Wild Camping
Wild Camping in Perthshire & the Southern Highlands
Big lochs, drove-road glens and the driest wild camping in the Highlands
Current conditions
Daylight Today
- Sunrise
- 04:25
- Sunset
- 22:09
- Civil dawn
- 03:20
- Civil dusk
- 23:14
NOAA Solar Calculator · 16 June 2026
About this region
Perthshire sits in the rain shadow of the western hills, which makes it the driest and often the most forgiving wild camping in the Highlands. The country is built around long lochs — Tay, Rannoch, Earn, Tummel — and the deep enclosed glens that feed them, Glen Lyon and Glen Tilt among the longest walking corridors in Scotland. It is permit-free Access Code land throughout, with the one important caveat that roadside honeypots like South Loch Earn now carry local parking and camping byelaws.
Best camping spots
- Loch Rannoch north shore (quiet forest and shoreline pitches)
- Glen Lyon (long enclosed glen, riverside ground)
- Loch Tummel and the Queen's View country
- Schiehallion and the Carie/Braes of Foss approaches
- Rannoch Moor edge at Rannoch Station (train-accessible)
- Ben Lawers high corries above Loch Tay
Getting there
The A9 is the spine, with rail stations at Pitlochry, Dunkeld, Blair Atholl and the remote Rannoch and Corrour stops on the West Highland Line. Many glens are long single-track dead ends (Glen Lyon, Loch Rannoch) — fuel up and plan the return.
Best months
May to September. The east-side rain shadow means Perthshire often stays dry when the west coast is washed out — a good fallback when the forecast is poor elsewhere.
Key challenges
Local byelaws restrict roadside camping and parking on the South Loch Earn road; deer stalking on the big estates July–October; midges in the enclosed glens on still summer evenings, though milder than the west coast
Why come here
The driest Highland weather; long drove-road glens for multi-day trips; train access at Rannoch and Corrour; some of the best autumn colour in Scotland along the Tay and Tummel
Frequently asked questions
- Can I wild camp at Loch Earn?
- Carefully, and not from the roadside on the south shore. The South Loch Earn road has a clearway and camping/parking byelaw that restricts roadside overnight camping — this is local regulation, separate from the national Access Code. Walk-in camping away from the road and the houses still operates under standard access rights. For unrestricted lochside camping, Loch Rannoch and the quieter parts of Loch Tummel are better bets.
- Is Perthshire really drier than the rest of the Highlands?
- Yes, noticeably. Perthshire and the eastern Highlands sit in the rain shadow of the higher western hills, so they catch markedly less rainfall than Lochaber or Wester Ross. It is the reason Perthshire makes such a reliable fallback: when the west-coast forecast is grim, the Tay and Tummel glens are often dry. The trade-off is that the highest ground — Ben Lawers, the Tarmachan ridge — still gets full Highland weather.
- Do I need a permit to wild camp in Perthshire?
- No camping permit is required anywhere in Perthshire — the permit system is specific to Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park, which lies to the south-west. The only restrictions are the local roadside byelaws (notably South Loch Earn) and the usual Access Code responsibilities around stalking estates, livestock and Leave No Trace.
- Where can I wild camp without a car in Perthshire?
- The West Highland Line is the key. Rannoch and Corrour stations sit in the middle of open moorland with legal camping straight off the platform, and Pitlochry and Blair Atholl give access to Glen Tilt and the Beinn a' Ghlo country. Rannoch Station in particular is one of the few genuinely car-free wild camping bases in the Highlands.