Edinburgh

Monday 15 to Wednesday 17 November

The good-weather goddess continued to bless us. Our airBnB was ideally situated within walking distance of everywhere we needed to be. Our local pub was a student hangout called The Brass Monkey and our closest restaurant turned out to be an excellent family-run Italian called Ciao Roma ( or Hispaniola - depending which entrance you use.) This part of the restaurant used to be a pub called Rutherford's; Robert Louis Stephenson's favourite haunt and is now decorated with pirate and shipwreck memorabilia; in honour of Treasure Island.

Stephen and Vivienne packed in a lot of museums, the Castle, Holyrood and a hike up Arthur's Seat. Neil and I preferred strolling the Royal Mile and Old Edinburgh Town, discovering local neighbourhoods and popping into pubs.

We had lunch with Charmaine and dinner with Karen and Neil.

We sampled set menus and local fayre and enjoyed a wonderful afternoon at the Johnny Walker Experience; a new museum of whisky on Prince's Street; highly recommended even if you aren't a whisky officianado. 

This experience of Edinburgh was so different from our last : two party-filled weeks in our campervan, mid- festival and pre-covid! 

This is why I travel and why I return. This profound and unique mix of the spontaneous and the planned, of the familiar and the strange, of people and place and context and time.