Terms & Conditions

We aim to have a straight-forward, open and reasonable relationship with you, our valued customer, and for you to have a reasoned and reasonable understanding of us as the supplier of your tour experience with us (herein referred to as the ‘Experience’).

Our aim is for you to have an exceptional and enjoyable tour with us.

Please note: Outlander: The Past Lives Experience is not in any way affiliated with Diana Gabaldon, Sony Pictures Entertainment or Starz Entertainment, LLC. Our Outlander-themed tours are provided to meet the needs of Outlander fans and to allow them to experience some of the best that the Scottish Highlands has to offer. No copyright or trademark infringement is intended on this website.

In the interests of clarity, safety and to abide by package tour regulations, we have set out our terms and conditions below. We also have a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) page that includes tips and recommendations to help to ensure your experience and stay with us is the best experience it can possibly be.

General Terms & Conditions

These terms and conditions refer to tours provided by Andrew and Diane Nicholson, operating as ‘Outlander: The Past Lives Experience’, of Culloden, Inverness, herein referred to as ‘The Operator’.

The term ‘scheduled tour’ refers to our group tours with a set itinerary. These are bookable as individual places (seats/persons) for specified dates that are published on this website. This is as distinct from ‘private tours‘ which may be arranged with a different itinerary and not open to the public to book.

Our Scheduled Tours include:

Seven-Day Outlander Tour
Three and Four-Day Outlander Tour based out of Inverness
Seven and Ten-Day ‘Heart of the Highlands Tour,’ based out of Inverness (2026 onwards)

All non-UK clients must be in possession of a valid passport. Your specific passport and visa requirements, and other immigration requirements are your responsibility and you should confirm these with the relevant Embassies and/or Consulates.

NOTE: From 2025, all travellers to the UK, except British and Irish citizens, will need permission to travel in advance through either an ETA or an eVisa. ETA is Electronic Travel Authorisation; you will need to purchase this at least a few days prior to your entry into the UK; it costs £10 GBP. It is easiest to purchase via the UK ETA App that can be downloaded via the Apple App Store or Google Play Store (for Android devices)

By booking, reading, and agreeing to our terms and conditions at time of booking you are agreeing to be bound by these. The person booking the Experience (the lead person) does so on behalf of all the other individuals included on it, so that all are bound by the booking conditions.

The content of the pages of this website is for your general information and use only. It is subject to change without notice. Neither we nor any third parties provide any warranty or guarantee as to the accuracy, timeliness, performance, completeness or suitability of the information and materials found or offered on this website for any particular purpose. You acknowledge that such information and materials may contain inaccuracies or errors and we expressly exclude liability for any such inaccuracies or errors to the fullest extent permitted by law.

Your use of any information or materials on this website is entirely at your own risk, for which we shall not be liable. It shall be your own responsibility to ensure that any products, services or information available through this website meet your specific requirements.

Our scheduled tours are for adults only aged 16 years or above.
Our scheduled tours are designed for reasonably fit and mobile adults. Although the tours do not involve very lengthy walks (e.g. more than 1 mile at a time) or require high levels of fitness, we do walk a good distance most days (typically 7,000 to 12,000 steps) some of which can be on cobblestones, uneven surfaces, spiral staircases and floors many centuries old. This is a guided package tour, so you will need to be able to keep up with the tour guides and the rest of the group to gain the most from this experience.
The Operator reserves the right to recommend that a participant does not participate in any such element of the tour which we feel they are not physically fit enough to undertake safely.
More details about fitness and mobility requirements and our tour vehicle are provided on the Frequently Asked Questions page.
Our Scheduled Tours are NOT suitable for anyone who suffers with car/motion/travel sickness, unless this is mild and can be easily rectified with daily medication. We travel many winding, single-track, hilly, undulating roads throughout each tour. Please note: we are not able to allocate a particular seat in the minibus to anyone for the duration of the seven days.
Tour participants must bring clothing and footwear suitable for the tour conditions and highly variable Highland weather. We supply umbrellas if required. Please bring waterproof and wind-proof layers of clothing. Please bring and wear sturdy and water-resistant walking shoes or boots. Please do not wear flimsy footwear including sandals or pumps/plimsolls. We do not recommend wearing Wellington boots.
Our Scheduled Tours are for English speakers only. We share a lot of history throughout the tour, so are unable to accommodate time for translation without it disrupting the timings and experience for the others on the tour. If you would like to book a non-English speaker and translator onto one of our tours then you would need to book a Private Tour and contact us to discuss this. We are unable to provide translation services ourselves.
We are unable to leave any tour participant alone in the minibus if they don’t wish to venture into any particular location.
By law, seat belts are required to be used when the minibus is moving.
We are unable to accommodate pets on the tour.
By Law, no smoking is permitted in vehicles or any buildings.

