10/11 Edinburgh

I'm sitting in a cosy lounge room with Thom playing on his computer and Laura quietly chatting to him and watching (cup of tea in hand). Trevor is also drinking his tea and reading his book.  The warm light spills over the room and the heaters are heating to a comfy level. The person who lives above is walking around (creak, creak, thump, thump) and all is calm. It has not rained all day - we even saw some blue sky at one stage.

We were up and out to walk up towards the castle and meet our walking tour guide Euan for a 10am start to the walking tour.  The day was looking promising as we made a cracking pace up the now relatively familiar route towards the Castle. 
Sure enough, a large group was assembling as the yellow umbrella appeared and the meeting place became clear. Luckily one of the parts of the group only was for an English language tour.  Not sure what the other one was.

Euan quickly moved us on, telling us about the old buildings, statues and life in the old days as we walked along, slipping into the narrow alleys off of the street and into hidden cobbled squares, the a quick story or two and popping back out again in another area.

old Parliament Square

Scottish flag bravely flying

writers museum

We gained some different views of the Castle, and also found some of the other old areas (such as Grassmarket - where the cattle used to be sold and executions held.  We saw the pub called the Maggie Dickson and heard the story of Maggie , who was executed, but cheated death.  (Her coffin was very active on the way to the burial place and she popped out and ran away - she couldn't be tried for the same crime twice).

We saw the Greyfriars churchyard (just a short distance from where J K Rowling sat drinking tea and writing her book)  with the many gravestones with familiar names (William McGonagall and Thomas Riddle among them) and the school for orphans through the fence with four houses and a yearly competition for the much sought after trophy. 

Greyfriars churchyard

"Hogwarts" beyond these gates

Faithful Bobby

I could have browsed the church yard for a long time.  There is also the story here of the small dog called Bobby who stayed by his master's grave for years after his death, and became famous for his loyalty.  The statue of Bobby has a gold nose (from all the rubbing of hands) , while all the rest of it is black.

We gained a different view of the Edinburgh Castle, perched high on it's volcanic position today  and enjoyed a rare patch of warmish sunlight.

Close your ears/eyes vegetarians.....  we opted to eat at Oink, where they cook a whole pig and then you can buy a delicious pork roll with pulled pork, apple sauce and black pudding sprinklings. wonderfully filling and warm. 

We then headed on to the Museum of Scotland - where we were assaulted by 6 floors of assorted interesting exhibition  - more than we could possibly do justice to.  Lots of hands on things to try, lots of technology information (how various machines work) and lots of Scottish information and history, plus much much more that we didn't have time to look at. Many beautiful things.  Entry is free here and it is a feast of information.

floor tiles

fly a hot air balloon

admire the stunning beauty of the central atrium

We finished by taking the external metal spiral stairs to the terrace roof, from where you can look down onto most of Edinburgh.  Another great view of Edinburgh Castle among the many other old buildings.

We followed our noses to walk home (it is hard to miss Arthur's Seat and Holyrood Palace as landmarks) to a well earned cup of tea and some recreation time.

Extreme use of netting to keep the pigeons out.  Pity they didn't shut the gate.  

Holyrood Abbey ruins

Look one way to see Arthur's Seat

Look the other way to see the little gateway into a lane that leads to our place. 

Tomorrow we head on to York. We have hardly touched the surface of the things we could have done in and near Edinburgh. Plenty to come back to, that is for sure.