Edinburgh: Day 4

Today we reached the halfway mark in our trip. We can't believe how much we've already done and yet how much we have left on our itinerary to do!
Our adventure today involved hoping on a bus for a day trip to Hadrian's wall!

Our first stop on the trip was Roslyn chapel. This Catholic chapel survived the Reformation after falling into disrepair and is here for us to view today because Queen Victoria fell in love with it and thought it should be "preserved for the country." Many of you may know of this chapel from Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code. The chapel has long been rumored to be connected to the Knights Templar and Free Masons. Russ was excited to see and learn about those connections. It was a beautiful medieval building, but I was more interested in the cat, William, who lives in the village and comes to the chapel everyday for a nap and pets!

The next stop was the small village of Melrose to view the ruins of Melrose Abbey. We only had an hour for both lunch and viewing the Abbey so we quickly found a restaurant to grab a bite and it turned out to be a good choice. The potato, leek, and thyme soup was so delicious and the strawberry shortbread dessert was amazing.

 

 

 

With a half hour left we made our way to the Abbey. We didn't have enough time for the audio guide, so we opted just to walk around and admire the architecture of the ruins. We also saw the site where Robert the Bruce's heart is buried.

The third stop on our trip was the Scotland/England border where we stood in two countries at once. A Scottish piper was playing and the mood was so jovial. It was so much fun!

 

After an hour/ hour and a half drive into England we reached our final destination: Hadrian's Wall! We stopped at Housesteads Roman Fort  and hiked up to the wall and Milecastle 37. When the wall was constructed, one of these Milecastles was placed at every Roman mile along the wall. It is 80 Roman miles long! (73 modern miles.) It was so fun to be able to walk along the top of the wall and look at the sheer drop off the other side! This was one of the things I was most looking forward to on our trip.

We then hopped back on the bus for the long drive back to Scotland, stopping for a quick rest stop at Jedbergh and a look at their Abbey ruins. Fun fact: Mary Queen of Scots had a house in Jedbergh.

We arrived back in Edinburgh just before 8:00pm and decided to grab some pizza. I discovered Pizza Express with my best friend, Claire, five years ago when we were in London. It is so good! Since we had seen a few around the city over the past couple days we decided to go there and it did not disappoint!

Edinburgh: Day 3

Today we visited New Town Edinburgh which was built below the hill of Old Town and the castle in 1776 in order to sell the idea to English that Scotland was an integral part of the United Kingdom. This elegantly planned out area has streets named after the British Royalty and the national flowers of England and Scotland.

We took a stroll through Dean Village a quaint little neighborhood on the outskirts of New Town, one of the oldest areas in Edinburgh. The village was built to support the milling industry on Water of Leith at the time when Edinburgh city was still contained within the castle walls.

We even stumbled upon a small park with three of the old mill stones displayed.

We then walked back toward the center of New Town to visit the National Gallery of Scotland. On the way we got an exceptional view of Edinburgh castle from below.

While the National Gallery was nowhere near the size of the National Museum, it was still displays a sizable collection. I was especially excited to see a few of Degas' ballerinas since I just gave a talk on the subject a few weeks ago.

We left the National Gallery and headed into the shopping district across the street in search of lunch. We found a little pub and I ordered fish and chips for the first time since we've been in the UK. I even got Russ to try a bit despite his distaste for all seafood. He was not a big fan.

We were both fans of the strawberry lime cider Russ ordered though. It was so good! 

Next to the pub was a bakery selling French macarons. As many of you know, I love French macarons just about as much as I love tea, so we had to get some.

 The salted caramel was the best.

We walked around the shopping district and found a few cute boutiques to to go into. The pedestrian area on Rose St. was very cute with its flags and cobblestone.

After a bit of shopping we walked up Calton Hill, one of the oldest public parks in the UK. The park holds the national monument and an observatory, and offers an amazing view of the Edinburgh skyline.

Edinburgh: Day 2

Today our itinerary was packed full of Royal history. We began the day with a tour of Edinburgh castle followed by a viewing of the Scottish Crown Jewels.

 

After a quick pop into the gift shop, we walked across the courtyard to the Tea Rooms at Edinburgh Castle. During the month of September only they were offer a Homecoming Tea, so we figured we had to try that. It was a huge spread; way more than we had expected!

 

Yes, I did buy a British coat with teacups all over it, and, yes, I did wear it to tea at the castle!

On our way out of the Tea Rooms we came across a wedding party that was just exiting the chapel led by a bagpiper. So of course we crowded around with all the other tourists and took photos of them.

This detour ended up costing us a good view of the One o'clock gun, but we joined the back of the crowd in time to see (in Russ' case; hear in my case. Short people problems...) the canon being fired. Traditionally, canons are set off at noon. However, this means firing 12 shells. The Scots, conscious about finances, decided to fire their canons at one o'clock to save on the cost. Some might call it being tight, but they see it as being careful!

We left the castle and headed down the Royal Mile. We stopped into St. Giles Cathedral for a quick look at the place where John Knox preached. The interior is a lovely Gothic building with the four central pillars dating from around 1124 CE and many later additions to the building.

We continued our stroll down the Royal Mile until we had reached Holyrood Palace. We took a brief turn around the Queen's Gallery with an exhibition exploring Poet Laureates, particularly Carol Ann Duffy, followed by a live guided tour of the historic palace gardens. We then were able to visit the palace itself, including Mary Queen of Scots' apartments. It was pretty neat!

After we finished our tour of the palace we headed back up the Royal Mile, determined to stop by Cadenhead's Whiskey Shop for a tasting. We were met with disappointment again when we learned that they only do tastings on Thursdays. (Where was all my planning on this?! I don't know how I didn't figure this out beforehand...) In any case, the guy at the shop was really cool and talk to us a little bit about whiskey and the whiskey that they make. There were still spots open for their Thursday tasting, so we may tack this on to our plans for that day!

Having thoroughly enjoyed the Elephant House yesterday, Russ suggested we check out their dinner menu. (I'm serious. It really was his suggestion!) As before, the food was very good. Russ had the chicken and bacon pizza and I had very filling bruschetta with a salad. And I discovered that they make a great Scottish Breakfast tea- their own blend!

It seems I had not used the restroom before as I was surprised and delighted to find it completely covered from floor to ceiling in Harry Potter related graffiti! Thank you, J.K. Rowling. You changed my life as well!!