Where To Stay On West Highland Way: Hotel And Camping Accommodation

21st October 2023

Your West Highland Way adventure starts as soon as you start to plan it. This article details everything you need to know about West Highland Way accommodation.

We’ve included a handy table to help gauge the distance between accommodations. You can book your itinerary around your walking plans.

We’ve also included the exact accommodation we stayed in when we did it in seven days.

Accommodation	Type	Location	Distance from the start (miles)	Our experience	Notes
easyHotel	Budget Hotel	Glasgow	0	Stayed	Cheap, basic, no windows, and Wi-Fi costs extra. It’s a budget, one-night-only kinda place.
Camp near Drymen	Wildcamp	Drymen	15.50	Stayed	Cute campsite in the forest. View spot here.
Camp near Rowardennan	Wildcamp	Rowardennan	32.75	Stayed	This is just after the area where camping isn’t permitted, so if planning to camp, you need to get here at least. View spot here.
Benglais	Campsite	Benglais	46.56	Stayed	Lovely campsite with restaurant and shop on site. It was quite ‘midgey’ when we were there.
Tyndrum Inn	Hotel	Tyndrum	59.36	Stayed	This was the only place with rooms for us. It was great!
Glencoe Mountain Resort	Glamping	Glencoe	77.36	Stayed	Cute little glamping pods with hearing. On site cafe and bar.
Macdonald Hotel and Cabins	Hotel	Kinlochleven	88.00	Eaten here	This place has something for everyone: camping and rooms. Very close to WHW and a great restaurant and bar. We celebrated Stew’s birthday here.
Highland Getaway	Hotel	Kinlochleven	88.56	Stayed	Very comfy, a bit more expensive but very good.
Fassfern Guesthouse	Hotel	Fort William	104.56	Stayed	Stayed here on WHW. A lovely guesthouse but more expensive.
Ben Nevis Hotel & Leisure Club	Hotel	Fort William	104.56	Stayed	Budget-friendly hotel, perfectly good enough.

Find your WHW accommodation in major milestone points

Below you can search your accommodation in some of the major milestone places along the trail. We’ve pulled out the place we stayed since we know it’s good but there are lots of choose from.

In this article:

Glasgow
Drymen
Rowardennan
Inverarnan
Tyndrum
Glencoe
Kinlochleven
Fort William
West Highland Way Accommodation Questions Answered

Glasgow

For most travellers, stopping in Glasgow is necessary. It’s a long way up to Scotland from most parts of the UK so if you’re travelling far, we would recommend staying one night in Glasgow before you start the walk.

This way, you’ll get a really good rest and the next morning you can start your day with an easy 30-minute train from Glasgow Queens Street to Milngavie. The first 18 - 20 miles of WHW is flat so you’ll be totally find doing it this way.

We stayed in the easyHotel. We just wanted something cheap, and it is that; even Wi-Fi costs extra.

From easyHotel you can easily get to the station and take one train to Milngavie. Easy!

If the easyHotel isn’t for you (I wouldn’t blame you), you have a lot of options around the train station.

Drymen

There are a few hostels and hotels in Drymen so you can find accommodation with no problem.

We actually wild camped just outside Drymen, and the map below shows you the exact point. It was actually a really lovely camp in the forest. We were tucked out of the way. We woke up to more tents around us; other campers joined us.

Because you walk through Drymen to get to this campsite, you can fill up on food. We went to the butchers and picked up a steak for dinner.

For more in Drymen, take a look at the map below and see what takes your fancy!

Rowadennan

Our Rowadennan accommodation was also a wild camp; the last wild camp of the trip. The map below shows you exactly where it was. It’s a nice point near the loch and in the forest. Campers nearby had a fire going.

Rowardennan isn’t an actual town so if you want a hotel you need to think about staying in Balmaha (before Rowardennan) or Inversnaid.

Inverarnan, Arrochar

Benglais Campsite pretty much marks the end of the no camping zone. It’s a great site with a restaurant and shop. They sell 1000-mile socks in the shop. If you’re suffering with blisters and aren’t wearing them already, buy some!

There’s a restaurant and bar there with good food portions. Definitely worth a stop to soak in the WHW atmos.