If you are booking this tour on behalf of others, then it is your responsibility to ensure that all the tour participants in your group are able to meet and comply with these terms and conditions.

If you have Special Requirements

If any tour participants have special requirements in terms of mobility, dietary needs, hearing impairment, travel sickness or anything else that is not listed here which may affect the tour, then it is vital that you discuss these with us before booking so that we can assess whether this tour is suitable for you. If you book without discussing special requirements with us first and we do not feel this tour is suitable for you, then you may forfeit your payment depending on when you advise us of your requirements. Any refund we agree to pay you if we are unable to accommodate you on this tour will be 1) based on our standard cancellation terms which are further down this page – please scroll down, and will be 2) minus the Stripe fees, which will have already been charged to your payment and are not recoverable, plus an administrative fee.

If you have any special mobility needs then you would need to consider a private tour with us, rather than one of our scheduled tours, so that we can give you the attention and any extra assistance that you may need.
We don’t have any specific disability or access equipment such as ramps or hearing loops.
We do have a PA system which sends our voices from microphones on headsets to the speakers in the rear of our minibus, which could help the hard of hearing.
Our Mercedes Vito Minibus has the following features:
Wide sliding passenger access doors (30” or 76cm wide ), with a particularly low step (14” or 36cm high) up into the minibus and a space of 20” (51cm) wide to enter between the two rows of seats.

The Minibus

Our vehicle is a Mercedes Vito Tourer ‘Select’ extra-long wheelbase. This is a quiet, efficient, spacious minibus with air-conditioning, comfort leatherette seating, comfort suspension and decent legroom. Our minibus has USB smartphone charging capabilities.

Please note that this is NOT a large walk-on/walk-off bus or coach. For photos of the vehicle, boarding and seating, please see our Frequently Asked Questions Page.

Wi-Fi

We recommend that you have your mobile phone provider grant you international data access/roaming for your holiday in the UK. Alternatively, you can purchase a UK sim card for a one-month data contract. These can be purchased from supermarkets in the UK.

Luggage Allowance Per Person

We can accommodate one large and one small piece of baggage per person as per the sizes laid out below. We won’t be able to carry any more in the minibus, so if you are bringing more luggage, please arrange to store it somewhere while you are on tour with us:

One suitcase/rucksack up to 25kg within the following dimensions: 30 x 25 x 10 (inches) or 76 x 63 x 25 (cm).

One piece of hand luggage, up to 10kg, within 24 x 16 x 13 (inches) or 60 x 40 x 33 (cm)

Food and Refreshments while on Tour

For the ‘Seven Day Outlander Tours’ – Breakfast at your hotel is included and one Afternoon Tea at Culloden House.
For the ‘The Heart of the Highlands’ Tours, no food is included, as accommodation is not included.

Lunch and dinner are NOT included on any tours.
We provide cold water and a large flask of hot water and mugs, along with a large selection of teas, coffee and shortbread, in the minibus.
Lunch – This tour is very much about experiencing as much of Scotland as you can during your seven days with us, as opposed to a culinary experience.
- Therefore, on five of the seven days of the Seven Day Outlander Tour, we stop at a supermarket for our group to purchase sandwiches, salads and snacks for lunch, which we enjoy outdoors on picnic tables/benches, along with the hot drinks we provide. We keep a large cool bag in the vehicle to store the lunches bought each morning. On the Culloden Day of the tour, Afternoon Tea will be provided at Culloden House (price included). On the final day, you can enjoy a sit-down restaurant lunch at House of Bruar (price not included). NOTE: If we replaced the five speedier picnic lunches with a restaurant lunch instead, then we’d also need to remove one tour location per day to allow enough time for restaurant service during tourist season. This would equate to losing one whole day of tour locations overall.
- Similarly, several of the days on the Heart of the Highlands Tours will involve eating a ‘packed lunch’ on the go. Where possible and practical, a sit down cafe or restaurant meal option will be offered.

