Advice for travelling in Scottish Isles of Shetland and Orkney (1 Viewer)

[fireblade2000uk]

We are considering taking a trip in April 2018 and were thinking of taking our tow car as our MH is 8.8m in length. Our concern is that we might be too big to fully explore the islands, hence taking the car. Appreciate that it'll cost on the ferries etc but we would hate to travel that far and miss seeing all of the sights.

So, any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

 

[Gellyneck]

@DavidG58 is yur man on this.

 

[WillH]

We have done Shetland in a 7m van and had no problems, we also saw vans larger than ours. The roads are very good though many are single track. On one occasion my rear wheels were only half on the road which was otherwise perfect (only saw one pothole in three weeks). I don't know how you would get on with a towed car as we had to reverse several times to allow vehicles to pass. Remember, Shetland isn't very big, there's not a lot of driving to do.

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[DavidG58]

@DavidG58 is yur man on this.

thanks for the thought, almost any other part of Scotland I am able to add comment to, but not yet crossed to Orkney or Shetlands, their time will come

Next year is Scotland again for us

But as general guidance to OP if you are sensible you will have no issues, single track roads work very well, although even those are becoming less common each time we go north more roads have been widened

But that is a longer outfit than we have taken, might be an idea to look at hiring a car once there, look at what you might save on ferries alone, or even stick to buses, we have been to the western isles a lot and never failed to get anywhere we wanted to in our MH, without hiring or even using buses

 

[fireblade2000uk]

Sorry @DavidG58 what does OP mean?

 

[bigtwin]

Sorry @DavidG58 what does OP mean?

Original Poster, i.e. You!

Ian

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[irnbru]

Theres good public tourist buses on Orkney. £8 a day I think it was for hop on hop off.

 

[obanvanman]

For Orkney we got the ferry from Gills Bay to St. Margaret Hope and the roads and ferry were excellent. Driving over Churchills Barriers along the way to Kirkwall. Camp site in Kirkwall and we used a motorbike to tour on, it is a fascinating island, (or should I say group of islands)?
Know f### all about Shetland apart from the fact that it is bleak, windy and it rains a lot. Oh yeah, chuffing expensive to get to.

 

[fireblade2000uk]

Well we've booked, Scrabster to Stromness for 4 days and then Kirkwall to Lerwick and straight up to Unst. 2 weeks of island hopping and wild camping.

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[WillH]

The expensive part of Shetland is fuel, fill your tank and it will easily last two weeks, remember, there's not far to drive. We found food prices the same as at home when in Tesco in Lerwick, Coop's are more expensive. You must camp at St.Ninian's beach, best spot on the mainland.

 

[fireblade2000uk]

It's on our list, Braewick is another definite location.