After our successful trip to Wales we always had in mind to do a small tour of Scotland. Once passouts's where secured we made plans and set off.
Ready for the off.
Day 1 - Preston to Perth appx 250 miles
We decided to take the M6 directly to Gretna for speed and ease, a boring ride nothing to report apart from losing my petrol can somewhere on route to the Tebay rest stop
I wouldn't mind but I've had it years and had just filled it up..... 
. Once in Gretna took the obligatory shot with the welcome to Scotland sign and had a brew.
From here we took the A7 through Hawick and Galashiels then onto Edinburgh, parts of this road were excellent to ride but closer to Edinburgh it wasn't so great and Edinburgh itself towards the bridge was bl00dy awful, loads of filtering...
I rang Adam when we where in town but due to it being the hottest day in Scotland so far this year they had knocked off early so no visit to the shop
. As a result it was straight on to the M90 upto Perth, sounds simple but the scooter was coughing and spluttering, turns out its not running when on reserve (never had a problem before) just what we wanted heading of into the highlands and the lack of fuel stops and now only one can of juice . Anyway we arrived in Perth and found a nice B&B then headed off for food and beer. Perth was a really nice place with some good pubs and restaurants, I'd like to spend more than a night there one day.Day 2 - Perth to Inverness appx 150 miles
Fantastic breakfast at the B&B, black pudding AND haggis yeah
We where planning to get to Fort William but the heavy riding put paid to that idea, we headed to Pitlochry then on the A93 over the Cairngorms. The landscape is BIG and so are the hills, the weather closed in the higher we went and it got really windy too. As we got to Aberdeenshire at the top of what felt like the world my mate unfortunately dropped his scooter when his pinned hip gave way
, no real damage other than a few scratches but a bit shaken up.
We passed many ski resorts which where like ghost towns as gladly for us there was no snow, the roads got easier to ride as we descended down to Grentown on Spey where we filled up and made way to Nairn and onto Inverness.
Barmoral
Matching colour schemes, fortunately they weren't needed
When we arrived in Inverness it took us ages to find a place to stay which didn't cost the earth, but after splitting up my mate came good
2 mins from the town centre so off we went and had a few beers and something to eat, also saw England loose again
Day 3 - Inverness to Paisley appx 200 miles
Only a continental breakfast today, yes in Scotland!!!!
We filled up and took the road to the south of Loch Ness, lots of single carriageway which was good took our time and enjoyed the views and road.
We filled up at Fort William and saw a Vespa Sportique or similar two up as we took the A82 out, this was a lovely road but fairly busy and I spent quite a while staring at the back of a German coach...
. The A828 took us close to Oban and then on to the A85/A83 to Inverary, these roads where excellent as was the weather, warming up with every mile . Inverary was a really nice little village where we sat on the harbour wall and enjoyed a chip barm/bun and a apple turnover yumm... We also decided to ring ahead and book somewhere to stay that evening so we could have longer on the road if needed.
From here we took Garys (GLScoot) advice (thanks Gary really did appreciate your input) and stuck to the A814 all the way past Naval base Faselane and through the very picturesque town of Helensburgh
The rest of the journey to Paisley was rather uninteresting through Dumbarton although the bridge over the Cylde was nice and high with great views either side .The M8 then took us to Paisley centre where we pulled over to look at how to find the hotel, when a car pulled over and the guy told us he had just bought an LML 200 but it was in the workshop as it was making a strange sound!!! John IIRC offered to lead the way to the hotel while we rode along side so he could here the scooters. He was happy that our scooters made the same noise his was, so there wasn't anything wrong after all - good news
We checked in at the hotel and locked the scooters up, fortunately the hotel was nice as it was booked on spec...
View from room
Locked up for the night
Paisley town centre was a real let down but we found a decent pub with good ales on but no food... and ended up with a kebab so all wasn't lost
Day 4 - Paisley to Preston appx 220 miles
Up the next day and down to breakfast which was an all you can eat affair, well what can I say - filled my boots
We set off to East Kilbride where we filled up and left for Stathaven where we took a wrong turn and ended up on the wrong road (B743), what a result it turned out to be. Its a great road many parts recently resurfaced with loads of long sweeping bends and some tighter ones thrown in to try and catch you out
I must have really enjoyed it as I waited for some time at the end for my mate to arrive From a place called Muirkirk we headed for the M74 to find the old road which criss crosses the motorway all the way down to Gretna Green. Just as we turned on to this road and stopped to check the map guy in a pick up pulled over, turns out he was an old scooter boy from the Hamiliton Ghosts, he even had the tattoo on his arm. We had a 15 min chat where he left to go and pan for gold, I kid you not...
The old road was nothing special but significantly better than the motorway would have been and did offer some nice bits. We stopped near Lockerbie for a quick break before carrying on to Gretna Green. When we arrived there we had a brew and an icecream plus I bought some tacky souvenirs, well you have too...
A quick few junctions on the motorway after a refill saw us bypass Carlise and join up with the A6 onto Penrith where there were some nice views of the Lakes and Pennines
Shap summit
Stopping on the A6 until Keswick where we filled up again we hopped onto the motorway for the short blast home.
Back Home after 4 days and appx 820 miles. The scooters performed really well, only struggling on the odd hill in the Cairngorms which if you saw the size of them you wouldn't be surprised
They cruised along nicely, handled well on the twisties, bombed along on the motorway and sprinted up some surprisingly long drags. Apart from the reserve issue we didn't have any problems what so ever and I would say it was quite a good test for them which they passed with flying colours.I kept a record of the petrol used and millage covered for comparisons, I used 30.7L and my mate 29.0L both exclude the last motorway blast. The resulting MPG was 115 and 121. This is probably down to a few reasons, my scooter has fewer miles on it, my mate as you can see is about 5 stone lighter than me
oops and I have an overrich 95 jet in, either way impressive by any standards... 
Its taken my ages to type this up but we really did enjoy the trip and wanted to share our experiences, I hope you enjoy it.
G.
