Scotland

Even though the weather was not ideal, it rained a couple days, the scenery was beautiful with lakes, mountains, rivers, stones fences and lots of sheep. Our guides were fantastic, upbeat and encouraging. Our accommodations were mostly top notch, especially the country inn in Keswick. I especially enjoyed the Roman ruins.

This tour was a good combination of beauty and history. Our leaders, Jago Hartwell and Daniel Guest, plus Callum Fallows (in training) provided great orientation, including historical context, and lots of cultural information about the Lakes District, the Pennines and the Scottish border. They each went out of their way to show us great courtesy and excellent service. There’s a lot of riding on this trip, more than others we’ve been on with VBT. Most of the riding was on quiet country roads and dedicated bike paths, which was great. The scenery includes lovely mountains and lakes, and lots of open pasture land crisscrossed by ancient Stone walls. We learned a lot about land management of these open rugged spaces. The accommodations were very nice and the food was varied and consistently good. I highly recommend spending an extra few days in Edinburgh, as it is a city of great history and beauty. We also passed through many small English villages, each of which had its own charm. Along the way we saw beautiful farms and many, many grazing animals.