Secret Loch Ness, Inverness & Cawdor Castle Tour from Invergordon

Wonderful tour!

David was our guide for the day and his knowledge and enthusiasm was apparent. It was an advantage being in a small 8 passenger mini coach as we were able to easily navigate the narrow roads to get to the sights. He was a great guide to culloden battlefield! He also indulged my Outlander requests! In spite of the drizzling day, it was a fantastic day! Highly recommend!

Best Scottish Tour

The guide was excellent. The trip really couldn’t have been any better. She was very knowledgeable about our surroundings. And quite helpful

Great tour of the Inverness area

We booked this as an excursion on our day in port in Invergordan. The instructions sent by the tour company were easy to understand. Emma was a fantastic guide and gave us a great tour around the area. It was a highlight of our cruise!

Amazing Tour

This was an amazing tour. There were six of us on the bus so it felt like a private tour. David was a wonderful and engaging tour guide. He listened to our group and tailored the tour to our needs. What a great day!

The Cows were the goat!

One of the best days ever! We did exactly what was listed in the tour description and our guide knew so much about the areas because she grew up there. We touched the stones, fed the Highland Cows, lived like a King and Queen for a few hours, shopped, saw where a monster lives and were back to the ship without running! Thanks for an amazing day🤗

Amazing tour!!!

David was out tour guide and he was simply amazing!! We only had a total of 6 people on our tour and he customized the tour to the desires of the group. We ended up going ll the way round lockness s well s many other stops on our 8 hour tour. I highly recommend! Nothing but great thing to say about David, Thistle Tours and this beautiful place.

Great tour. Emma was a...

Great tour. Emma was a well informed guide. Plenty of time available at Cawdor Castle, the battle field, Inverness and Loch Ness.

Really enjoyed the day!

The tour was informative and we liked how the guide asked us what we wanted to do and what was important for us to see.

Culloden, Cawdor Castle, Inverness and Loch Ness

This is a fantastic tour. Emma was a wonderful guide. Her depth of knowledge is unbelievable. Culloden, Cawdor Castle, Inverness and Loch Ness were the four stops. I highly recommend you book.

A great way to spend my birthday and Mother’s Day in the beautiful Highlands!

I would say that our guide David knocked it out of the park. He was mindful that our group had two different departure times and was very flexible in consulting with the group to make use of our time. While my husband and I are Outlander fans another younger group were Harry Potter fans and David tailored conversations to both.

Wonderful day in the Highlands!

From the moment my husband & I were picked up at the port until the moment we were dropped off we had a wonderful time! Our guides were June and Lizzie and they took us to all the places we wanted to see and we had ample time in each place. We loved driving through the highlands on back roads… putting our hands in Loch Ness… exploring Clava Cairn & Culloden battlefield, the Cawdor Castle and gardens as well as free time in Inverness. Thank you both for a memorable day! (Some of the cruise excursions were cancelled due to an accident on a main road away from the cruise port but our guides knew how to get around it and we were able to continue our day with no issues!). I would highly recommend this trip!!

Best Highland Tour

We loved this tour!!! Beautiful all-day tour through the beautiful Scottish Highlands. We loved that our guide was local and knew the area well. The tour was super flexible and they catered to our family's needs. Would absolutely book again.

Wonderful from start to finish

Absolutely superb tour, massively enjoyable and a great group of people supplemented by a brilliant guide Rhona and lovely driver Danny. The stops were excellent and everything was arranged seamlessly. Information was brought to life and personalised - such wonderful knowledge of the area and history were imparted. I would HIGHLY recommend this lovely small group tour. Excellent value for money, highly professional company

Great experience!

Frank was a great host and guide for the day. He instantly became a friend. His knowledge of the area was amazing.

Tour was very informative and our tour guide June was top notch.

Able to do a bunch of things without wasting time loading and unloading a large tour bus. Well worth it and such a better experience !

Excellent tour!!!

