We are back from two weeks in Scotland, so plenty of pictures are forthcoming.
We arrived on Tuesday the 27th, but we were visiting a friend in Edinburgh, so the actual touristing didn’t start until Wednesday. Naturally, we hit the Royal Mile first.
Since I can’t resist a good cathedral, here are some highlights of St. Giles Cathedral.
And, since I also can’t resist a good garden, here are the highlights of the Dunbar’s Close garden, as well as the Cannongate Kirkyard nearby.
We had fairly good weather this day – we only got rained on twice, and took both opportunities to get some food. I really enjoyed wandering around. We were still offseason, but it was fairly packed on the Mile – I can’t even imagine what it’s like in August during the Fringe festival. Edinburgh Castle was completely booked out for the day, so we settled for looking at it picturesquely brooding over the city as we were bussing back and forth.
The next day was a fairly rainy day, so not as many pictures. (We did stop for lunch at the amusingly named Boozy Cow, because how can you resist that name?) One good set that I did get was at St. Cuthbert’s Church. It’s a lovely old church, but the kirkyard has some interesting features due to the grave robbing issues in the late 18th/early 19th century. The watchtower below only has windows facing the graves, because it was meant for watching the graves specifically. Fortunately, it’s a calmer place now.
And finally, on Saturday, we went to the Farmer’s Market, aka our friend’s favorite place to bring her visitors to get local souvenirs. I bought yarn. And some locally made Celtic themed earrings. And there were amazing sausage rolls. (P got his haggis out the way with that.) Since Victoria Street was nearby, we were also forced to visit a couple book stores. Truly a sad day for us both.
The final bonus image in the above slide show is from P’s first drive on the “wrong” side of the road. (I ceded navigation duties to the local that day…) I can report that Edinburgh is no worse than Boston (and probably not as bad), once you get used to being on the other side.