Edinburgh

May 1

Today we spent the day in Edinburgh. We started off with a bus tour of the city. Our guide boarded the bus and gave a narration as we drove through the city. Most of this part of the tour was through the new city which dates from the Georgian period (1714 - 1837).

We ended up outside of Holyrood Palace where part of our group disembarked for a walking tour of the old city with a different guide than the one for the bus tour. We entered the grounds of the palace which serves as the Queen's residence when she is in Edinburgh. Our guide provided us with a listening device so he could talk to us as we walked along.

The Holyrood Abbey is also on the grounds. It is ruins but was still very beautiful to see. They also had several gardens and we were here at the right time to enjoy the spring flowers.

When we left the palace grounds we proceeded to walk up the Royal Mile. This is the street that leads up hill to Edinburgh Castle. The castle is on the highest point in the city. Along the way we saw several old buildings and our guide filled our heads with lots of information about the history of the city and its rulers. One of the houses we saw was John Knox's home one of the oldest in the city.

We passed the current Scottish Parliament building. 

We saw the World's End Tavern. The guide said it got its name because this was the site of the old city wall and beyond it was the rest of the world.

We also walked through a close which is an alley that leads to buildings behind the main street. 

We went through Saint Giles Cathedral.

We finally arrived at the plaza in front of the Castle. Norman had our tickets so we proceeded to enter and avoided the long line waiting to buy tickets. 

At this point we were on our own to explore the Castle. We walked through the royal apartments, the museum and even got to see the crown jewels. Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures inside. 

 

We also had a great view of the city and could even see the waters of the North Sea.

When we finished touring the castle we headed back down to our hotel stopping for a light lunch at an Italian restaurant. We split a chicken Stromboli. We rested in our room and then explored a few of the shops in the vicinity of our hotel.

The last event for the day was a group dinner at a venue outside of town. We were treated to a Scottish Dinner including Haggis. We had bagpipe players and dancers. The highlight of the evening was when they called out our names and brought us champagne to toast our 50th wedding anniversary. Norman had arranged this and we really appreciated it.