Absolute Escapes Traveller Reviews

My wife and I enjoyed a walking holiday on the John Muir Way and spent 3 days on Isle of Skye. We had an opportunity to experience Scotland in a way that is different than merely touring the normal tourist attractions.

Absolute Escapes did an excellent job of making our arrangements and handling the logistics of our holiday. They went above and beyond in providing assistance for some minor issues. Especially Andy Gabe who provided assistance over the phone to my wife Chrisi in finding help to address a minor injury. We both would highly recommend Absolute Escapes to book a holiday.

This is the first walk that my husband and I have done in Great Britten. We chose the low tear of accommodation to fit our budget and enjoyed all of them. Our least favorite was the the hostel in Inverness as it was large and impersonal. All of the other places were small, comfortable and intimate. We had steller food along the way, much to our surprise, and the prices were very low compared to food in the U.S. Much of the Great Glen Way travels through tree plantations in various phases of growth or extraction which isn't very exciting. There were highlights like the little town of Invermoriston that has a gorgeous river with stone bridges and a nice park, and some great views of the various lakes as you go along. The baggage service was great and there was never a hiccup. I would use the Absolute Escapes company again but would choose a different walk.

Absolute escapes did a great job, even retrieving a pair of shoes for us that my husband had left behind at a hostel. We would use them again.

We picked up a car in Glasgow and drove to the Isle of Arran, which we would not have discovered without Absolute Escapes (AE). Hotel was divine. Loved the distillery. The hike up Goatfell etched in my mind forever. In a word, Arran was magical. We then drove to Edinburgh where we spent 4 nights and had a great time touring the city, riding bikes, eating in fabulous restaurants (many farm to table). Again, AE's recommendations and hotels selections were spot on. We plan to return to the islands next summer for a more extended stay and will certainly reach out to AE.

The AE team tailored our 6-night trip to our passions and needs and made marvelous suggestions that allowed us to both relax and enjoy a lot of outdoor activity. AE listened and work with us to get to just the perfect itinerary, making suggestions and tweaking until we were happy. Couldn't be more happy with their services.

We had a very nice holiday! All arrangements were excellent. The weather was okay, apart from occasional showers.

Accommodations and luggage transfers excellent.

Before we left on our holiday, we felt confident in the planning due to the prompt and efficient communication that we had with Absolute Escapes and this confidence was supported by our experience. Our itinerary was well organised with helpful suggestions and the selected B&B accommodation was excellent.

Great and responsive, understood what we wanted.

Great experience to walk in such fabulous surroundings. As expected the weather was changeable but did not diminish the views and vastness of the area. Thoroughly recommended for all those who enjoy a bit of a challenge - although average fitness will suffice - and the satisfaction that a large intake of food and drink is a must.

Absolute Escapes responded to all aspects of the brief. The accommodation they arranged was v good (sometimes excellent) and their guidance notes, dinner and route recommendations were well worth following.

We walked the WEST HIGLAND WAY and the GREAT GLEN WAY from 31 MAY 2017 to 11 JUNE 2017.

Very good organisation.

Before sailing to Mull we enjoyed an overnight stay at the Manor House Hotel in Oban which was perfectly located for access to our ferry crossing the next morning. Both accommodation and food were first class as was the welcoming nature of staff at all levels. A comfortable ferry crossing from Oban to Craignure on Mull was followed by a 20+ mile car journey to the north of the island taking us to our pre-booked destination of Killoran House, Dervaig, some 7 miles west of tourist filled Tobermory. Killoran House is a high quality guest house in a rural setting with magnificent views back across an attractive landscape to Dervaig village. The guest house is owned and run by a relatively young couple, experiencing their first season at Killoran House, one might say 'learning on the job', but doing so very caringly. Accommodation was very comfortable and the public areas took full advantage of the outstanding views. In addition to breakfast, dinner was available but this was a prescribed 3 course meal, with no choices and whilst this was of good quality,the alternative of eating out at either of two excellent fairly adjacent restaurants could require Killoran House to reconsider their evening meal offerings. Dervaig proved to be a good base from which to explore most of Mull's many and varied attractions, perhaps with the exception a particular desire to visit Iona off the far south coast of Mull. Two memorable days out were a wildlife tour with Discover Mull, operated by very knowledgable Arthur and Pam Brown - www.discovermull.co.uk and a very short ferry crossing to the island of Ulva where the Boathouse Visitor Centre offers a reasonaby priced lobster and other fresh seafood lunch opportunity prior to a return ferry crossing in time to join a pre-booked boat trip out to Staffa from Ulva Ferry to see spectacular Fingal's Cave overflown by hundreds of puffins. After 4 days exploring Mull it was time to move on to Skye, crossing from Tobermory to Kilchoan on the Ardnamurchan peninsula then following the beautiful west highland coast route to Mallaig where a ferry would take us to Armadale at the south end of the Isle of Skye. After a further 50+ mile journey leaving the Cuillins in the south to join the interesting peninsulas of the north, we arrived at our base for the next 4 nights - Edinbane Inn, Edinbane - on the road between Portree and Dunvegan. The Edinbane Inn, as the description 'Inn' might suggest, is more of a pub/restaurant with rooms, although our room and its en-suite facility was generous and very comfortable. In the evenings the Inn was clearly very popular, not surprisingly give the extremely high quality of its cuisine and it became obvious that, even as a resident, it was essential to book a dinner table at least one day in advance. The nearest alternative equivalent quality eating places were 14 miles away in Portree and one such, The Granary Restaurant, proved to be a very special experience. Edinbane was an ideal location from which to explore the northern part of Skye and while much of our time was spent travelling round the scenic peninsulas radiating from both Portree and Dunvegan, one stop-off was particularly interesting - that being Skyeskyns at Loch Bay, Waternish - www.skyeskyns.co.uk -a traditional exhibition tannery and home of the luxurious highland hand-combed sheepskin, with a guided tour to see how leather is made combined with a related high quality retail outlet. Finally we returned from Skye over the bridge and completed a 200 mile journey home through wonderful scenery all the way to Strathtay in Perthshire. From beginning to end we were delighted to experience excellent and friendly service every where we stayed or visited.

