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Wully Davidson: Cairngorm Trip

The Cairngorm Mountain Railway

The Cairngorm mountain railway has always been a kind of ‘bucketlisty’ thing with me, so decided that the current spell of good weather would be an ideal time to do it. This would involve getting the Glasgow to Inverness bus, getting off at Aviemore, then catching the number 30 bus for a 20 minute trip to the Cairngorm base station, or ‘up the hill’ as it’s called locally.

I intended getting the 0755 bus from Buchanan bus station, arriving in Aviemore at 1050. But, when I arrived, the 0755 bus wasn’t on the information board. The next bus was 0855, arriving at 1150. I enquired at the information desk about this, and was told that the 0755 Citylink bus only ran on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Sure enough, when I checked the online timetable later, there was a FSS note above the time, indicating that the bus only operated on these days. It’s important to pay attention to these little notes on the timetable, otherwise your plans could end up being scuppered. Other examples are ‘SDO’, indicating school days only, and ‘NSD’ (not school days).

Pitlochry

The E8 Ember electric bus also runs between Glasgow and Inverness, going the same route as the Citylink, and taking the same time. From Glasgow, the E8 departs at 0700 and 1000, which seems odd, as the Citylink departs at 0955, just 5 minutes earlier than the 1000 time. Returning to Glasgow, the E8 leaves Aviemore at 1609 and 1812. The bus stop for both is at the Cairngorm hotel (arriving), and train station across the road (departing). The 30 bus to Cairngorm takes 20 minutes to make the 10 mile trip, and leaves Aviemore from the bus stop outside the train station, near the town centre. There’s one bus an hour, which online timetables say departs at 20 minutes past the hour. However, the timetables at the stop say 22 minutes past, and this appears to be correct.

Cairngorm Hotel Aviemore

As we approached Cairngorm, nearly all the passengers got up to exit the bus at what I assumed was the end of the trip, where I’d get the train. As I was about to leave, I thought I’d better confirm this with the driver, and was surprised to learn that the base station for the railway was another 3 miles further on. Something to bear in mind if you’re considering doing the trip. I think the stop where the passengers got off was called Glenmore.

Aviemore Train Station

The base station has a shop, cafe, bar and adventure play stuff for kids. There are numerous mountain bike trails and these were being well used, particularly by youngsters. You can hire bikes at the site. The train takes less than 10 minutes to make the trip, and an all day ticket costs £20, or £16.50 for a senior. So, you could make a few journeys up and down, if you wanted to. The station was a lot more sophisticated than I’d expected. I thought it would be just an outdoor track with a train, which you boarded and bought a ticket from the conductor.  Instead, it’s a fairly big indoor station, with four counters for purchasing tickets, a giant screen showing films of the area, and very large ‘totem pole’ like wooden sculptures.

On the way up, my ears popped about half a dozen times, due to the change in air pressure. It’s 1,097 metres (3565 ft) up at the top, the highest I’ve ever been on the planet’s surface. The UK’s highest restaurant, the Ptarmigan, was very crowded, so I decided not to partake, instead taking in the views and getting some photos. The views weren’t as great as some I’ve seen on my travels, but you do get a sense of the altitude of your vantage point. Everything seems below you, and on a clear day like this one, you could see for a very long way, although the blue haze from traffic pollution gets in the way, even in the Highlands.

Cairngorm Ticket Office

Wildlife spotted from the buses included one red deer stag, one roe deer, two cock pheasants, four rabbits and a buzzard. It was nice seeing the rabbits. They’ve had a lot to put up with since myxamatosis wiped out 99% of them in the 50s. Now, it a virus causing rabbit haemorrhagic disease that’s killing them. Until this trip, Kerrera was the only place I’d seen them.

Wully Davidson, May, 2026

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