Payment Options

Deposit payments are normally made via our secure online booking system (from TuriTop); the payment gateway is Stripe – a well-established industry standard card payment processing platform often used by online booking engines.

We request the balance payment be made by Bank Transfer through our Wise.com bank account, which allows you to pay us in your local currency and for no charge as a domestic wire transfer. Paying by credit card incurs a large fee for us, which has not been incorporated into the price of your tour. If you need to pay the balance by credit card, please advise us, and we can come to an arrangement to share the associated fees.

Please note that due to the volatile state of the financial markets and inflation, we reserve the right to apply a surcharge to our tour price. We will only do so if our costs are inflated unexpectedly high (i.e. if inflation continues to run at well over 10% or our hotel prices rise by significantly more than this). We very much hope not to have to resort to this and would only do so to cover any unexpectedly increased costs.

Bookings and Cancellation charges

For all of our tours, a non-refundable/non-transferable deposit is required to confirm a booking and reserve your desired dates.

If you are booking within 60 days of the tour start date full payment will be required.
By booking with us and paying your deposit, you are making a firm commitment to take the tour with us and pay the tour balance when it falls due. Any unforeseen circumstances would need to be covered by your travel insurance, should you have to cancel, to recover your costs.

The payment and receipt of a deposit does not imply acceptance of a booking. A contract is only made between you and Outlander: The Past Lives Experience (the Operator) upon your booking being confirmed and accepted through written communication thereof to either you/participant or your authorised Travel Agent.

Full payment is required by a date no later than 60 days prior to the date of Experience commencement. If the full payment has not been received by this date, as specified in our confirmation, we reserve the right to treat the booking as cancelled. If you requested a single room on our scheduled Seven Day Outlander tour, the additional cost of this will be added to the balance that falls due at 60 days prior to the tour start date.

The ‘lead participant’ is the person who makes the booking on behalf of all participants in a multi-person booking. It is your (or on bookings involving more than one person, the lead participant’s) responsibility, as the customer, to check the accuracy of your booking including your travel dates and to ensure compliance of each individual with these terms and conditions.

If you wish to cancel your booking please do so in writing via email, the date received by us being the date of cancellation.

Please ensure you have adequate travel insurance to cover any additional costs or losses that you may incur through no fault of our own, as we will be unable to cover your costs or losses if you choose to travel uninsured.

The following cancellation fees apply.

Number of days prior to start of your Tour	Cancellation fee as a % of the total price of your Tour
More than 60 days prior to the tour	The initial deposit to secure you place(s) on the tour are non-refundable and non-transferable. When you make the initial deposit payment(s), we accept this as firm commitment on your part to attend your chosen tour. This in turn allows us to put everything in place for you. In this respect, no booking should ever be treated as a temporary reservation while deciding whether to attend or not. If you do need to cancel, we ask for as much notice as possible so we may have an opportunity to resell your place(s). As a small Highland business, we rely very much on our customers not waiting until the balance payment is due to let us know they won’t be coming, as we are very unlikely to be able to resell your place(s) at that point. We only cater for small groups of six people maximum, so one or two lost bookings on a tour has a large impact financially on our business.
Less than 60 days prior to the tour, after final balance payment is completed	Once the balance payment is made and your tour is paid in full, then everything is in place for you, including hotel accommodation and locations tickets. So 0% would be refunded and you would need to claim the full cost of the tour from your Travel Insurer. We will supply any confirmation required to aid your claim.

If you develop symptoms and fall ill during the tour

We understand that no one ever wants to miss parts of a multi-day tour because they don’t feel well, but knowingly remaining on a tour with an illness that could be contagious can have huge repercussions for all others on your tour, including the driver who we rely upon to keep us all safe.

If you begin to feel ill during the tour with anything that could potentially be contagious and infect others, such as coughing, cold/flu-like symptoms, sore throat or any other kind of sickness, it is essential that you share this information with us immediately so we can deal with it quickly and efficiently. Please do not leave reporting this to us until it is evident that you have been ill and potentially contagious for some time.

If you suffer with Hayfever/pollen exposure, then you will need to ensure you are medicated for the duration of the tour so you are not displaying cold/flu symptoms, as we will have no choice but to treat this as a potentially contagious illness and follow the same procedure.

