Edinburgh Day 2

We split from my brother and sister-in-law for the rest of our trip since they had seen a lot of the sites during a previous visit. Herr made sure to eat Scottish breakfasts at the bed and breakfast every morning while I stuck to toast. Our first stop was Edinburgh Castle. Before we started the ascent to the castle, we came upon an adorable farmers’ market. We took our time perusing the booths and had some hot chocolate while taking in the view of the castle.

It was terribly windy and chilly once we got inside the castle, but it was still quite enjoyable. The castle is steeped in intriguing history, especially when the crown jewels were stored in a privy for one hundred years. We saw the gun salute or whatever it was. Really they shot something out of a huge cannon-like gun. 😛 A special service was being held in the chapel, so we couldn’t see that, but we saw the crown jewels, prisons, living apartments, etc. I had the most delicious tea at one of the castle cafes (which I still have to buy for myself!) with lunch.

Our next stop was Saint Giles’ Cathedral. We paid to take photos, which was worth it. 🙂 Then from there we started walking towards the Royal Botanic Garden. We stopped by the Scott Monument (as in Sir Walter Scott, the author) and had some ice cream. We had a pretty good view of the city from the castle, so paying to walk up the monument was not a priority.

At the corner were bus stops of the standard double decker buses that would take us right to the gardens. We, of course, sat up top to get a better view. The royal gardens are free, and boy was I in heaven! Herr took the opportunity to slow down and at one point took a nap as I took photo after photo of all the rhododendrons and other flowers in bloom. The greenhouse was lovely, but in the end we decided not to pay to walk inside. We spent many hours in the gardens before heading back. We stopped at a quaint restaurant a few blocks from the gardens, but I was still full from all the other food and could barely eat my fish and chips. At least we walked off all the calories, since we went nearly everywhere on foot!

We did get a little lost walking back to the bed and breakfast, but not terribly so. We got in a bit more distance, and it was nearly dark by the time we got back. We were both happy to take off our shoes and crash.