Day 6 Edinburugh, Scotland

Edinburgh, or the Dunedin of the North as some with a very vivid imagination might describe it. We arrived to a really great Scottish summer’s day, well it was raining and about 17 degrees so pretty typical I guess. It got better as the day went (see photos for evidence) and didn’t rain during our entire time ashore.

We docked in Leigh which is a seaside suburb and were berthed right next to the former royal yacht Britannia (more of that later). We did not have a tour booked so went into the city and walked the Royal Mile which runs between Edinburgh Castle at the top end and Holyrood Palace/the Scottish Parliament at the other with a few side excursions into the small lanes and surrounding streets.

The Edinburgh fringe festival was well underway and the Edinburgh Military Tattoo is about to start it’s run, so the city was packed and really lively. We walked for bloody miles interrupted by a stop at the Castle Arms for a drink and the World’s End pub for lunch (photos attached...). We didn’t go into the castle grounds as it was chaos up there with thousands of people on site. Lots of Harry Potter themed stuff around as it was the place where J K Rowling wrote the first of the novels. Loved the city, it’s extremely picturesque and well laid out.

After returning to Leith we went and did the tour of the Britannia which is well worthwhile if you’re ever in town. It’s smaller than you might imagine but did play host to most world leaders at some point up until it’s decommissioning in 1997.

Ship life update - our newly formed trivia team (4 Americans, 2 Canadians and us) finished second on day one of the ship team trivia contest, beaten by a team that got a perfect score. On day 2 we were forth (there are about ten teams) and the same team that won on day 1 got a perfect score again, I’m a little suspicious.....

The photos show... The Royal Mile, leading up to the castle; the Elephant House cafe above which J K Rowling wrote the first of the Harry Potter books; Victoria terrace overlooking Victoria Street; Edinburgh Castle with me in the foreground; the Tollbooth Tavern on the Royal Mile; the grounds outside the Castle ready for the Tattoo; the World’s End pub with me in the foreground again; the Queen’s bedroom on Britannia; the Royal yacht Britannia; the Castle Arms where we had a drink on the terrace.Read more