The minibus is a confined space and we travel many miles as a small group, often with group members who are vulnerable to infection, so if you do begin to feel ill during the tour, then the following procedure must apply for the protection of everyone on board, and for the protection of everyone we take our groups to during the tour:

We will need to isolate you from the others on the tour at the earliest opportunity. No tour location is more important than the health and well-being of the seven others on board the minibus.
We will assist you in obtaining a medical appointment with a local Doctors’ Surgery for your symptoms.
You will require a Medical Certificate from the Doctor who examines you to confirm that you are not contagious before we can allow you to rejoin the tour group. There is generally a cost to obtain a Medical Certificate of up to approximately £40, which you would need to pay direct to the Doctor examining you. If you are unable to provide a Medical Certificate which confirms that you are not contagious, then unfortunately we will be unable to allow you to return to the tour. No partial refund would be payable in this instance, and you would need to claim any losses from your Travel Insurer.
If the Doctor confirms you are contagious, then, for obvious reasons, you will not be able to rejoin the tour. We would recommend purchasing the Medical Certificate anyway, as it will aid your Travel Insurance Claim. In this instance we will offer guidance if requested on what alternative travel and hotel options might be most helpful for your onward journey.
If you clearly have symptoms but refuse to see a Doctor or provide a Medical Certificate, and have chosen not to advise us you’ve been feeling ill for a day or two, then we reserve the right to isolate you from the rest of the group immediately and until you are symptom-free, including from the remainder of the tour. No partial refund will be payable by us and you would need to claim from your Travel Insurer. Our tour guests rely on us to keep them safe, and this includes being well enough for their return flights home.
You will need to have appropriate Travel Insurance in place to cover any unexpected costs associated with not being able to rejoin the tour, such as alternative hotel accommodation and any compensation for days of the tour that you are not able to attend.
We are not able to transfer any part of your tour to a later date or provide any pro-rata refund for sickness during the tour. You would need to rebook in full when you are well enough to attend.

IMPORTANT – For any disruption to your tour caused by Government imposed restrictions, it is essential that you have adequate travel insurance in place to cover the potential costs involved, such as additional hotel accommodation/quarantine, the loss of part of your tour, onward travel, repatriation etc. These costs are not covered by us.

In addition, if we have paid for or reserved accommodation as part of a tour, then any cancellation fees from the accommodation provider will be charged to you. This includes the cost of our own accommodation for tours that involved overnight stays away from Inverness where we are based.

Cancellations by Us (not due to Government imposed restrictions)

If we have to cancel your tour for any reason other than Government imposed restrictions, we offer a 100% refund or an alternative date agreed by the customer. In the unlikely event that we become unable to provide a significant proportion of the services you have booked after you depart, we will make alternative arrangements for you at no extra charge, or if this is impossible, we will provide you with transport back to the point of arrival and a pro-rata refund for the cost of the remainder of your holiday.

In accordance with “The Package Travel, Package Holidays and Package Tours Regulations 1992”, all participants booking a multi-day package tour (i.e one that includes accommodation and/or location entry tickets) with Outlander: The Past Lives Experience (the Operator) are fully protected for the initial deposit and subsequently the balance of all money paid to us, arising from cancellation or curtailment of your travel arrangements due to the insolvency of the Operator.

Sharing our Tour Content online or with others

We know that people love to share the photos and videos they take on holiday, and this is of course fully expected. However, this should never extend to clients giving away our Intellectual Property without our consent. Our ‘Intellectual Property’ is the creation of the tour experience, which includes the order and flow of the itinerary locations, the content we share verbally or visually at each location and the way in which we weave the story together over the duration of the tour. This creates the overall tour experience, which is our Copyright, and which is not for sharing with anyone who is not on the tour.

Clients book to experience the tour, but that does NOT grant the right to video or record us delivering the content, or to share it with any social media audience, friends or family. The simple way to remember this is as follows: Anything you learned from us, which you would not have learned from visiting the location on your own, is essentially our Copyright and Intellectual Property. We do not grant permission for that to be shared with anyone who has not booked with us.

Our Tours have taken many years of research and hard work to weave into the experience we share with our groups. We know for a fact that many elements of our tours are unique to us and not delivered by any other tours. In this respect, we reserve the right for our tours to be experienced only by our paying guests. Mutual trust within each small group is therefore vital to the whole experience unfolding as fully as it’s meant to.

