Can anyone recommend a travel agent in Scotland?

emc....Scotland is a delightful region to do on yoyur own. A travel agent is hardly necessary in my opinion. But you must do the initial research. To keep it simple, get the Fodors or Frommers guide book on Scotland...read it! Then decide what is of interest to you, how much time you will want to spend in Scotland, check the airlines for best deals from your gateway city in US (I'm assuming you're in US)to either London or Glasgow....then start working on lodgings and transportation between cities unless you expect to drive. This board is most helpful for first time travelers to a particular region...give us a chance to help you, and you'll be amazed at what you can do without a travel agent...and it's a lot more fun..ask anyone on these boards.
Stu (write me direct at anytime, if you wish...I've counted up five visits to Scotland

e-mail is [email protected]

emc,

If you really want a travel agent, Sheila and Caroline should be up in a few hours and may be able to suggest someone.

Thanks for your replies. Tower - we usually do all our travel planning ourselves, but want tickets to the Tattoo and want to make sure we can get a hotel. We have heard that it can be really difficult to find accommodation during the Festival so we thought we'd look into getting some help with it. A few years ago we used a travel agent in Honolulu for a trip to Hawaii and it worked out beautifully - it really paid off to use an agent who knew the area well.

Barrhead Travel are a good independent agency.
barrheadtravel.co.uk

Now is a good time to book accommodation for next August : you don't need a travel agent, it's only difficult if you leave it late in the day. Here's the address of the Edinburgh tourist board whose website lists a lot of accommodation - http://www.edinburgh.org.

Also (although the search function isn't all it should be) try searching for Edinburgh & accommodation/hotel/B&B etc here on Fodor's to see other people's recommendations.

Also see www.tripadvisor.com for reviews.

If you give an idea of what your budget is, I and others will be happy to make recommendations.

Equally you shouldn't have a problem getting Tattoo tickets if you do it as soon as they go on sale : here's the Tattoo office's website - http://www.edintattoo.co.uk. You will see that it says "Ticket details available November 2005" : I think they go on sale about December.

Caroline,

Thanks for the suggestions. I use TripAdvisor frequently and have done some prelim research on it for this trip. I'll take a look at the edinburgh.org site, too. Any suggestions from you and others would be gratefully accepted. We are looking for a B&B or guest house in the 35 to 45 pound per person/per night range (with en-suite facilities). On our last trip to Edinburgh, we stayed at the Castle View Guest House, which we liked very much, but we thought we would like to try a different spot this time.

Hi emc. Not very clued up on B&Bs I'm afraid. I know that people always rave about the Castle View here and you couldn't find anywhere more central.

If you want a central cheapish hotel I recommend the Ibis on Hunter Square, right next to the Royal Mile. As you probably know it's part of a French chain : we haven't stayed in the Edinburgh one but others we stayed in have been simple but clean and adequately equipped. I think it was about £70 per room per night this August.

Also there's a new Travel Inn on Lauriston Place : I haven't heard any reports yet but it's quite centrally located and we've liked other Travel Inns we've stayed in (rooms more spacious & nicely decorated than other budget chains, IMO).

If you want to look for another B&B then there are a lot on Dalkeith Road, Craigmillar Park & out along the A8 - St John's Road/Corstorphine Road/Glasgow Road - all a couple of miles from the centre but on quite good bus routes.

Two B&Bs of which I know the proprietors slightly & so am sure would be nice are One Albert Terrace and Pringle's Ingle. They are both in Morningside which is about a mile and a half from the centre & also good for buses. You'll find both on the tourist board website. (Warning : don't confuse the Albert Terrace one with the one in Musselburgh which is a lot further out.)

Best wishes, Caroline

emc: You really won't find a better located B&B than CastleView. If you want a hotel, Caroline's suggestions are good.

But as you might guess - most everywhere raise their rates and require a 3 night (or more) minimum during festival/tattoo time.

How long are you planning for the Edinburgh part of you trip?

And no, you really don't need a travel agent to help with this sort of thing - Especially if you want a B&B. And tattoo tickets are easy to buy on-line.