A Walking Tour of Edinburgh
by matt @ 10:51 am. Blogged under Travel / Holidays
On a Tuesday morning filled with bright sunshine, with Scottish breakfasts lining our stomachs, we drove into Edinburgh City Centre in search of a car park. We found an NCP (St John’s Hill) and the fees were no worse than average at £5 for 6 hours. Having parked up by 12pm we took a stroll up Chambers Street, past the Royal Museum. Initial impressions of the surrounding architecture and beige stone colouring reminded me very much of Bath. As we reached the top of Chambers Street I saw a whole bunch of toothless edgy characters standing on the corner – they looked like they should have been on the Jeremy Kyle show… of course they were standing outside of main Edinburgh’s Court House!
As we turned right into George IV Bridge, I saw the Elephant House coffee shop on the other side of the road – as recommended by our Lonely Planet guide to Scotland (but unintentionally found). We decided to pop inside and grab some tea and chocolate brownies. A few people were surfing online and drinking coffee, many tables seemed to be occupied by students with their books and folders piled high. We found ourselves a table at the back of the building – with views of Edinburgh Castle high on Castle Rock. Elephants were everywhere decorating the premises; the bookshelves beside us must have contained every single ‘Elephant’ related book ever written.
As it approached 12:30pm we felt ready to re-emerge into the freezing cold but perfectly sunny day, and head up the Royal Mile to Edinburgh Castle to witness the ‘One O’clock Gun’. Each day at 1pm a large 105mm field gun is fired from the top of the castle, a tradition going back to 1861 when it was a time signal for shipping in the Port of Leith. Apparently the gun was once used to shoot at a Zeppelin that was bombing Edinburgh during World War One (they missed). As we walked up through Portcullis Gate I lost track of time, whilst looking out from the nearby battlements I asked Sue what the time was… and almost immediately there was a huge bang which made us jump “That’ll be One O’clock then� I said – I managed to grab a post firing photograph but had hoped to film a short snippet… oh well, at £10 to get in I won’t be paying to try again tomorrow.
We spent around two hours wandering the castle grounds and buildings, for me the most spectacular thing about the castle are the surrounding panoramic views of the city below and impressive Salisbury Crags to the East. There were the usual historic displays, illustrations and descriptions of previous castle eras – a full 3000-year span if including all prior use of this natural defensive position. It had started to get quite chilly by 3pm so after viewing the ‘Stone of Destiny’ (a lump of rock that has monarchical significance) we headed out of Edinburgh castle and back down the Royal Mile.
Most of the shops in Edinburgh’s Royal Mile were souvenir outlets (as you’d expect) - kilts, tartan, flags… monkeys in kilts, monkeys in tartan, monkeys with flags, etc. All good in a car boot once you get home and get your head straight! Our Lonely Planet guide recommended a trip up Calton Hill to observe the sunset across the City, so we headed off in that direction to try out my new Samsung Digimax. We stopped enroute at ‘Wannaburger’ to keep ourselves going. Wannaburger was quite impressive, modern décor, friendly staff, an ethical stance on sourcing free-range food and in-house baking. I didn’t much like the Chicken Classic burger I opted for but Suzie_Q’s cheeseburger was delicious.
Calton Hill was just as described – a high point with magnificent views of Edinburgh, from the Castle to the Crags and out over the Firth of Forth. Strange buildings and monuments littered the top; it looked like god had randomly dropped bits of Rome and Trafalgar Square up there. As the sun went down the sky looked quite moody, the panoramic photographs I got were a great opportunity to test out the new camera. After 30 minutes on the hill we were getting very cold, so we headed back across North Bridge to pick up the car (grabbing some fudge on the way).
Technorati Tags: edinburgh castle, royal mile, one o’clock gun, calton hill, edinburgh parking, firth of forth, salisbury crags
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January 18th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
Esther and I went there! I agree the views from the castle were amazing. We witnessed the 1.00 Gun, although we were prepared for we still leaped out of our skins!
Sounds like you had better weather than we did, wet wet and wetter!