Honest
Is a Highlands day trip from Edinburgh worth it? An honest answer
Eight of the twelve hours are spent moving. You will stand at Glencoe for twenty minutes and at Loch Ness for two. If that sounds like a poor trade, read on before you book — because for most people it is still the right call, and for some it genuinely is not.
Quick answer
Yes, for most visitors with one free day — the driving is through the best scenery in Britain, and there is no cheaper way to see it without a car. No, if you want to walk in the mountains, if twelve hours seated is a problem, or if you are visiting between November and February and expect to see the return leg. In those cases take the eight- or nine-hour southern days, or give the Highlands two nights.
The honest numbers
- Total day
- 12–12.5 hon the northern route
- Time moving
- ~8 hoursthis is the real figure
- Time stopped
- ~4 hoursacross three or four stops
- At Loch Ness
- ~2 hoursthe longest stop
- At Glencoe
- 15–25 mina viewpoint, not a walk
- Distance
- ~400 milesthere and back
- Cheapest way otherwise
- Car hire£60–£90 plus fuel, plus driving it
- Shortest alternative
- 8 hoursthe Outlander day with entry
- Best alternative
- 3 daysthe Skye trip, if you have them
- Cancellation
- Free to 24 hso booking early costs nothing
The case for
Why it is usually worth it anyway
The road is the point, and hiring a car is neither cheaper nor easier.
Because the driving is the tour.
People book this expecting the stops to be the product and the road to be the cost. It is closer to the other way round. The A82 north from Loch Lomond, across Rannoch Moor and down through Glencoe, is one of the great road journeys in Europe, and you spend hours of the day looking at it through a large window with somebody explaining what you are seeing.
Then there is the arithmetic. Hiring a car for a day costs £60–£90 before fuel and parking, and then you are driving four hundred miles on unfamiliar single-carriageway roads instead of looking out of the window. The train to Inverness costs more than the tour and leaves you at a station 160 miles from Glencoe. For one day without a car, the coach is not the compromise — it is the only sensible option.
And the stops, while short, are the right stops. Twenty minutes under the Three Sisters is not a hill walk, but standing at the bottom of a nine-hundred-metre wall of rock does not take an hour to register.
The case against
Five people who should book something else
If you recognise yourself here, there is a better booking on this site.
- You want to walk in the mountains
A day trip gives you viewpoints and car parks. The walks here start at three hours and go up steeply. Give the Highlands two nights in Fort William or Ballachulish instead.
- Twelve hours seated is genuinely difficult
Take the eight-hour Outlander day at $116 or the nine-hour Loch Lomond loop at $73. Both are shorter, gentler and spend more time out of the vehicle.
- You are visiting in December or January
You will do a third of the tour in the dark. Book a southern loop, or accept it knowing exactly what you are getting.
- You have three or more days
Then the Skye trip at $229 is a better use of them than three separate day trips, and it covers Loch Ness on the way home anyway.
- You are chasing the monster
Nobody is going to see anything. Book it for a deep, dark, beautiful loch and an honest sonar screen, and you will not be disappointed.
If a shorter day is the answer, this is every day trip on the site with its real length and price.
Every day trip, compared→The verdict
What we would tell a friend
One day: go north. Two: add the viaduct. Three: take Skye.
If you have one free day in Edinburgh and you have never seen the Highlands, book the northern route and accept the road. From $57, it is the cheapest four-hundred-mile day out in Britain and it goes through the best of it.
If you have two free days, do that one and then the Glenfinnan viaduct or the Outlander sites. Two different days, two different halves of the country.
If you have three, stop booking day trips. The Skye tour at $229 covers Glencoe, Fort William, the viaduct, Skye and Loch Ness with time to stand still in each, and it is rated 4.8 across nearly three thousand reviews.
And if long coach days are simply not for you, that is a fine answer too. The eight-hour Outlander day is rated 4.8, walks you around real castles, and gets you back to Edinburgh in time for dinner.
The one booking nobody should make is the twelve-hour northern day in December while expecting the June version of it. Everything else on this page is a reasonable choice.
Common questions
Is a Highlands day trip worth it? Answered
Is a Highlands day trip from Edinburgh worth it?
For most visitors with one free day, yes. Eight of the twelve hours are spent moving, but the moving is through the best road scenery in Britain and there is no cheaper way to see it without a car.
How much of the day is spent driving?
About eight hours on the northern route, with roughly four hours stopped across three or four stops. Loch Ness gets about two of them.
Is it better to hire a car instead?
Not for one day. Hire is £60–£90 before fuel and parking, and you spend the day driving four hundred miles on unfamiliar roads rather than looking at them.
Are the stops long enough?
Glencoe is fifteen to twenty-five minutes and Loch Ness about two hours. Short, but they are the right stops. If you want to walk, you need a night in the Highlands.
What if I do not want a twelve-hour day?
Book the eight-hour Outlander day with entries at $116 or the nine-hour Loch Lomond, Stirling and Kelpies loop at $73.
Will I see the Loch Ness monster?
No. Book it for a very deep, very dark loch, a good cruise and an honest account of what has and has not been found there, and it is an excellent afternoon.
Is it worth it in winter?
Only on the shorter southern routes. The northern day ends in darkness from November to February, which is why it costs less then.
Go deeper
More on the Scottish Highlands
The classic day trip
Twenty thousand reviews, and what the twelve hours contain.
Loch NessLoch Ness tours
What the loch is, and what the cruise costs on the day.
GlencoeGlencoe
The valley every tour stops at, and why the road is the point.
The viaductThe Glenfinnan viaduct
Twenty-one arches, a steam train and the 1745 rising.
All day tripsDay tours from Edinburgh
Every direction, compared, from nine hours to three days.
SkyeIsle of Skye
Three days, two nights, and why a day trip cannot do it.
