Scotland- Edinburgh

Edinburgh Castle.
Edinburgh was such a beautiful city and we would have loved to have had more time to spend here but it will definitely be on the return list along with the rest of Scotland. Far and away this was both of our favourite country to date!

On our first day we headed straight to the main tourist trap, taking a walk up the Royal Mile to Edinburgh castle. we were greeted with bagpipe playing, kilt wearing men as well as a token Brave-heart. even though this part of town was quite busy with tourists it didn't feel that crowded or cheap as some other cities.  The Scottish hospitality and jovial culture  springs from every part of this city and really it it just great to walk around aimlessly and take it all in.
The below pictures are of Edinburgh castle and views of the city from in it. 

Walking the Royal Mile (Below) 

The Real Mary's Close.
Such a Bizarre site. this is a street which has remained untouched and is still much like it would have  looked hundreds of years ago. At some point in time the Edinburgh government decided they wanted to build a government building, however there were already streets and homes where they wanted to build it... some governments would re plan, others would demolish the existing structures, well not Edinburgh... they just built their building over the top.  This street is now the only one still accessible and was quite  incredible to visit. our guide told us about life on these streets, including the twice daily call to throw your  waste bucket out into the street, needless to say it would have stunk, and the streets were a few feel high of human and animal excrement. lovely :)

In all of my wisdom, I decided to get up early one morning whilst Nic was a bit under the weather in bed to tackle the giant Arthur's Seat which looms over Edinburgh. it couldn't be that hard right? I downloaded a park map the night before so I was set. From the home we were staying at, Google told me it was a 40 minute walk to the bottom, and then the walk up to the top...easy...

the walk there was anyway. I managed to follow my directions almost perfectly, but even with a detour, got there in good time. It was only then that I began to realise just how big this hill was... it hadn't looked that big from the top of Edinburgh Castle well the walk was pretty much up, and then up some more. I decided to take a path that i thought would take me around and up to the top... unfortunately the paths were not really clearly marked and the map I though was easy to follow turned out to be a bit more difficult. after walking to my first peak, I was saddened to see that my chosen path went straight back down to the bottom... and I had managed to miss the two paths I was going to take... so I went back down again...on the upside to this, on after the second, smaller hill, i came to a lake where there were some gorgeous baby swans taking their first trip to the water after this i decided no more messing around. i could see the hill and some lightly trodden paths so I went straight for it. this was harder than the two hills i had walked up before, it was much longer and gradually got steeper until i was walking at something close to 75 degrees (i guesstimate) and to a point where I was almost rock climbing.  finally, after a couple of pit stops at the semi summits (bits where it flattened out somewhat so i could stand still without falling backwards) to catch my breath and take some photos of the stunning view, i made it to the rocky and very vertical summit. Whilst I was struggling to breath and questioning my fitness I was so proud that I had made it all the way to the top (along with a couple of smaller tops along the way), as it was still pretty early, I had the place to myself for a full 15 minutes before another group of people came along. as a set off back down the hill, I saw the path they had come up (the one I should have come up and the one that now several groups of people were walking up) and it was most certainly flatter and more gradual and probably the road I should have taken to be easier on myself... but then again I never do like to get to my goals the easy way and in the end, walking down this way I was so much prouder and happier with my effort.

an old monastery built on the side of the hill