Edinburgh, Scotland, United KingdomSalisbury Court Edinburgh Scotland
Wait, was it today I woke up so early? No, that was yesterday.
I was awake for awhile before looking at my phone. It said 7:15 am so I got up quietly and folded my washed clothes, then put on the kettle, showered, then started my breakfast. (This sounds just like yesterday.) I fried an egg and put on a slice of cheese and ate it with my leftover smoked salmon. Quite a good breakfast - held me at least until 10 am or so.
We took a bus but didn't get off on High Street as we should have - I can never tell where it is. I did remark to Marilynn that we were going downhill which I felt was farther than we should have because it signified that we would end up on Prince Street - which we did, Then we had to walk back up the hill to the Castle. We thought about going through the park, but weren't exactly sure where we would end up, so we took another street up. Excellent exercise. We got to the Castle, passed through the stadium that holds the Tattoo, and then got to the ticket booth where an attendant helped us print out our tickets, just like at the car wash at home.
The Castle is, of course, on a promontory overlooking Edinburgh so there are good panoramic views but I couldn't get my panorama mode going properly. We went into the Great Hall and viewed the Crown, the sword and the Stone of Destiny - no photos allowed there so I had to buy a postcard (or two). We went into the basement of David's Tower and then into the Prisoners of War exhibit that showed how prisoners lived through the ages up to WWII. I think there was something else, too. Oh, we took a break and had tea on the grounds - actually tea and coffee and scones with jam and cream. They were quite good - soft and crumbly. The service was exemplary too. We had a nice young man with long hair who seated us.
After the Castle, we went to the gift shop where I was able to buy some tea towels to give as presents - doesn't everyone want a tea towel?? And need?? I also got more postcards to complete my documentation of the castle visit.
Marilynn had planned to visit the National Museum of Scotland after our castle visit.
It is located on Chambers Street which runs between the High Street and our accommodation. She had visited before I arrived and really enjoyed the Early Scotland history exhibits and recommended them to me as she explored some of the other sections. She accompanied me to the 1st floor by elevator but it took ages for the small elevator to come to get us. She was having some problems with her knee after yesterday's all-day tour. We split up and I went through the Scots history exhibits and tried to pick up some information by reading the large print titles when I couldn't read the smaller print because of the dim lighting. The layout was a bit confusing but I think I saw all of the exhibition. I then went down to -1 floor for the older history and enjoyed that but the lighting was even dimmer. For some reason I ended up going backwards in time and didn't really get to the prehistory part with geology and prehistoric animals in any depth. I took a lot of photos that may not be worth anything once I have examined them. Marilynn and I met up near the door - or actually she called my name as I was passing her in the attempt to find her - it took me quite awhile to orient myself on the main floor between the entry door and the restaurant. We went to the gift shop where I bought even more postcards and a very special tea towel.
Once we left the museum, it seemed to be raining more steadily, if not hard really. We had some difficulty in deciding what to do next.
I wasn't extremely motivated to do another museum but agreed to go to the Surgeon's Museum. Once we got there, it turned out to be more about dentistry and Marilynn wasn't really interested, but there was a cafe right there so we had some cappuchinos while waiting to get hungry enough for dinner. Marilynn checked for nearly restaurants and came up with one serving traditional Scottish pies called the Pie Shop. We had to backtrack to 38 South Bridge St to find it and it turned out to be a takeaway shop with very limited seating so we decided to order two pies - a pasty and a little cottage pie - and take them back to our apartment. It seemed ages - and all uphill - on our way back. It didn't seem that laborious last night when we had such a long day - why did it seem so hard today? Anyway, we stopped at the corner beer and wine shop and got a bottle of cab franc to go with our pies. Was that an appropriate pairing, I wonder?
Once back at the apartment, Marilynn warmed the pies in the over. I took out the bag of greens. We had the pies with a salad and our new bottle of wine. Marilynn ordered tickets for the next castle in Stirling and we settled down to do our tourist chores. I uploaded my Nikon photos, sent some phone photos to family and friends, and now I have finished this blog and will now do some packing since we are leaving in the morning on the train for Stirling Scotland.
2025-05-22