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Edinburgh Day 3/Scottish Highlands Day 1

Oof, what a stressful day.  It started out fine, I slept in and leisurely packed my bags to check out at 11am.  Then I went to the café and filled out postcards and mailed them then walked to the train station where Enterprise is located for my pickup.  I was there early, so I went ahead and did the paperwork then hung around for a bit until the car was ready.  They misquoted me on the car price and wanted to add almost another $100 to my bill so I argued with them for a while before giving up and deciding I’d figure it out later when I get back and have more time. On top of that, I had reserved a small economy car and they gave me a big ass, brand new 2019 SUV type car, and maneuvering it around the narrow streets is a nightmare.  I hit a bollard just trying to get out of the parking lot and bumped a couple curbs trying to get out of Edinburgh because it barely fits through anything in the narrow streets!  Fortunately none of that seems to have done any damage.  FYI it’s not a good idea to pick up your rental car from a major metropolitan area with super crazy traffic. In hindsight I should have taken a train to the airport and picked it up there. Lessons learned! I did successfully get out of town with only three people honking at me for driving slow and/or not knowing roundabouts, but no accidents.  It was funny though because when I got to the Highlands another car pulled out into my lane, obviously used to driving on the right, and came at me head on. I saw him and slowed down and sympathized with him after seeing the look on his face once he realized.  Once I got out of town driving got a lot easier, it was a long but uneventful drive up to and through Inverness, and I made it down Loch Ness to Benleva Hotel Bed and Breakfast in Kilmore.  Once I checked in I went to the lounge and ate some delicious mac and cheese and the best garlic bread I ever had.  I crashed out pretty quickly after that. I’ll be hunting sea monsters tomorrow!

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Edinburgh Day 2

Edinburgh is amazing, I loooove it. The place smells like baked goods and sweets, it’s fairly easy to navigate since there are so many big landmarks, there is so much to do, people seem happy and active. Sure it has its problems, it has homeless folks and petty crime and is expensive like any other major city…but I really, really like it! Today I stopped by an old church called St. John’s near my hotel and the huge old graveyard attached to it with Edinburgh Castle behind, then to Ross Fountain, and walked down to Holyrood Palace. The actual palace is pretty typical, it felt like walking into Windsor Castle all over again, but the destroyed abbey remnants were pretty cool and spooky, both from inside and out.  Despite no rain in the forecast, it started pouring fast and hard in between peaks of brilliant sunshine leading to a series of beautiful, big rainbows while I was at Holyrood. I jumped into a ramen shop and ate while one bad rain patch passed through, it was pretty good ramen…mid-level, a little bland, but good on the stomach.  It’s funny, the British really don’t use salt all that much considering how many people they’ve historically killed for it.  Anyway, once the rain cleared I hiked up Calton Hill to watch the sunset, then decided to call it quits early because it was super windy and cold! I needed to get my hotel and rental car scheduled for tomorrow (pray for me driving in the UK for the first time) and buy some new shoes because the walking shoes I got are apparently not waterproof like I thought they were.  Good thing they have normal shoe stores here, like Skechers, so I got some waterproof boots.  Then I went back to the hotel to pack up for the big trip up to the Highlands!

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Edinburgh Day 1

I guess I was tired, since I slept until 8am before getting up and heading out.  I stopped at a cute coffee shop for a mocha then wandered over to a nearby church and headed to Edinburgh castle.  I ended up spending 4 hours at the castle, in part because it was gorgeous, but also because they have a military museum with family service and death records as well as a historical association that has researched over a million Scottish clan names.  Since I knew both Shelton and Booth are Anglo-Saxon names, I spent the better part of an hour just scouring through the records trying to figure out where my ancestors were primarily located.  Apparently, the Booth family were seafarers who often were lost at sea and were largely concentrated in the Aberdeenshire area, although they were located all over the region and were a combination of two huge families in the 12th-ish century.  There were a lot of military records to be found for the name Booth.  For Shelton I didn’t find that many, even though our name is of Scottish origin.  Turns out the Sheltons were big landholders and farmers in the Nottinghamshire area, and when people were encouraged to move to and occupy Ireland we packed up and went to Dublin and became government and law enforcement folks for a long time which is why we didn’t have much of a Scottish military presence.  It was all really interesting.  I also think I love Mary Queen of Scots, that lady had an attitude in a “big mood” way.  She openly criticized her husband and family, working her distaste for them into her needlework which is on display today.  It’s pretty funny, too bad she was ultimately betrayed by those same people and killed despite being a fair and beloved ruler of her people.  Anyway, after spending so much time at the castle I didn’t have time to go to the palace, so instead I wandered down the Royal Mile and ducked into the Angels with Bagpipes restaurant, a Michelin rated place, to try haggis neeps and tatties, a really good artichoke root based soup, and this local drink that was made from strong vodka, champagne and strawberry flavoring.  The weather decided it had no intention of clearing up, so after eating I wandered over to another graveyard and took in the spooky atmosphere before heading to my hotel to dry off and drop off my bag.  Then I headed back to Mercat circle to meet the tour guide to the underground catacombs around the former south bridge.  The tour was a perfect mix of informational and campy, and our guide Alex did a great job, it was really hilarious given the seriousness of the topic at hand.  The tour highlighted some of the killings, hangings, burnings, and the shitty way people generally lived back in the day including the poor conditions. Afterwards I trudged back to the hotel in the pouring rain and discovered that my shoes which I thought were waterproof are not, so add that to the list for tomorrow. I got my free pint at the hotel bar and went to bed after a hot shower to warm up.