9/11 Edinburgh

How do you exhaust yourself? Visit Edinburgh and walk a lot in freezing cold wind.  That will do it.

 We had prebooked our tickets to see Edinburgh Castle- so were locked into arriving somewhere between 9.30 and 11am. We made it!!

Our little unit is an easy walk from the Castle (about 2km straight up the Royal Mile) . In that 2km I would not have imagined there would be so many kilt makers and sellers of tartan and other wonderful things such as shortbread and hats which make you look like a hairy highland cow.

There are tiny narrow stone laneways heading off of the street every 50 yards or so with lovely names (Baker's Close, Advocate's Close) and many taverns, cafes and old grey stone buildings on either side of the narrow street.
We walked past the new houses of Parliament on the way (very modern buildings among the old ones).  We spared a thought for friends at home seeing the Nicolson kiltmaker sign and Lyon Close.

The Castle is, as expected, amazing.  We took up the offer of a free tour and got the basics of the Castle layout, before going off on our own to investigate the many interesting areas.

We admired the views,

saw the "Honours of Scotland" (the crown, sceptre and Sword of State) which were locked in a wooden chest for 111 years and forgotten, then found just where they had been placed!! The crown is a pretty crown with red velvet puffy bits, and the sceptre has a lovely sparkly bit (like the night sky) inside the glass bauble near the top of it.  Of course photos are not allowed.

We also saw the Stone of Destiny - a precious hunk of sandstone which the monarch sat upon to seal their coronation.  This was, in 1951, stolen by students on Christmas day and taken to a church 500 miles away! It sits beneath the throne in Westminster Abbey when a new British Royal is crowned. Today it was beside the crown in a glass cabinet with a security guard watching over it.

We also toured a number of museums for the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards and the  Royal Scots and the Royal Regiment of Scotland. We saw how prisoners lived beneath the castle at various times, visited the amazing war memorial (looks more like a church)

and the tiny St Margaret's chapel, Built for Mary Queen of Scots,  which holds only 20 people and is at the very top of the tower (the oldest building in Edinburgh). It overlooks the pet cemetery for soldier's pets and regimental mascots and the biggest cannon I have ever seen (6 tonnes).

We drank very expensive hot chocolate and ate very expensive and not very good pizza, and were pretty tired after a few hours of such activities.

We then walked home (via another much better and much cheaper cafe)  to rug up some more before commencing our assault on Arthurs Seat.  It seems unclear why the rock is called this - it feels like it should be about King Arthur, but maybe not.  Anyway, Arthur's Seat is a craggy outcrop a long way up and it is said that it is a good place to watch the sunset.As you can see by the picture- it was grey day... not really optimal for sunsets.

We can walk out of a narrow lane at the end of our street and cross a lovely park and be in Hollyrood Park, which is where Arthur's Seat is, so there was little excuse for not going.  (only the biting wind and the fading light) .
I don't think there really was a sunset, but it was certainly an impressive vantage point to look out over Edinburgh and it was lovely to see the twinkling lights coming on

and becoming brighter as we made our way down- stopping to admire the ruins of St Anthony's Chapel as we went.

As we went we joked about how we would place controls if this was an O map and what we would describe them as... little did we guess that this was used as the site of the world school games in 2008!

the route we took was pretty much the green one I think.  

Home again to some heat (actually lots of heat) and warm cups of tea, and the decision about what to have for tea.  We are still undecided about what tomorrow will hold.