The following applies at every tour location:

We do not allow any tour guest to film or record us delivering any part of the tour content. You will have the opportunity to take video and photos of the location after we have finished delivering our part, and you are of course welcome to share those online as your own.
When we welcome you into our private home as part of the tour experience, we do not allow any videos or photos to be taken inside our home.
The daily Itinerary – written and maps – which we share with each tour guest are not to be shared with anyone else in any capacity. These are our Intellectual Property and are reserved only for those who have paid to experience our tour.
When we show the tour group photos on a device which we use to add context to the information we are sharing with you, then we do not allow photos or video to be taken of the information on our device.

Accommodation and Travel

When booked directly with us (The Operator), your tour does not include travel to Scotland, or within Scotland to the start-point of your tour (e.g. transfers to and from an airport or train station). Your tour experience with us starts when we pick you up at an agreed place.

It is your own responsibility, or that of your authorised Travel Agent to make international flight arrangements and travel arrangements to the agreed pick-up point. Whilst we will do our best to accommodate any unforeseen changes to your travel arrangements, we (the Operator) cannot take responsibility for changes or alterations to any flights or any travel delays.

Our Seven Day Outlander Tours include hotel accommodation.

For our Ten Day Heart of the Highands Tour and our Three and Four Day Outlander Tours:

These are all based from Inverness and do not include accommodation.
We provide you with an extensive list of convenient accommodation options from which you can choose and book rooms to suit your style, requirements and budget.
Note that hotel accommodation in Inverness is relatively expensive – on a par with Edinburgh. That said, there are many Bed & Breakfast (B&B) and Airbnb options which provide high-quality accommodation at much lower prices.
Once you have booked your tour with us, we provide you with a detailed Information Pack (PDF file sent to you by e-mail). This includes recommendations on travel, transfers and accommodation.
We have also listed local attractions, pubs, wine bars, hotels, B&Bs and airbnbs on a Google map, to help you to choose your own accommodation.

Liability and Force Majeure

The Operator does not accept any liability for loss, damage, delay, inconvenience, or direct or consequential loss, however caused, unless due to our negligence, in which case our liability is limited to a maximum of the cost of the Experience. Any activities such as walks or visits to attractions are completely at the client’s own risk. We advise to our best knowledge each tours physical, dietary and clothing requirements but we can’t make decisions for you.

The Operator will not accept responsibility for accidents, injury, lack of fitness, carelessness, illness, negligence or lack of punctuality attributable to the customer.

If you have any disability or illness, please inform us prior to booking the Experience so advice can be given on the suitability of the tour and our facilities.

The Operator will use all reasonable and legal means to ensure that the tour starts on time agreed and that it reaches its destination on time. The Operator will not incur any liability whatsoever in the event of any delay due to causes or circumstances beyond its control. These circumstances include but are not limited to: weather, roads, traffic, civil disturbance, industrial action, strikes, wars, sickness, floods, any other or events beyond our reasonable control, or force majeure.

The Operator does not accept liability for death, bodily injury or illness unless this arises from the negligent act and/or omission of a representative of the Operator whilst acting in the course of your Experience, tour guiding and your stay with us.

The Operator does not accept responsibility for any loss of valuables, including electronic equipment, during your tour with us.

Insurance and Your Safety

We cannot accept responsibility for conditions which are outside our control, e.g. the weather, the closure of visitor attractions etc. We reserve the right to alter or cancel our tour itineraries where necessary due to weather conditions, road closures, etc.

All participants must be fully insured for the duration of the Experience. Participants are responsible for arranging their own travel insurance, which must cover at least medical expenses, injury, death and repatriation. It is advisable that you also have cancellation and curtailment as part of your insurance policy. In addition, you should be insured against loss of or damage to baggage and personal possessions including all your electronic equipment.

Complaints

If you should have a complaint about the Experience, then we request that you let us know straight away so that we have the option to discuss and if possible, rectify the issue. Any outstanding complaint must be made in writing and received by the Operator within fourteen days of the end of the Experience.

In the unlikely event of any sort of dispute arising, the Law of Scotland shall apply. If the dispute cannot be resolved directly between us within 6 weeks of written intimation of the dispute, both the Operator and our customer shall attempt to settle the dispute by Mediation. A Mediator will be selected with the assistance of the Law Society of Scotland. If the mediation is unsuccessful, the Sheriff Court at Inverness shall have jurisdiction.

Security and Privacy

We are committed to ensuring that your information is secure in order to prevent unauthorised access or disclosure.

Please refer to our Privacy Policy page for more details.