Tyndrum

I absolutely love Tyndrum. It’s home to the Green Welly which is basically a Highlands service station. I dunno what it is about Tyndrum but I always feel happy when I arrive there. We lived just 15 miles from there, in Kinlochleven, so I guess it always marked the ‘nearly home spot’ after we’d drive 400 miles to se our family.

The Green Welly is a cafe and shop. If you want some Scottish food, The Green Welly is a good stop. They have local food like clootie dumplings and haggis.

It started to rain when we got to Tyndrum so we stayed in the Tyndrum Inn.

We ate lunch at The Real Food Cafe and had a dish of battered meats like battered sausage, battered haggis and maybe even a battered beef burger; very Scottish. To be honest, I don’t recommend that haha

From memory, when we got to Tyndrum the Inn was the only place with rooms due to the rain. There are other great places to stay such as

Glencoe Mountain Resort

Glencoe Mountain Resort was like a haven for us because we arrived in pouring rain and soaked through. We tried to pitch our tent but the wind was so strong we couldn’t even do that.

Due to bad weather, other hotels had filled up and we had resigned ourselves to finding a less windy spot and a wet night.

The resort offers little heated glamping pods, a cafe and a bar on site. We both got a drink after that day!

Kinlochleven

After West Highland Way Stew and I moved to Kinlochleven and now it’s one of the most special places to us. We love it. We’ve got a lot of experience with the restaurants, bars and hotels. I do have a full blog on where to stay in Kinlochleven since we know the area so well.

There are a lot of choices and my strongest recommendation would be Macdonald Hotel and Cabins. Their hotel is perfectly situated for WHW it’s right on the track. Plus, they’ve got a bar called the Bothy Bar where you can get some good comfort food. The views from the bar are gorgeous. Stew and I went here quite a lot when we lived in Kinloch.

When we walked WHW, we stayed at Highland Getaway. The rooms are beautiful and the water pressure was amazing.

While we’re on the subject of Kinloch if you’ve got the energy you can walk about one mile to Grey Mare’s waterfall (definitely worth a visit) and you can wild swim too.

Here’s a map I put together.

Fort William

I’ve stayed in two hotels in Fort William and ate in many hotel-restaurants.

Stew and I can recommend Fassfern Guesthouse and Ben Nevis Hotel & Leisure Club

Fassfern Guesthouse is a lovely, lovely guesthouse. To be honest, this was out of our budget but we finished a day early and it was raining so we had no choice. It was worth every penny. The room was gorgeous, bed comfy, and a hearty breakfast the next day.

Ben Nevis Hotel & Leisure Club is perfectly fine! It’s al large hotel and it’s a bit old and tired in places but there’s really nothing wrong with it at all. I stayed here during a Winter Climbing course and would stay again.

If neither of these places are for you, there are loads of places in Fort William.

WHW Accommodation Questions Answered

Here’s all your West Highland Way accommodation questions answered.

Where should I stay when walking the West Highland Way?

West Highland Way is a very popular walking route. There are a lot of places to stay en route. You can choose from hostels and budget accommodations to lovely hotels and luxury guest houses.

You can use campsites or for more independent travellers, wild camp spots.

Can you camp along West Highland Way?

Yes, you can camp legally and for free across the majority of West Highland Way. There is a stretch where camping is prohibited, though.

Where is the best place to start the West Highland Way?

I would recommend most travellers start their adventure in Glasgow. Stay in the city close to Charing Cross or Queen Street train station, then get a 30-minute train to Milngavie. In my opinion, for most, that will be the least tiresome option where travel is concerned.

Do hotels get fully booked on West Highland Way?

Yes! West Highland Way is a very popular thru-hike that goes through some of the most beautiful parts of Scotland. People are travelling there all the time. Plus, Fort William, where WHW ends, is home to Ben Nevis and people travel just to hike the mountain.

In the peak summer, hotels will sell out.

Should you book West Highland Way Accommodation in advance?

We had at least two days where we struggled to find accommodation because the weather turned and it was heavy rain and high winds. If there’s bad weather, rooms will fill up.

So, if staying in accommodation is important to you I highly recommend you book in advance.

Will baggage transfer take bags to accommodation?

Baggage transfer services like Baggage Freedom will take your bags between hotels as long as they are on route. We met a couple of women who were wild camping and baggage freedom met them at nearby hotels, and gave them their stuff there.

Post written by: Zoe Ashbridge