UKC

If you were taking a partner (a walker but not a scrambler or a climber) for a spring/summer weekend away on the Caledonian sleeper, where would you head to?
Ive got vague plans but would welcome some expert advice. I was thinking one of the smaller stations but not sure which one? Maybe one with a good hotel, can be a bit expensive but not gleneagles? Somewhere a bit remote would be fine as long as it did meals. Maybe a station where you can walk (or paddle) to a great place to stay?
Thanks

In reply to stevieb:

My first thought was Ossian SYHA, which is a fairly magic place to stay although it's very much a hostel rather than a hotel...

In reply to Ramblin dave:

Hi, I did consider Loch Ossian hostel, but looks like smallest room is an eight berth dorm. There are rooms and a restaurant at the station though.

In reply to stevieb:

I've not stayed in the station itself but was very impressed with the quality of the interior and cafe.

If the rooms are of similar quality it would be worth a night.

In reply to stevieb:

There is a hotel near Rannoch station - not stayed there though.

Why not get off at corrour and walk to fort william - camp or bothy one night, then end up at the swanky hotel in the castle at fort william?

In reply to EuanM:

thanks. It does get a good write up

In reply to Dr.S at work:

Yes, I was looking at some of the bothies and the lairig leacach, thanks. But if you mean inverlochy castle, then no, I think that's beyond my 'a bit expensive'

In reply to Ramblin dave:

Yes, agreed. I think Ossian is difficult to beat even though the thought of communal acc and cooking may put you off. They of course turn out to be part of the magic ingredient. We weren't designed to live on our own!

In reply to stevieb:

If you end up in Ft William in the morning the 1st thing you'd want to do is get out of the place... Why not extend your rail trip up to Glenfinnan, Arisaig or Morar? There's also the 'Hogwarts Express' steam train in summer.

In reply to stevieb:
Like the previous poster, I would carry on on the train to Mallaig and stop at Morar/Arisaig (one of the most beautiful places in the world surely and plus there's a posh restaurant there as I recall), maybe pop over to Armadale/Ardvarsar on the ferry if you have time. All transport by train and ferry.

In reply to Tom Last:

Does the sleeper actually have a sensible connection to Mallaig? The last time I looked at this sort of thing it got in to FW too late for the morning train so we'd have ended up waiting around a couple of hours for the lunchtime one and missed half of the day.

In fact, anywhere much past Corrour and you're looking at a bit of a late start if you're planning to do a day's walking straight from the train.

In reply to stevieb:

Better still, if you get as far as Mallaig, jump on the boat to Inverie. Some seriously nice places to stay there (Knoydart Hide comes to mind) and properly remote.

In reply to Raskye:

I've not done any of the west coast between fort William and an teallach, so all of these are tempting for a longer trip.
But for a long weekend I'd probably aim to just do the big train journey.
Corrour and rannoch (sort of) stand out as the places you can't really get to by car.
No love so far for the eastern leg of the sleeper.

In reply to stevieb:

We did an absolutely cracking three-day walk a couple of years back from Blair Atholl to the Tarf Hotel[1] to Glen Feshie to Aviemore. Stopped over in Aviemore SYHA, had a nice breakfast at the Mountain Cafe and then got the daytime train home. That was late autumn, so the river crossing in Glen Tarf was fricking freezing, but the bog in the glen was mostly frozen - not sure how much of a pain Glen Tarf would be in warmer weather.

[1] note: not a real hotel

In reply to Ramblin dave:

Ah, possibly not. It's 10+ years since I last did it.