Highland Adventure: Edinburgh Day Trip

Absolutely fantastic day trip! Our guide Colin was amazing and so funny and full of history and information. Would 100% recommend doing this trip. The whiskey was good, the coos were gorgeous and the views even better! 2 Essex girls now in love with scotland

Colin runs a great tour! We had a blast, saw some coo’s and breathtaking views!

My friend booked us the Hairy Coos and Views tour expecting the Highland cows to be a bigger part of the experience, and unfortunately I was pretty disappointed. The price of the tour is essentially for transportation to the different stops. Several of the actual activities at the stops cost extra. Touring Blackness Castle was an additional charge, as was the boat tour on Loch Katrine. The Highland cow stop was especially disappointing. There were maybe three cows to see, and during our visit two of them were inside the barn. You could purchase food to feed them, but that also cost extra and was cash only. Our guide never told us ahead of time that we would need cash. We later found out she apparently had cash available if anyone needed it, but that wasn't communicated to us either. Communication in general was lacking. At one point, our guide scolded us for talking on the bus because she said it was distracting her while she was trying to give us information. We would have had no problem being quiet if she had simply asked us or mentioned at the beginning of the tour that conversations made it difficult for her to speak while driving. The timing was another issue. We were picked up around 10:30 AM and were told the tour was approximately 6.5 hours, which should have had us back around 5 PM. We didn't return until almost 6:30 PM. That's a significant difference, especially if you have evening plans, and there was no apology or real acknowledgment of how late we were running. If you're looking for an inexpensive way to get out of Edinburgh and see several different places without having to arrange your own transportation, this can be a decent option. Just be aware that many of the experiences at the stops cost extra. However, if your main reason for booking is to actually see and interact with Highland cows, I would recommend looking elsewhere. I ended up visiting Jacksons at Jedburgh afterward, and it was exactly the kind of Highland cow experience I had originally hoped for — an amazing tour focused on the cows where you actually get to learn about them and see them up close.

I don’t think I have ever had a guide scold a bus full of adults because a child was speaking out of turn. Ours did and petulantly stopped speaking herself. There was almost no color commentary on the lang trip. Be aware that this bus trip is taking you to places that will require you to pay more money to do the activity at each stop. You are genuinely buying a bus ticket, not a tour with activities. As the cherry on top, we were over an hour late returning with no apology or even acknowledgment of the inconvenience.

Campbell was an absolute gem. So charismatic, helpful, funny and very informative. We really enjoyed the tour. The only negative would be check in. There was a woman holding an unbrella. She never identified herself, talked to anyone or let anyone know what to do. It was confusing and a simple " are you checking in for the X tour?" would have been appreciated, on a chaotic. and busy street. She seemed a bit lazy. Luckily Campbell was on top of things when he arrived,