Booked this tour as an alternative to the ones offered by our cruise. SO glad we did! Rhona was an amazing guide, one of the best we've ever had. The Scottish Highlands are so beautiful and of course the coos are absolutely adorable! The falls were dry when we were there so we visited Clava Cairns instead which are in a beautiful area and were pretty impressive. There were 8 of us total and she was wonderful about tailoring the day to what we wanted (or didn't want) to see and do. She got us to Cawdor Castle just as it opened so we avoided the crowds. We had ample time at all stops and never felt rushed. She also kept tabs on the traffic to avoid any delays and we made it back to the ship with time to spare. She is an excellent driver, navigating the narrow, single-track roads with ease and made sure we were all comfortable. The price of this tour wasn't significantly less than what our ship offered, however the small group, the option of being able to actually dip your toes in Loch Ness and Rhona's excellent guiding made it a superior choice in our opinion. Maxine was very quick to respond to emails with all of my questions (which were many)! All in all a fantastic tour and one of the best experiences of our 10 day cruise. Thank you Rhona and Maxine for the wonderful memories!!!

Excursion

Lem the guide was great and friendly give him a 10. Was told up front that the falls were dry so that was a no go. Was extremely foggy at the start but weather cleared up and had a great view all around. Lem drove us all around the area so we got to see more than was listed on the tour which was nice. This was the first time booking an excursion from someone other than the ship was very worried about that but everything went smoothly. Thanks Lem for the GREAT time

Great experience

Mo was our guide on this trip. She was fantastic. She was informative, funny and very personable. She helped make this tour even better than the description.

Wrong Itinerary

Our tour guide, June, was very accommodating. The issue was that the itinerary we signed up for, was not the one she had on her schedule. It seems this company has many similar tours and they seem to go where they want to and not necessarily what you signed up for. I complained early on and June was very flexible to give us what we wanted. We had a shorter time frame to do things since the ship times were shortened. Where we had to miss stops because of weather, she inputted a different stop which we enjoyed.

An absolutely wonderful day

Our guide Mo was exceptional. She shared an amazing amount of information, both historical and local lore. She took us to various sites and explained some of their history and let us explore them on our own. It was a great day and I would recommend it anyone.

Excellent all around

Len was a great guide! The weather had been dry and hot, so we ended up not being able to go to the falls. Len made up for it by adding a stop that wasn't originally on our tour, and it was a wonderful way to see another piece of history in Ireland. So glad we were able to do this tour.

Perfect day exploring Loch Ness and Inverness

We had a beautiful day touring Loch Ness in Inverness. Our tour guide Len was a lifelong local and added so much color and insight to our day. I highly recommend this trip and if you’ll be lucky if you get Len as a guide.

Amazing tour

Amazing tour, highly recommended! We were on a cruise docking at Invergordon and the guide was able to accommodate us to make sure we were back on ship on time. We thought this was going to be a small group tour but even better, we ended up having a private tour with our incredible guide named June! This tour was perfect to visit all the musts in Inverness in a small amount of time. June gave us great explanations and facts about Inverness, Invergordon, Loch Ness, Clava Cairns, Culloden Battlefield and Cawdor Castle. We also had enough time to visit each places and do some shopping in Inverness. 10/10 experience!

Secret of Lich Ness

A fantastic tour. We didn’t see Nessie-jk. Loved the castles and our guide was very knowledgeable. Very accommodating and highly recommend.

Small group, great experience

An interesting day in a small group. We had enough time at all the places we visited. The travelling in a group of only sic people made the tour very flexible. Our guide Mo provided all the informations needed and even had a brochure in German language for us.

Not worth the money

Not worth the money spent on this, we did not get to see a waterfall because it was dried up. We were taken to a battlefield that we hardly had time to see. The highland cows were just two on a farm this was very expensive for what we got.

This small group works...

This small group works great for us. We get around and visit all the must-see spots and take pictures. We bought Scotland scarves. I touch the Loch Ness water and completed another bucket list. I found the Viator small group or semi-private tour great for couples traveling.

