How much does the NC500 road trip cost?

Ashleigh
Feb 18, 2023
2 min read

It can be as little or as much as you would like to spend... however, we decided to try to keep the cost down as much as possible, still allowing budget to try out local delegacies and supporting local businesses.

Our top tips would be:

- fill up fuel at larger garages (although we did have one experience of a very remote garage!)

- Stock up your cupboards before you travel with essential sundries, sauces and dried foods.

- have an idea of how many times you would like to eat out / try 'famous' eateries on route

- ensure you have researched the trip and have a budget in mind for activities

- prepare for those little extras, like memorabilia, travel tokens etc.

Our spendings:

Fuel - £290

Stop overs - £320

Food & Activities - £490

TOTAL = £1,100

FUEL - £290

We tried to keep our fuel tank over half full the whole journey, which helped us in remote areas, not having to search for the closest fuel station in desperate need.

STOP OVERS - £320

As this was our first long road trip in the camper, we chose to stay on campsites. Having evaluated the situation and knowing what we know now 9 months on, we would have definitely 'wild camped' a lot more keeping the cost down and made use of the 'stay' schemes around Scotland.

There are schemes such as staying in car parks, or the Forestry and Land 'stay the night' scheme for a small fee. We did use a ski resort car park scheme one night in Aviemore for £10 a night, it was the perfect stopover if you are self sufficient.

I feel we would have benefitted much more financially using these amazing schemes, mainly because we would find ourselves rocking up at a campsite at 7pm some days after a full day of adventuring, and gone by 8am the following morning. At £30-£35 a night, this adds up!

FOOD AND ACTIVITIES - £490

I have grouped this together because food is part of the NC500 activities! :-)

We stocked the cupboards with sundries before leaving and the fridge with fresh vegetables, meat and graze board items. We spend roughly £120 of this on a big food shop before we left. During the route, we mainly cooked a fresh meal each evening, and prepared packet lunches for our daytime adventures.

There were not many places to eat out on the East coast, however once we got to the West coast we tried a few local take out places for lunch.

We tried - cheese'n'toastie, Lochinver pies, Surf'n'Turf, Ullapool fish and chips, Manuella's bakery etc. all of which we loved!

Walking with and feeding reindeer in the Cairngorms, was another expense included in our activities, a little pricey at £65 but well worth the look on their faces.