minute walk from the campsite.
People often talk about key turning points in life, where a specific decision changes their lives forever. This certainly wasn’t a life changing decision point, however it was one that left us with a smile and memory that will last. We’d originally planned to spend our final night of the trip a little further south and as a wild camp, except on the spur of the moment we decided to spent another night at Newbridge Country Park. Upon booking our 2nd night we found out from the campsite owners that they were planning a big Bon Fire, Fireworks, and a BBQ that night in the field adjacent to the campsite and we were welcome to join. The campfires were huge and yes there were two of them! The fireworks and sparklers were fantastic, as was the BBQ and drinks.
Words cannot express how genuinely welcoming, inclusive and friendly everyone was, and that goes for our entire trip not just this particular campsite. Throughout the trip everyone we passed whilst out on our adventures said hello, on more than one occasion they even stopped for a quick friendly chat. Even the chaps at Nevis Cycles just outside Fort William went above and beyond to help my wife after she’d broken the seat post on her bike. With a very specific seat post size that wasn’t stocked they rummaged through the spares to find one that would fit to keep us biking.
We’ve had several holidays this year in the van including Skiing in the French Alps, Touring the Northern Italian Lakes and numerous closer to home weekends away, yet this short break to Scotland has topped them all as our best holiday this year! Would I put it down to if you asked me? Well it certainly wasn’t the weather which was overcast or raining most of the week. No it was the beauty, the remoteness, the friendliness, the connection to nature and most of all the magic of Scotland that has never failed to deliver a memorable holiday.
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