One note I discovered about renting cars in the UK is that they often take a £1000-£1,500 "hold" on your credit card during the deposit which sometimes sets off the 'fraud' alerts with your bank. You may want to notify you credit card that you'll be overseas and having a rather non-routine charge on your card (better to do it now than on a mobile phone from the airport car rental place trying to sort it out).

Anonymous wrote:You can see a lot of Scotland in a week. Don't be afraid about heading to the Isle of Skye. The roads are pretty good getting there and it is absolutely gorgeous.

I probably wouldn't do this trek with a one year old though, it's just a long drive from Edinburgh. I guess if you can fly out of Inverness instead of having to go back to Edinburgh or Glasgow it would be more doable. Just a lot of time in the car when there are other nice places.

I agree with doing a train to York and then a train to Edinburgh. Train station in both cities is very convenient to downtown and places to stay and York is a great place to visit for a day or two (lots to do for families but also great to just walk around).

Advance train tickets can be bought very cheaply -- last year our train tickets from London Kings Cross to York cost 14 pounds per adult and less for the kids.

If you know you want to go to Scotland you could consider flying out of Glasgow on the return.