Edinburgh

Three days in Edinburgh.

| Mairead

05 9a

(Cute salt and pepper)

We went to Edinburgh on Monday. We came home on Wednesday. We fitted in loads and left out loads (sorry Dan and Carol and Amy and Calum and Aaron…) We didn’t bring blogging tools, so here’s a summary and lots of pictures. Edinburgh is well worth visiting and especially with lovely weather.

05 9b

(Cobblestoned street near our apartment)

We were meeting Doris and Grahame. They booked a pretty apartment within walking distance of the city and we arrived on Monday afternoon to a warm welcome from them. Let me fill you in on these personalities. Doris is Canadian, Grahame is British, living in Canada for almost 100 years (I think that’s accurate.) Doris smiles a lot, Grahame laughs a lot. Doris is very, very generous, Grahame is learning to be patient. Doris loves to shop, Grahame is a fast learner. Doris make great pancakes, Grahame writes great Facebook updates.

05 9c

(The American barista in Starbucks almost spelled my name right, but… hey, there’s my sister’s name – Moira!?)

Of course I knew all these things already so when Doris said, “this room is yours, I hope it’s ok”, I should have known she had given us the big bedroom, with the comfy chair (for mediating as Grahame calls meditating) while they had the little one with no chair. I have no idea where their sixteen suitcases (slight exaggeration) were stored. I also should have known that when we were offered pancakes for breakfast the pancake ingredients (including oil for frying, cups for measuring and maple syrup for pouring) had come all the way from Canada in one of those sixteen suitcases.

05 9i

(The measuring cups from Canada)

I didn’t know these thing until later and I’m glad I didn’t because I really enjoyed the room and the pancakes and I didn’t feel even a little guilty.

05 9d

(Big rivets in the big door at the big castle in Edinburgh)

We hadn’t realised that Doris and Grahame were vegetarian… and they weren’t… but they seem to have started a new health regime, possibly? So… none of us ate meat for the three days and we walked… a lot. Denis has an app that tells you how many steps you’ve taken over the course of a day and we were walked an average of 15km. We may have led the Canadians to believe that this was normal for us… but the truth is we might top 2km a day, normally. So… we kept up with them and they kept up with us keeping up with them! There was a moment when someone mentioned the possibility of taking a taxi to the restaurant but Denis said “not at all, it’s just around the corner” and the rest of us smiled wanly at each other and trudged on for a further 2km.

05 9e

(Our guide around Edinburgh castle. Well… his kilt and socks and boots, anyway)

We saw Edinburgh castle (where the kings and Queens used to stay and fight), Holyroodhouse Palace (where the Queen sometimes stays and works) Marks and Spencer’s (where underwear is world-renowned) the Royal Mile between the castle and the palace and a beautiful castle called Tantallon near north Berwick – ahem, the town where Denis’ sister-in-law works… but we didn’t visit, sorry 😦

05 9l

(The Bass Rock as seen from Tantallon Castle. Why is the rock white? We wondered too and Doris investigated. Each white dot is a bird!)

We didn’t have any arguments which could have been because of all the gifts Doris bestowed on us (you remember I said she was generous.) I didn’t even mind that I had to wear two pairs of leggings, all my underwear, all my tops, my fleece and my rain coat on the plane home in order to fit the gifts.

05 9h

(The ruined abbey at Holyroodhouse Palace)

If you are thinking of going on holidays with some friends may I suggest you only go with the ones who give you the bigger bedroom, lots of gifts, make the breakfast, let you choose the restaurants and generally make you think you’re lovely people to spend time with… but don’t go with Doris and Grahame – they’re ours.

We’ll be back, Mairead.

Honeymoon in Edinburgh.

| Mairead

Scottish Flag

(The Scottish Flag)

We arrived in Edinburgh on Saturday afternoon. Twenty five years after we had planned to get there…. I wanted to go to Edinburgh for my honeymoon and Denis was happy to go too! But we never made it. At the time Denis was working on a cutting edge project. (Bear in mind it was 1985, cutting edge then looks boringly ordinary now.) It was also a secret project. Even from me. I had no idea what he did at work except he liked it. I soon found out.

1Edinburgh Castle

(Edinburgh Castle)

Unfortunately our honeymoon clashed with a very important work deadline. I was twenty four at the time and very set in my ways about the world, love came before deadlines and my honeymoon came before everything. Then his boss made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.

1Kilt

(They wear knee socks under their kilts)

I was invited to a meeting in his office, where I had to sign a non-disclosure agreement before the secret project was revealed to me. I think he thought if I knew how amazing the project was I would happily give up my honeymoon. I must have been ahead of my time because I thought it was boringly ordinary then. But the boss had daughters and he must have had an inkling that I would need a different kind of motivation. His offer: instead of Edinburgh he would pay for a honeymoon in New York and even throw in a trip to Disney World in Florida, but it would be a month after the wedding and Denis would be in New York for that month.

1Quote

(“Work as if you live in the early days of a better nation.” Alasdair Gray.)

That did it, we went to New York for our honeymoon. So a month after our wedding I was sitting beside the boss’s wife on my way to New York on my honeymoon. Sometimes we think we know exactly what we want and then something even better comes along. Maybe the thing you can’t have now will be yours in twenty-five years time or not at all, but something even more amazing can be yours right now….. the perfect exam results for the magical relationship, the perfect partner for a relationship with yourself, the perfect honeymoon for the thrills of Dumbo.

Take a look at what’s on offer to you right now, Mairead.

The Blinding Cold.

| Mairead

Fort William

(Loch at Fort William)

The sun is shining as I write and the sky is blue and I am toasty… but yesterday I was freezing. Not literally…. well maybe not freezing but very very cold. The day started sunny and the Loch was very calm. We were all dressed up in the bike gear putting our next location in the sat nav when I realised we didn’t have a next location – I hadn’t booked our next location. We were off to Edinburgh, it was a weekend and I had only last night overheard a conversation about the difficulty of getting accommodation during a weekend in Scotland, oops. But of course it was all fine, we still had internet, booking.com is still great and the rating system still works so within two minutes we had a lovely bed for the night within budget.

Wet Stones

(Scottish Stones)

So off we set, into the mountains. As we sped along the blue of the sky began disappearing and the sun was just a memory… I was feeling a cold breeze. I checked the temperature constantly because it definitely felt like negative figures on my back but no, it was 11 degrees, a new high for this holiday, but it didn’t feel high inside my jacket. We were travelling through beautiful scenery, snow capped mountains and waterfalls and none of it was having a comforting effect on me. Eventually I turned off the intercom because I was getting bored of my complaining.

Exercise

(Scottish Exercise)

Which gave me time to consider what was going on…. I was feeling colder than the thermometer was registering. So I was thinking, that it doesn’t matter how amazing life is outside, you just can’t see it (or feel it) if it’s freezing cold inside your jacket (metaphorically speaking.) Which is a shame because of the icy interior we could miss the beauty of our lives and there’s beauty in every life. Isn’t there? Stay warm inside because it’s spectacular outside and you really don’t want to miss it.

Be nice to yourself, Mairead.