Scotland - The Haggis Experience

Scotland is my best travel experience till date, not just because I love mountains, silence and single malt.  It so happened that I was suddenly alone during the 2004 Easter long weekend in the UK.  A splendid (well, almost) Italy trip got cancelled in the last moment.  I sincerely think Italy would have been splendid since I chalked out the itinerary after hours of Googling.  We planned to cover Venice, Florence, Lake Garda and Rome -  travelling in trains and staying at quaint little B&Bs.  But, never mind...

Ok.. So I had 3 days left to plan a long weekend and I somehow stumbled upon this company called Haggis Adventures.  I blindly went and booked a package for 269 pounds for 5 days and had a superb holiday.  
The guy met me (and a bunch of wild backpacking girls) at London’s King Cross station on Thursday morning.  Put us onto a train to Edinburgh (EdinBurrraaaa ).  Picked us all up at the station in the trademark yellow bus and drove us down to Bruntfield’s Youth Hostel.
And drove us all around Scotland for the next 4 days, taking us on trekking trails, staying in a castle, having a bon fire, arranging Scottish folk music & dance at the cute little Scottish pub in the village at Carbisdale, tasting authentic Malt throughout, spend a night on the Isle of Skye and educating us all the while on the ancient geography and tragic history of Scotland.

Not to forget the tour guides.  They were mad. And made us play all sorts of games and made it feel like a college trip.

Next time you see a whisky whose name starts with Glen,  think of me.  Because Glen is the scottish word for mountain.  Any Speyside whisky is good because the water from the river Spey has the peaty taste imbibed from the coal in the land.
I made some great friends from all over the world – US, Brazil, New Zealand, Yugoslavia, South Africa, Canada and Australia.
I can devote a whole page for this trip, but in short :
Go for Haggis adventures when you go there next time.

Tour operators information

Information:

Hope you’ve read my previous post evangelizing tour operators. Here is the list of companies I’ve bought packages from and reasonably happy.

Haggis Adventures – Scotland – http://www.haggisadventures.com
Amazingly creative and ‘honest’ people in the business. Will write later about my Scottish experience (yea, it was not just a tour, but an experience).
Rating : 4.5 / 5

Eurostar packages – Belgium & Holland
Eurostar maybe running into a tunnel of losses, but for tourists it is still a great chance to get a great, inexpensive ride in the under-sea tunnel connecting England and France.
Train from London to Brussels is about 3 hours and you can book hotels & packages from affiliated operators. Very reliable.
Rating: 4/5

Orbit Tours & Travels – India – Himachal trip: http://www.orbit-world.com
These guys specialize in business tour packages (of the conferences & exhibitions variety). But of late they are into “Discover India” packages to all the popular destinations in India and abroad.
Recommendable, considering the price and the scale of operations: Rating: 3.5/5