I knew nothing about Absolute Escapes before coming across them during a browsing session. From the very first telephone contact I had with them they made me feel that a proper understanding of my requirements was extremely important to them and it was obvious in their subsequent actions that they had listened carefully to the detail of my request. In my dealings with them it was not always the case that I spoke with the same person, which irritatingly can require one to repeat what has been said before, but in their case that was not so since each person seemed to be familiar with the status of my developing request or if not they got someone in the know to phone back very promptly. Their friendly employees were always a pleasure to deal with and the package they put together fully met our requirements as did all the useful supporting information that they provided on a voluntary basis.

We walked from Milgavie to Fort Williams. Our trek taked us 9 days. We enjoyed very much and we admired the wonderfull lanscapes: flowers, loches, mountains.. It was hard, but also pleasant.WE appreciated the guesthouses :the welcome was very nice! Unforgetable!

Very good organisation!

The Scottish self-drive trip that we did in May 2017 was superb. There was a good mix of sightseeing and also relaxing times in comfotable accommodations. Highlights included looking around picturesque castles especially Doune Castle, Urquhart Castle, Sterling Castle and Blair Castle, all different and unique but highly recommended. We also visited the Isle of Skye which was wonderful and took a boat trip to the Isle Mull & Iona and visited Staff, the Abbey and took some great pictures of the unusual Fingals Cave with the rock formations (the sea cave is formed of hexagonally jointed basalt columns, similar to those that make up the Giant's Causeway in Ireland), which we walked around and also were able to walk on the cliff top to see the puffins close up (they were nesting). Having a tour of Cragganmore Distillery, Deanstone and Talisker are recommended and interesting to see how the whisky is made. We stopped at Nevis Range and took the gondola trip up the mountain which we would recommend for the views and photographic opportunity. A different experience and fresher air at altitude as expected but we enjoyed a coffee/cake in the restaurant, a further walk to a vantage point and watching the cyclists going down the mountain sides. All the B&B accommodation were first class, rooms were spotless, beds were all comfortable with cotton sheets really home-from-home with luxury towels and shampoos, hand creams etc. Also the owners were all friendly and helpful and cooked tsatisfying full breakfasts with plenty to choose from. In fact the breakfasts filled us up so much we didn't alwasy need to have lunch! We were welcomed by the owners who were all so friendly and helpful and suggested places to eat for dinner or sightseeing places. The location of each place were all so good as they were within walking distances of local restaurants/pubs/harbours etc. There are so many things to do in the areas we stated in and it was greate to be able to choose from the lists and descriptions provided by Absolute Escapes. Would recommned to research the places before you go and then you can make a rough plan of what you want to see. We took our English Heritage card with us and this got us into many castles as it also covers Scotland so we saved a lot with this membership. In summary, lovely experience for wildlife, breathtaking scenery, fascinating castles, easy self driving with views that pleasantly change on the way. Scotland really is varied from glacial glens and lochs, on days we flet energetic we did walking in the mountains or in National Parks and even went quad biking in the Cairngorms and visited a reindeer centre also! There's something for everyone and families with all ages. we are now looking forward to planning the next Scottish holiday to explore new places, and all of this in our own country, no passport needed and no jet lag! Wish I had known Scoltand was like this so many years ago, it's as good as an overseas trip!

Jason Martin at Absolute Escapes was so helpful in personalising our itinerary for Scotland. He spent significant time talking to me to establish what we wanted from the holiday and pulled together the ideal trip for us building in the things we wanted to do. Once the itinerary was finalised after some tweaking he sent thorugha detailed itinerary with timings and details of where our accommodation was along with descriptions of the area, recommended places to eat and of course sightseeing locations nearby each point which we could choose from. He also provided useful links and gave advice about how to build extra excursions ontop such as trips to the Isle of Skye and booked ferries for us. We were also provided with a touring map of Scotland and other brochures prior to thte holiday. I found Jason to be extremley helpful, he was never rushed and genuinely wants to help build the perfect trip and it certainly lived up to our expectations. I would have no hesitation to recommend Jason at Absolute Escapes. If you asked us for areas for improvement we would struggle to find things to say. We are looking forward to booking our next holiday with this company.