Afternoon at the Royal Mile

The Royal Mile

Welcome back !   I have heard from so many of you that you are enjoying reading my blog each day.  Thank you for reading it, and letting me know.  It's a great way for me to keep track of what I am doing every day and wish I had done this on previous trips.  The older I get the more forgetful I get and sometimes I can't remember what I did two days ago lol.  This way I can go back and read where I went and what I did.
So lets get on with today.  Got up and watched a British show called "Wild at Heart".  Its actually filmed in South Africa and is about a vet at a game reserve.  Its pretty good - great scenery, music and the animals are awesome.  After the show was over, took a quick bath as we had to catch the train around 11:30'ish.  When we arrived in Edinburgh, we made our way over to Primark so I could return some shirts I had bought last week.  After we got that business taken care of, we headed up the Mound towards Edinburgh Castle.  We didn't go in the Castle as we have all seen it before.  So we just stopped at the entrance to take some photos and enjoy the views.  Edinburgh Castle for those of you not familiar with it, sits high up above Edinburgh on top of a volcanic rock called Castle Rock.  There are some magnificent views of the city from up there.  After the castle, we made our way down the Royal Mile in the direction of Holyrood Palace.  A lot of the Royal Mile is cobbled, and there is so much history in the buildings that line the Royal Mile.  We stopped in for a visit at St Giles Cathedral.  St Giles is magnificent inside.  They used to allow you to take photos inside the cathedral, but now there is a charge to take photos.  We didn't bother with taking photos as I have some from the last time I was here.  After St Giles, we wandered slowly down the mile, looking and exploring closes as we walked.  If you are wondering what a close is, here is an explanation of "closes" from Wikipedia -

"The Old Town of Edinburgh, Scotland, consisted originally of the Royal Mile and the small streets and courtyards that led off it to the north and south. These are usually named after a memorable occupant of one of the apartments reached by the common entrance, or the occupations of those that traded therein. Generically they are termed closes, a Scots term for alleyways, although they may be individually named closes, entries, courts and wynds. A close was private property and therefore gated, hence closed to the public, whereas a wynd was an open throughway, usually wide enough for a horse and cart. Most slope steeply down from the Royal Mile creating the impression of a herring-bone pattern formed by the main street and side streets when viewed on a map. Many have steps and long flights of stairs. "

Buildings on the Royal Mile

We found some interesting closes, one of my favorite being White Horse Close.  It has little houses on there, and if I had to live in Edinburgh I would love to live there.  It kind of reminds me of a french look.  While we were there exploring the close, my mom started talking to a lady that came out of one of the houses.  She told us a little history about the place, and then we found out she was a housekeeper at Holyrood Palace for 20 years.  She received a medal for 20 years of service from the Queen herself.  She said that meeting her in person and getting the medal from her was mind boggling, and it made her speechless.
We also stopped for lunch on the Royal Mile at a place called "Has Beans".  My mom and I had Cream of Chicken soup and a toasted Coronation Chicken sandwich.  My dad had a Haggis and Caramelized Onion toast on ciabatta bread.  The food was delicious, and we will definitely return there again sometime for lunch.

The Bridges

We made it down to Holyrood Palace, took some photos and then headed back up the Royal Mile.  From there we headed down the Bridges towards St James Center (a shopping mall) as my mom and I wanted to go to Poundland to buy some weight watcher biscuits (cookies)  Poundland is like our 99 cents only stores.  While we went to the mall, my dad disappeared to go get a pint (a beer).  As we had about an hour to waste, my mom and I did a little clothes shopping.  Found a really nice dress and shirt that I just had to have.  Also a cute hat.  I don't normally wear hats but this one just caught my attention.    We caught the 4:30 train home back to Dunbar.  Now we are just reaxing at home, all playing on our electronic toys lol.  I added quite a few photos to my Facebook from our trip today so I hope you will take a look at them.  Tomorrow we were going to head to Haddington ( a town close by) but we have decided to do that on Thursday.  So tomorrow we are taking a nice long walk around Dunbar - down by the beach.  I will take my camera along as it will be new territory for me.  
Well thats it for tonight.  Until tomorrow .........bye for now :-)