ferry's to scottish islands
hi, has anyone taken a caravan on the Scottish ferry's? After a bad experience getting onto a ferry at Calais, we've avoided ferry's in our caravan, but are planning a 6week trip around Scotland and would love to stay on as many Scottish islands as possible. it seems Northlink ferries go from Aberdeen to Lerwick and Kirkwall-has anyone here made that trip with a caravan? Also the ferry to Skye or any of the other islands on the Western side-has anyone taken a van over? Thanks for any advice/info
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For Skye, you can use the bridge unless you particularly want to travel the route that involves ferries.
We have not been to Shetland yet, but have used the short ferry to Orkney without any problem. Plus we have used the ferry to Lewis solo, but saw vans on it, they had no problems.
I think the ferry ramps these days are much better than they used to be.
Some of the fares will be a bit lower next year so we are looking forward to visiting more of the islands.
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Freeleaf, If you had a bad experience with an enormous ferry to Calais you will perhaps find some of the smaller ferries to the Hebrides a challenge. So maybe start with a visit to Skye - by crossing the bridge.
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We've used Pentland Ferries to Orkney and Northlink from Kirkwall to Lerwick. We used the MH but plenty of people took caravans. Northlink have the larger ferries and also do a Scrabster to Orkney route. Be aware that it is necessary to reverse onto Pentland Ferries but the staff will help and even do it for you if required.
My advice is to go for it.
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Been on many ferries on routes to the outer hebrides, never had a problem with the caravan. Tightest ferry was the Oban to Castlebay ( Barra ). It's not a Ro-Ro but the deck handlers are excellent at their job and we turned around with feet to spare.
The ferries to the Orkneys and the Shetlands are no problem either.
Enjoy your trip
K
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The best site to search out trips to the western isles is the Calmac site, you can put a tour together easily. Due to a build up in tourism on this side of Scotland it might be better to book the important bits and possibly take pot luck on the crossings in between.
The Northlink ferry straight to Kirkwall from Aberdeen is a good one to consider if you want to get there and then take smaller ferries to the other Shetland islands were you don't need to book unless it's the busier school holiday time. Then perhaps break the journey via Orkney on return. There are a lot of local ferries to other Orkney Islands. From Orkney some people like the Scrabster route because they get a glimpse of the Old Man of Hoy rock stack but the quickest is the Gills Bay route (Pentland Ferries) and as TW says they are helpful if you don't want to attempt the reversing bit. It's not a huge ferry and you won't be below decks.
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