Monday, October 3

After we finished our tour of HMY Britannia we got back on the bus & headed to the Royal Mile & a general walk around the Grassmarket Square area. The architecture here is fantastic. The photo below is of Holyrood Palace at the “bottom” of the Royal Mile. This where the Queen stays when she’s in town – no reservations required for her!

The palace is built on the site of an abbey/monastery founded in 1128. By the time we arrived at the palace we were pretty overloaded with information so we passed on the tour.

The photo below is of a building just up the street from the palace. I love how the architect incorporated the clock tower inbetween the buildings. No matter which way I look in Edinburgh I see something interesting & want to take another photo. Thank goodness for digital cameras or I’d go broke developing 35mm film!

The photo below shows a promenade with sidewalk cafes created on the rooftops of the shops on the street below. This is on the way to our hotel in Grassmarket Square.

We had dinner at a small cafe called “The Elephant House” (see photo below). It’s just a small place on the George IV Bridge & it would be very easy to simply walk past it if you weren’t looking for it. The decor & the menu are very basic but it’s a neat place & the food is good. What helps to make this place special is that JK Rowlng wrote parts of her first Harry Potter novel here while stretching out her coffees. Ian Rankin also had his crime fiction hero “Inspector Rebus” have coffee & lunch here in at least two of his novels. It was neat to sit here having a pint & a jacket (baked) potato for dinner and thinking about these famous writers & their characters.

After dinner we headed back to our hotel to absorb all we had seen & learned on this day. Looking out our window, it was almost hard to believe that we were looking at Edinburgh Castle all lit up above us.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) we visit the castle!

Cheers everyone!

Monday, October 3

We started our 2nd  day in Edinburgh by purchasing a 2 day pass on the Hop On/Hop Off city tour bus system. We have found that this is a great way to get around a large city & see all the sites. Then we can return to the sites that interest us most & spend more time exploring.

Our first stop was HMY Britannia. This beautiful ship served Queen Elizabeth from 1953 to 1997. It is now retired from service & is permanently berthed in Edinburgh as a floating museum accessible to the general public. I cheated a bit with the photo below (copied from Google) because I couldn’t access this particular view of the ship during the tour. All of the rest of the photos in this post were taken by Catherine and I.

The public charitable trust that now owns & cares for Britannia has done an excellent job setting it up for tours. We spent about 2 hours touring the ship & enjoyed every minute of it.

An interesting fact that I learned right away is that the helm for steering the ship is actually below decks. The navigator on the bridge calls steering commands down to the helmsman through a communications tube. This is done because the bridge is so visible & exposed to attack. The same goes for other British naval ships. You learn something new everyday!

The photo above is the lounge facing the stern. Apparently the Queen & Prince Phillip were quite involved in the design & the decoration of the entire ship. They wanted it to be well done but not ostentatious.

The dining room & adjacent receiving lounge are beautiful. It’s neat to imagine all of the history that has occurred on board this ship & all of the dignitaries & world leaders who have met the Queen & dined here with her.

Even the engine room is immaculate. We could not get right down into the works but the viewing windows gave lots of opportunities to see pretty much everything. Britannia traveled over 1 million nautical miles in her service to the Queen & the royal family. The ship also traveled to Canada at least 6 times.

After we finished our tour we went up to the tea room on the top deck & had a tea & a latte. Perhaps we were siting in a location where the Queen & the Prince had their tea occasionally.

My latte looked so nice that I didn’t want to drink it – but I eventually did.

If you ever get to Edinburgh, make sure that touring HMY Britannia is on your list of things to do.

Cheers everyone!

Sunday, October 2

After visiting the Falkirk Wheel we continued on to Edinburgh. The first thing we needed to do was to return our rental car to get the Enterprise Car Rental location at the city’s central train station. This meant driving the car right into the middle of the city. We chose this particular drop off point because it is only a few minutes’ walk from our hotel.

