Edinburgh - day 2

In the morning I woke up and had a small breakfast at the hostel before leaving for the day. After leaving the hotel I stopped at the local grocer to pick up some provisions for the day – as I knew it was going to be a long day and I wouldn’t have time for lunch until mid-afternoon.

On the way to Edinburgh Castle, I stopped in on the Edinburgh Market.  I picked some shortbread and border table (like a crumble fudge) to have as snacks for the day (I’ve also split some off to give to Karolina as a thanks for letting me stay with her in Newcastle).  Both snacks were so delicious, and much better fresh than what they probably taste like from the tins in the tourist shops.

I then made my way to Edinburgh Castle. 

There’s so much to see and do, I spent over 3 hours there. Upon arriving I took a guided tour, which was really good way to find out information about the castle and get oriented…not to mention the tour guide Leslie was really animated. While at Edinburgh castle I saw the Scottish crown jewels, the prisons, St Margaret Chapel (which can only seat 20 people), and a bunch of other interesting things.  Probably the neatest thing (after the crown jewels) was watching the 1 pm cannon.  The Scots fire a cannon at 1 pm so that the ships in the harbor can re-set their instruments and clocks (probably more important in the past before the advent of digital clocks).  I read in my Rick Steve’s book the cannon is done at 1pm rather than 12 pm because at 1 pm they only need to use 1 shell (not 12).

After Edinburgh castle I took a long stroll down the royal mile, stopping to look at various sights and checking out numerous of the free museums.  Part of the way along my stroll I popped into the Elephant House for lunch. This is a cute little café (absolutely filled with elephant everything) where Harry Potter was born, where J.K. Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book.  For lunch I had a ½ pizza and salad.  The waiter sat me at a table near a window that looked out to Edinburgh Castle.  Looking at the Castle from my table, the Castle seemed almost…..magical.

After leaving the Elephant House, I continued on to see Greyfriar’s Bobby.   

I was quite disappointed to find out that the National Museum was currently closed for renovations, so I headed back to the Royal Mile (stopping first at PieMaker to grab a Cornish for dinner later on), and continued my descent.  I popped into a few more mini museums, and at around dinnertime made it to the Palace of Holyroodhouse. The Palace is where the Queen stays when she visits Edinburgh in the summer (as the Castle is quite chilly with being on top of an extinct volcano).  

I then continued behind/beside the palace to the park of holyroodhouse and did a portion of the Arthur’s seat hike.  I stopped hiking at about the mid-way point (I was quite tired and my blisters were getting the best of me), but this still gave an excellent vantage point of the city and harbor.   

After hiking back down, I caught a bus back to the city centre (sadly that route didn’t have double deckers) and returned to the hostel for the night…I was absolutely knackered and done for the day.