Europe // 08 // Scotland - Edinburgh

Unfortunately, the next morning was laundry time. (This is what happens when you only pack a carry on! Actually, we only needed to do laundry because we went through so much clothing in Ireland trying to stay dry.) After waiting for what seemed like forever as the laundry finished we went straight to Old Town.

Also, it was my birthday! Hooray! 23!

We made it just on time to watch the 1 pm Edinburgh Castle cannon shooting from the New Town side of the River. We were thrilled to have caught the event on our last day in town!

Being on the New Town side of the river we ran through the Scottish National Gallery, where we briefly met the subjects of paintings by the likes of Da Vinci and Rembrandt. But we had to hurry to our next destination in order to have enough time, so we only spent about 30 minutes in the Gallery. A brisk walk all the way across the river and down the Royal Mile took us to Hollyrood Palace, where we planned on spending the majority of our time. We grabbed audio tours on our way in, and those made all of the difference in our visit. Each room had a detailed explanation of its purpose, history, and art. The tapestries are larger than a two king size beds put together and they have 60-something of them! The plaster ceilings were to die for and the thrones were surprisingly understated-they kind of looked like decorated wooden folding chairs with red velvet and embroidery. The abby outside, which was built in the 1100's, was also incredible. And the gardens? Let's just not even talk about it. There were no photos allowed inside the palace, but we have plenty of the grounds!

After we completed our tour, which lasted about 2 hours, we ran to the Museum of Edinburgh. It wasn't really our jam, so we left lickity split and made our way to the National Museum of Scotland. The latter is much less focused on Scotland, but has terrific displays of world history. We spent most of our time in the animal room (Steven's favorite) which houses a t-rex skeleton and other exotic bones, and the ancient Egypt room (Sarah's favorite) which had a mummy and sarcophagi among other relics of the civilization. We only had 45 minutes in the museum before it closed, so it was a quick visit. One thing we noted about the museum was that it was focused around being family friendly. There were stations set up throughout the exhibits for younger guests to interact with and learn more about what they were seeing, and entrance was free (always a bonus).

Now granted, going to Scotland should be a birthday celebration in and of itself, but Steven treated me to something super special after our day of running around the sites of Edinburgh. Warning: all of my nerd is about to come out...this is where Steven took me for dinner:

The Elephant House! Bah! To be honest the place is way over priced, so we only ordered a pizza to share, but it was worth it. JK Rowling has stated that she would go to the Elephant House when she needed to go on a walk to get her daughter to sleep and wanted to write. The cafe is a dedicated Harry Potter nerd stop now. And certainly a little over-commercialized. But really, Harry Potter! You can't say no! If only you could see how excited  I was...oh wait...you can:

The fast paced day called for a calm evening. A walk around the city park, where the Nor Loch (North Lake) used to be before it was filled in, people watching and viewing the sunset were the perfect ending to our day. Also, obligatory bagpiper picture! That guy was awesome!