Thankfully the GPS got us there without much stress. I figured that we drove about 1,200 kilometres since we picked up the car in Liverpool 8 days earlier. Back home we would not think too much about driving that distance in only a day or two but it was quite a challenge to do this on the “wrong” side of the road, with the steering wheel on the “wrong” side of the car & on many roads that are much narrower than what we are used to. I really enjoyed most of the driving parts of our holiday & would not hesitate to do it again.

When we finally got to our hotel we were pleasantly surprised at the location & at the view from our room! I took the photo below from our hotel room window!

After we got settled in we went out to get something to eat & explore the neighbourhood. Our hotel is in the Grassmarket area in a part of the city often referred to as “Old Town”.

Edinburgh is a beautiful city. Every time we turned a corner there was another stunning view. I was taking so many photos that I drained two camera batteries.

We walked down the Royal Mile, the main street that starts at Edinburgh Castle & ends at Hollyrood Palace, the Queen’s residence when she is in the city.

At approximately 1/3 the distance down the Royal Mile is St. Gile’s Cathedral, the High Kirk of Edinburgh. For the Church of Scotland (i.e. the Presbyterian Church) this particular church is the equivalent to “Westminster Abbey”.

St. Gile’s was founded in the 12th century. The present church dates from the 14th century & was extensively renovated in the 19th century.

The church is beautiful inside & out. There are several massive stained glass windows & the ceilings are intricately decorated & painted.

As it turned out, our timing in visiting the church was great as there was an organ recital being given early that evening. It was really neat to hear the organ played to its full potential.

Catherine & I had an early dinner & returned to the church for a wonderful recital that lasted about an hour. Visiting St. Gile’s was very special to Catherine & me as we felt that Dad was there with us too.

Sunday, October 2

Our final destination on our holiday is Edinburgh. However, we planned a slight detour to visit the Falkirk Wheel, which is more or less between Stirling & Edinburgh & about 45 minutes’ drive from Edinburgh.

The Falkirk Wheel is a modern version of a hydraulic boat lift that lifts & lowers canal narrowboats a height of 79 feet – joining the Union Canal with the Forth & Clyde Canal. It went into service in 2002.

This is an amazing piece of Scottish engineering. Boats float in a tub that rotates inside the circle at each end of the wheel. The tub always stays level while the whole mechanism rotates from top to bottom.

We watched the wheel rotate through a cycle. It was surprisingly quiet & fast & only took about 5 minutes from start to finish.

We had lots of fun going through the locks on our narrowboat but I’m not certain that I could take this ride.

Here’s a link to a video on YouTube that someone else took of the wheel in operation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fX6kJKjg4y0

Cheers!

Saturday, October 1

We had a really nice breakfast at the Atholl Palace Hotel in Pitlochry & then headed for Stirling, which was about a 90 minute drive.

Our first stop in Stirling was at the Wallace Monument, which is a tribute to the Scottish hero, William Wallace, or “Braveheart” – as popularized in the movie starring Mel Gibson. However, the story told in the movie is not very close to the life and heroics of the real William Wallace.

The Wallace Monument stands on a high ridge overlooking the Town of Stirling. It is 67 meters high & was built between 1861 & 1869.

The monument is very striking up close & from a distance. It made me think a lot about William Wallace being such an important part of my own name & I’m glad that my Dad & Mom decided to bless me with them, as well as the link to such an important part of the history of Scotland.

Our next stop was Stirling Castle. The castle & the grounds are massive.

The first buildings on the site date back to the 1200s but most of the buildings were built between 1490 & 1600. There is so much Scottish & English history associated with this castle that it’s mind boggling. Mary Queen of Scots was crowned here in 1592.

The castle is extremely well preserved & the guided tour we took was great.

Our last stop for the day was at our B&B for the night – a beautiful Victorian home just a 10 minute walk from the castle. After a long day of soaking up so much Scottish history it was nice to have a nice quiet place to rest & reflect.

On to Edinburgh tomorrow!