Waters of Leith and Arthur's Seat

We said today was going to be a lay day, and we almost made it. To be sure, we did lay in for a while, no alarms, no hurry. And we did have a slow brekky in our apartment at Patirot Hall in Stockbridge. But come 11 of the clock, the siren call for espresso coffee made its way to us both, so we did a little hop skip and jump up to a local Starbucks, of all places, for a morning tea.

We then decided to head down to an area where there is one of Scotland's finest public schools. On the way, we did a bit of tourist shopping in a gallery, which was fun. The school is a co-ed boarding house, and although it looks like the set for Hogwarts, it has never played any part in the Potter films.

Fettes it is called, and it is very famous, probably the most famous private school in all of Scotland. We looked through its heavy iron gates and photographed it and I wondered just how much it would cost per term to send your child to such an imposing school, one that was fouded in 1870. One former headmaster when suggested that "Fettes was the Eton of the north", quipped back that "Eton was the Fettes of the south". Regardless of such claims, as an architectural marvel, it is an amazing building to gaze on.

We walked back to our apartment along the Waters of Leith walkway, a lovely leafy walk along the river. However, despite our sore feet from yesterday, we ended up going too far and had to doube back somewhat. It was okay, just one of those things, and we both handled it with relative equanimity.

A further rest at home for an hour then saw us take the car and drive to Arthur's Seat, an extinct volcano in the heart of Edinburgh, where some, though not most, people believe Arthur had Camelot or at least, fought battles up this way. It's a good two hours to the top (at least), and there was no way we were going to put our bodies through that, so instead, we settled for a small climb, maybe a 1/5 of the the climb to Arthur's seat, to the ruin of St Anthony's Chapel, a 15th century chapel that stands there overlooking the pond below and the city in the expanse, and hearkens back many centuries to the 1400s. It was beautiful in its ruination and it was a truly lovely feeling to be up there with it and looking out over the city in the coolness of the breeze.

Tonight, we returned to a pizza place where we ate on our first night, Franco Manca's. Wonderful authentic pizza, dreamy waiters, and garlic breads and rosemary breads to die for. We are relaxed and feeling better. It was good to mostly stop today. For tomorrow, we move on.Read more