On my second day in Edinburgh, my friend and I decided to take the time to explore the city and some Scottish traditions. Don't forget - I have a quick vlog of this trip at youtube.com/liveshiv! Although we were exhausted from an 18 hour day the day before, we got an early start and began roaming the streets of Scotland around 10AM.
One of the first things we saw was this artist painting this amazing mural right in the middle of an open street! That's one of the things I love about Europe, there are so many open "courtyard" type areas, and it gives way to artists, mimes, singers, people playing instruments and magicians on the street. There's such an air of creativity and culture.
As we continued walking, I noticed how beautiful some of the colours were on the buildings. I didn't realize there was so much colour everywhere! Needless to say I loved the cobblestones streets and the tiny shops and tiny winding roads.
Of course, we went up to the Edinburgh castle. We didn't get a chance to go inside, but the outside was totally breathtaking. There are apparently a lot of "museums" inside of the castle as well, which we would have loved to see, but there wasn't a lot of time and a lot more exploring to do!
This is the view across from the castle, also beautiful and featuring a church and some mountains in the background. What's awesome about Edinburgh is that the city isn't flat at all! There are so many steps and passage ways, and from some of the higher points, you can see the mountains from all different parts of the city.
This is one of the passage ways (they were everywhere) that was like an overground tunnel between parallel streets. Usually they led to a street of a different level, as you can see in this picture! Also, they were all called a "close". They were very convenient because they prevented you from having to walk all the way around to get the other street.
I felt like everywhere I walked there was some beautiful building to photograph! This was another beautiful and MASSIVE church we walked by. We managed to go inside, where we couldn't take pictures, but it was also awesome inside, with the ceilings carved and painted exquisitely.
Oh..you know..just a photo op on a gorgeous street. Most streets were decently filled with people, but they weren't too busy which was good. It wasn't super packed like London, so it felt like a great getaway from the city!
Finally around 1PM we sat to eat at a bar that had..YOU GUESSED IT..all the whisky you could ever imagine. I'm not joking, they had a menu with over 100 types of whisky listed!
Of course we had to try some haggis! Now being a vegetarian, I wasn't thinking I'd ever have the experience to try it. BUT LO AND BEHOLD..they had vegetarian haggis!! Obviously, it's not the same as authentic haggis but it was still yummy!
This is clearly Shirley and I enjoying our 21 year old whisky! I had Glen Scotia, and she had Isle of Arran. Hers was so much sweeter, mine was SO smoky! Not fair!!
After our meal we walked around a bit more and just explored the beautiful streets. There were tonnes of cashmere stores, so of course we ended up with some scarves. Interesting fact: Did you know there are more sheep than people in Scotland? It's true!!
And that was it, we took a train around 5PM back to London. Such an amazing little journey. I learned so much and felt so lucky to have experienced such a breathtaking city. I recommend it to anyone visiting Europe!
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