Where to begin? My family (husband and daughter) and I landed at Heathrow and spent a few days in England on our way to Scotland. Sandyford was our first ever vacation rental. I booked it just a few days before we arrived. The description sounded nice and the price was reasonable, and it was available for the dates we needed. We did not really know what to expect so when we arrived, we were amazed!
First, the apartment is HUGE. It has three bedrooms, a full sized kitchen, a dining room and a very large living room. It also has a nice garden with a table and chairs and a swing, which my daughter loved. The apartment is nicely decorated, with most things from Ikea (we love Ikea). One room had two twin beds, one had a single toddler bed, and once had a double or queen and its own bathroom. The room with the twin beds had a large bookcase full of toys and books. My daughter was over the moon excited about it and did not want to leave on the day we checked out. She even named the little doll and the "dog" (Carly and Dragon, respectively). It always takes her a day to get used to a new place, but she was right at home the instant we arrived.
The kitchen is a full sized working kitchen, with a large refrigerator, stove, lots of counter space, and washer and dryer. I made full use of the kitchen and cooked dinner two of the three nights we were there. Not far away is a Co-op food store and some takeaway places. It was so nice to have a place to relax, where my daughter had a room to play in full of toys. She never even looked at her own toys or books while we were there, because there were so many great children's books. The living room was comfortable and we spent our evenings there after my daughter went to sleep.
Bishopton is well situated with respect to the Erskine Bridge and Loch Lomond. It did not take any time to get back and forth and we never had to deal with any city traffic. We spent our time exploring the Trossachs and walking in the forests, throwing stones into the lake, and driving toward Argyll. Bishopton is very quiet and we like that a lot. We also went to Dumbarton Castle and we all liked it very much. We got a castle pass there and were able to fast track into Edinburgh, Urquhart, and Stirling Castles later in our trip.
This apartment set the bar high for future rentals and made us realize that we will likely always seek out vacation rentals when traveling with our daughter or in a group. We have a friend that lives in Balloch who had dinner with us one night, and even he was impressed by the apartment.
Quirks to look out for: I think a light bulb was burned out in the larger bathroom because it was very dim in there. The sun does not set until very late and the curtains do not block the light entirely, so we hung some blankets so that my daughter would not think it was still daytime and want to stay up.
All in all, it was a wonderful experience. We were still talking about it long after left. I HIGHLY recommend this apartment, especially to any families traveling from far away, who do not want to be in the city and want space. I think we were smiling the entire time we were there.