Edinburgh

Edinburgh skyline and train station

We spent three of our days in Edinburgh.  There is a very nice fast train that runs From North Berwick into the city centre.  The city is quite compact and easy to walk around.  The weather has continued to be cool, mostly in the 50s, with occasional drizzle.  Our first day, we started off walking up to the Castle, which is located on a basalt promontory called Castle Rock.  They recently had a big celebration in honor of the Queen’s Jubilee in the Esplanade in front of the Castle, and were in the process of removing the bleachers and stands, so some of the view was blocked. 

Edinburgh Castle

Oddly enough, we had just watched a rerun of the celebration on TV the night before.

The castle is huge and imposing, of course. The oldest portion dates to the 12^th century, but many portions are much newer.  We decided to just visit the forecourt and not pay to go inside as a lot of the exhibits seemed to focus on military history.

St. Giles High Kirk

We elected to spend our first day just walking around the city.  From the Castle, the main street of the Old Town proceeds for what is known as the Royal Mile to the Queen’s Palace of Holyrood.  It is full of lots of shops, tourist attractions, statues, old houses and narrow alleys.  The most magnificent building is the High Kirk of St. Giles, which we did go into.  Its central tower is very distinctive and different, like an open work crown.  There are many memorials to Scotland’s famous thinkers and writers.  We also asked them for directions to the Quaker Center, or at least the street it is on!

Arthur's Seat

The Royal Mile turns out to be, in fact, about a mile long, and mostly downhill the way we were going, so we did a lot of walking.  It ends at the Palace that the Queen uses when she comes to the capital.  The new Parliament buildings are right down there too.  It is a pretty good example of modern architecture.  Since Parliament was in session, they were not doing tours, and we also elected not to go into the Palace.  That end of town is dominated by another basalt cliff called Arthur’s Seat, and some other hills, all of which have stayed open land. 

Greyfriar's Bobby

We walked back up a street parallel to the Royal Mile, a much more normal business street, bordering on the University district.  We sought out a statue commemorating Greyfriar’s Bobby, a Skye Terrier who stayed by his master’s graveside for 14 years.  It reminded us of a similar dog statue in Wellington.  Wikipedia tells me that this is probably an urban myth.  Probably stray dogs found that graveyards were good places to hang out because people would feed and fuss over them.  People liked making up a story about a loyal dog, and the caretaker often found it to his advantage to play up the myth.

Quaker Center on Victoria Terrace

 We found the Quaker Centre on Victoria Terrace, which is a pedestrian balcony that runs above and alongside Victoria Street, which plunges downhill.  By the end of the terrace, you are two stories above the road.  We returned to Edinburgh on Wednesday to attend the midweek Meeting for Worship.  We first went up all the way to the third floor where the main Meeting Room is.  It is a magnificent setting high above the city, but it was also clear that it was not where the people were.  So we went down a floor to the library and found the group.  There were about 14 of us, and it was a very nice silent meeting.  We visited with a number of people afterwards, including a young man from Guilford College starting a year at Edinburgh University.  Just down at the end of the Terrace was the Scottish Genealogical Society.  We went in to see if I could find anything more about the first Bell that I know of, who is reputed to have been born in Scotland.  Unfortunately, no real luck, but the volunteer helping me was very nice.

Theseus Temple Vienna version

Wednesday before Meeting for Worship, we also went to find the Edinburgh version of the Temple of Hephaestus.  Part of the façade of the Old Royal Grammar School is based on this Temple, and we are collecting photos (see Penshaw monument recorded on the drive to Scotland).  We walked a bit around the New Town, which was built up as a new business district in the 19^th century.  Then we visited the Writer’s Museum, which is a small house off the Royal Mile dedicated to Robert Burns, Walter Scott, and Robert Louis Stevenson.  I learned a lot.  Burns grew up in a farming family and was known as the plowman poet.  He was part of a revival of the Scottish language and culture.  Sir Walter Scott came about 12 years later and was the only one of the 3 to live a long life.  He is so revered by the Scots that there is a huge memorial to him in Edinburgh – a statue under a gothic spire as tall as most church spires.  He was the first English language novelist to receive great international recognition during his lifetime.  The train station in Edinburgh is named after his novel Waverley, supposedly the only station named after a novel.  It is nice that the city has at least as many statues of writers and philosophers as it does kings and generals.

The rest of our time in Edinburgh we spent in the National Museum - Wednesday afternoon and most of Thursday - looking at their exhibits on Scottish history and prehistory.  I also viewed their exhibit on Scottish geology.  I learned that Scotland and England mostly have been on different tectonic plates.  Until recently, Scotland was part of the North American plate, but when the Atlantic Ocean opened up, fairly recently geologically speaking, Scotland separated.  Then England banged into it and they have been uncomfortably  merged ever since.  Otherwise, Scotland’s geological history seemed pretty similar to the English history I had seen in Kendal, but these exhibits were much better done – really good clear fossils and dioramas in particular.  There was also lots of interesting information about the medieval and renaissance period and the nobility and the church.  We enjoyed it, but museums are also exhausting too.  It was always pleasant to come back to our small town and take a walk on the beach.