Lochness

Very Good tour guide and driver. We enjoyed the whole trip. More free time would be nice. We enjoyed the scones and tea.

Great trip

Our driver and guide Mo. was the best. Favorite stop for me was castle caldor. Also loved that we were in a van. Not a bus

Great experience!

Mo was our guide and she was fantastic! She gave us the flexibility of our time and made sure we all saw what we wanted to see. I tasted haggis for the first time! She is very knowledgeable and answered all our questions. Highly recommend this excursion!

Unique & amazing experience 💝

I tour guide Mo was simply amazing She was very friendly, knowledgeable and it was a pleasure going with her💝 She took into consideration our individual likings and took us to every place we wanted! It was great.

Highlands tour

June and her husband were very informative and so friendly. June explained the all about the highlands and even found out about my family heritage.

Wonderful excursion while on a cruise

We’ve visited Invergorden by a cruise so I’ve planned in advance an excursion. A lot of choice and everything explained very well. Thistle has a very convenient website for planning excursions while ashore. They helped me through email very well and quick and even the day before, because we had to go through emigration and I was scared we wouldn’t be there on time, they assured us they would wait for us. After leaving the ship, we met Mo, a wonderful lady who has a lot of knowledge and have seen a lot of the world as well! She gave us a wonderful day, (and a nice recipe to make cranachan), we could ask whatever we want, she even detoured to see the locks, and brought us back in time. What’s very important because ships don’t wait when not booked with them!

Family Trip

The boat ride was easy not too much movement. The water and surrounding sceanary was beautiul and the castle tour was fascinating

Sad Moment

Today I had to cancel our excursion with Thistle because our cruise was canceled due to the virus outbreak. Just as she has been all along the way of my researching and scheduling, Maxine was gracious and kind and immediately refunded the money we had paid for this excursion. It's heartbreaking for me because our fabulous adventure was cancelled but even more so because companies like Thistle are taking a tremendous hit. BUT... when we reschedule our cruise, and we will Lord willing, we will also reschedule with Thistle. I'm so impressed with the personal touch they provide and the quick communications. I have no doubt that we would have been thrilled with our excursion booked with them and we look forward to actually experiencing it !!

Amazing Cancellation Policy and Customer Service

We were scheduled to cruise on the Regal Princess May 4 to the UK. We booked several tours and one of them was with this company. Our cruise was cancelled due to the Novel Corona Virus. It was easy to cancel online. Their cancellation policy is generous. In addition, Maxine wrote me to say she was sorry that we had to cancel and made sure our cancellation was immediately recorded. We will definitely book again with thgem when we can take a cruise in 2021!

Ein gelungener Tag in den Highlands

Sehr schöner Ausflug, von der Buchung bis zum Ende der Tour war alles super. Mo hat alles toll erklärt und individuell zusammengestellt. Wir waren nur zu viert, das ist natürlich viel besser, als ein Bus mit über 40 Personen. Vielen Dank für den gelungenen Tag

An unforgettable day🍀

A relaxed group. Everything was explained in detail, it was great. We were able to get our first impressions of Scotland. We'd be happy to do it again. Many thanks to June and Jim

An exceptionally beautiful day

June picked us up directly from the cruise ship and she gave us a wonderful day. We were the only guests that day and were amazed that more guests hadn't booked because the price was completely fair. We were out and about all day and saw the most important sights: Culloden, Cawdor, Clava Cairns, Inverness and Loch Ness. When June found out that our son is a fan of the Harry Potter series, she spontaneously drove us to a gorge where a scene was filmed. It was an incredibly individual, informative and unforgettable day in Scotland. Thank you, June!

Great excursion!

What a great tour I had. I was out with Mo that day. A sweet lady, truly a local, with a passion for what she does She showed me around the area all day and you could tell her goal was to give me a great experience. And that was 100% successful. I really enjoyed it and can recommend anyone to book an excursion with this company.