My partner and I are planning a 2-week trip to Scotland and Ireland in August and are looking for a little advice. Having read through a lot of these threads, I've determined that we'll hire a car and drive ourselves around since the bus tours don't seem to let you spend much times at the stops. However, I've also learned on here that we shouldn't plan to do too much. With that in mind, I'd like some advice on what are the absolute must-sees.

We're going to start in Edinburgh and spend a couple of days there, and then continue on. I've found a lot of good info on the city,but we'd like to see some of the impressive landscape and do a bit of walking about (rather than intense hiking). The Isle of Skye seems to be the place to go for that. Any other suggestions? We'd also like to see some historic landmarks - castles, abbeys - but there are just so many. Any recommends on a top three?

And lastly, any thoughts on which country to spend more time in? From the research I've done, it seems that there's more to do/see in Scotland, but maybe I just haven't researched enough on Ireland yet. It seems like maybe there are more castles/abbeys to see in Ireland, and more interesting landscape in Scotland?

Of course, if anyone has a must-see that is outside of what I've mentioned here, feel free to share. I'm looking for any help! Even links to other threads dealing with my questions would be helpful. I found a lot of the UK, Ireland threads were to do with London, so it was a little difficult to find what I was looking for.