RV-ing in Scotland

Wednesday, February 7, 2018

Have you ever thought about RV-ing in another country?  On another continent?  How about Scotland?

(Photo left … a piper outside the St. Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh.  Bagpipers need to practice.  This piper was not playing for money, but was practicing.  He was very good and so there was a crowd of people gathered around enjoying the music.)

Since I am now trailer-less (having sold the Rockwood MiniLite trailer), I have been spending more time online reading other people’s RV blogs and watching RV-ing videos.  I stumbled upon an interesting “vlog” (a video-blog, hence a “vlog”) created by an English fellow who lives in his travel trailer in the British Isles.  Andrew Ditton is his name.

There’s a link to Andrew’s YouTube channel in the right hand column on this webpage under “RV Blogs That I Follow”.  Some of you may have explored it already, but for those of you who haven’t, I thought it would be worth mentioning because life on the road in Europe and Britain can be altogether different than it is here in the USA and Canada.

A home (or homes) in/near the villages of Muckhart in Clackmannanshire.
The Scottish people love flowers!

In Britain and Europe, a travel trailer is called a caravan … an entire campground is called a campsite (or simply “site”) … and the specific spot on which you park your caravan is commonly called a “pitch”.  There are all manner of other differences in nomenclature and in physical characteristics of RVs, too.  It’s quite fun and entertaining.

For instance, do you know what a “mover” is?  I have talked with three dealers in North America (including ETI) … none of them knew what it was.  I googled “RV mover” and couldn’t find a device anything like what they use in Britain.  There are a number of brands in UK/Europe and they are quite common on caravans there.  The Caravan Mover Shop has a great video showing how a mover works.  You don’t even have to know the language they’re speaking to understand the video. 🙂  Why don’t we have these devices in North America?

Let’s get back to Andrew’s video-blog that I started to tell you about.

The English fellow, Andrew Ditton, who creates this Scotland RV-ing vlog, absolutely LOVES Scotland (as do I), especially the Outer Hebrides.  He does a spectacular job of video-graphing his journeys while traveling in his pickup truck and caravan.

His oldest/first vlog post was in 2010 and is an excellent video introduction to Andrew and to a caravan trip he took to the Outer Hebrides back in 2010.  And yes he lives in an Airstream that is built in Ohio, USA.  There is a substantial market for Airstreams in the UK and Europe.

Then in 2014, Andrew posted this cute video (below) about his dog, Dougal, and his (the dog’s) get-up while riding on the motorcycle.

Andrew has posted hundreds of videos on his YouTube vlog channel.  My favorites are the 70 posts (yes 70!) that chronicle a three-month trip to Scotland and the outer Hebrides in 2015.  Andrew calls the series “ScotVlog”.  Most of the videos are only a few minutes long, but of course some are longer.  You may not want to watch all of them, but you might choose a few and get a taste of how caravaning is done in Scotland, and let yourself enjoy seeing a bit of Scotland that most people don’t see.  I love the Scottish music (performed by Scottish musicians) that Andrew uses as background in many of the videos.

Here’s ScotVlog 4:

I’ve shared ScotVlog 4 (above) with you instead of ScotVlogs 1-3 because I think #4 is a good intro to this 2015 trip.  It also has a bit of Gaelic in it, and a bit of music, and a bit of humor.

The other ScotVlog videos that I think you might like to watch are:  8   9   10   20 [#20 shows the “youngsters” and their music at a Mànran concert, check out the musical instruments! … warning, flashing lights in parts of the concert for readers of this blog who are susceptible to that].

Other ScotVlog videos you might like to watch are:
24
27 [#27 is a bit long, you could start it at time mark 6:00 if you’d like, which shows you what the roads in Scotland are like, even dual track roads can be exceptionally narrow, and it shows what happens when a LARGE lorry (truck) comes at you around a curve].
28 [driving through the sweet little town of Moniaive, notice how close the front doors of older homes are to the road, skip the rest of that video].
29 [start at time mark 1:00, you’ll see his “pitch” on a sheep farm and hear a bit about the reality of sheep/lamb farming, then at 4:45 you can skip the rest].

Must say that almost every one of Andrew’s videos has some wonderful redeeming quality and information, although some are more interesting than others.

Other videos in the ScotVlog series that you might find interesting:   31 [getting on the BIG CalMac ferry]   32 [driving around the main road on the Isle of Arran]  34 [Lochranza Campsite on Arran]   35 [flooding at Lochranza and driving out of it]   36 [small ferry to Claonaig]   37 [an interesting drive down the wrong road on Kintyre]   38 [Carradale Bay Campsite, local eateries, and the correct road back north]   40 [taking a gamble on a dicey road, and the Tayinloan tea room]   44 [beautiful Morvich Caravan Club Site, near the Isle of Skye]   45 [motorcycle trip up over the mountains and then to Skye via the tiny Glenelg ferry, watch how the deck of the ferry rotates!]   49 [Outer Hebrides, Isle of Lewis, through Stornaway and then off across the peat bogs.]   50 [Driving to Kneep/Cnìp, pronounced “neep” (or so I’m told), then arriving at campsite]   52 [motorbike ride on west side of Isle of Lewis with great local Gaelic music]   56 [start about 2:10, playing with Dougal on a huge sandy beach at Ardroil Campsite].

Unfortunately, the last 10 days of Andrew’s 2015 visit to the Outer Hebrides was full of wind and rain with only occasional sun breaks.  The Outer Hebrides are open directly to the north Atlantic Ocean.  He was there in March, April, and early May … so it’s not surprising about the weather.

Skip those other videos if you wish, but don’t miss these last two videos:

65 [Andrew and Dougal, world’s worst sheep/lamb herding].
57 [Cianalas with sweet Gaelic music about the Isle of Lewis].

Although RV-ing would be a great way to see Scotland, I don’t think I’ll be taking my new Escape travel trailer (or caravan) to Scotland any time soon.  But wouldn’t renting a canal boat in Scotland for a few weeks be a fun adventure?

Canal boats for hire, staged for cleaning and re-fueling at a dock near the Falkirk
Wheel, out in canal country between Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Highland cows (English language) … Bò Ghàidhealach (Gaelic) ...
Heilan coo (Scots, pronounced “heelan”) … Bos taurus (Latin).
(photo taken in the Cairngorms)

Note:  All videos here are Andrew Ditton’s.  All photographs here were taken during a three-week trip that a friend of mine and I took to Scotland in 2007.