This summer has been pretty hot in the Netherlands, so I was really looking forward to our trip to Scotland. When me and my friend Kimberly (also check out her blog; The Travel Diary) initially booked the trip back in May, I was a bit worried about spending my summer holiday in a region that is so notorious for its bad weather. However, Scotland had been high up on my to-go list ever since I started watching the TV series Outlander. The snow-covered mountains, rolling hills covered with purple heather and abandoned castles really speak to the imagination.
Before our trip would really begin, we first had to get through the hardest part: the airport security. Since this is the first summer without mayor covid restrictions in most countries since the pandemic hit, most people are eager to finally go on their triple-cancelled holidays. This created a large rising in the number of tourists at airports around the world. Problem is that most airports had to fire a lot of their staff due to the travel bans and restrictions during the pandemic. By now these people have found other jobs and the airports are left with a shortage of security personnel. This resulted in long queues of sometimes up to four hours just to get through security. Schiphol Airport had already urged airlines to cancel some of their flights in order to keep the situation at the airport somewhat “under control”. Hence our early flight to Edinburgh of 7 am got rebooked to a flight at noon. In hindsight we were very happy this happened, since we didn’t have to go to the airport in the middle of the night so we could still get a good night’s rest.
After all the horror stories that we heard from our friends and on the news, we arrived at the airport four hours in advance just to be safe. It hardly took us 40 minutes to get through security. So with 3.5 hours to kill we ordered some frappuccinos at Starbucks until it was time to head for the gate.
Once we had arrived at the airport of Edinburgh we took the tram to the centre and walked to our hotel to drop of our bags. We were staying at the fancy Fraser Suites hotel, located just off the Royal Mile in the heart of Old Town. We barely had time to freshen up, since we had booked a free walking tour that was about to start. We both love going on free walking tours upon arriving in a new city, since it gives you some footing and the general layout and back story of the place that you’re visiting.
The tour started at the Royal Mile; the collective name for a succession of bustling streets that run through the centre of Old Town. From here we walked past Castle Rock with the magnificent and iconic Edinburgh Castle on top. I was surprised to hear that the castle was actually built on top of volcanic stone from a volcano that died out a long time ago. Arthur’s Seat, a large and imposing hill right outside the centre of town, is in reality also an ancient volcano. I had no idea that we had volcanoes this close to home. The tour guide also introduced us to a whole new concept that’s quite typical for Edinburgh: graveyard picnics. A quiet place can sometimes be a hard find in a bustling city, so the people of Edinburgh like to hangout at the Greyfriars Kirkyard. They treat the cemetery as if it were just any ordinary park and the cemetery stays open all day and night for people to relax. At the kirkyard you can find many ancient tombstones that date back hundreds of years. It comes to no surprise that the city’s most famous resident J.K. Rowling took some inspiration from this place. She even inspired some of the names from her Harry Potter books on names that she found here in the cemetery, like Tom Riddle, McGonagall and even Potter himself!
The most popular site near the kirkyard however, is the statue of Bobby the loyal Skye Terrier dog. The dog was once owned by John Gray back in the 19th century. John was a nightwatchman who always took Bobby with him on his patrols through the city. Both he and the dog were well-known by the locals and everyone greeted the pair whenever they ran into them. Sadly John got tuberculosis and he passed away, so the dog was left without its master. The dog however never left his side and remained at his master’s grave for allegedly 14 more years. People would pet him, give him some food and even build him a small dog house beside his master’s grave. Later, Bobby was also buried within the kirkyard. The dog’s loyalty has become famous and several books and and even movies have been written about him. People now come to the kirkyard to visit his statue and touch his nose for good luck. A really inspiring tale, much similar to the Japanese Hachikō (Hachi). During the tour we heard many more interesting stories, but some of them you should really find out for yourself. As our guide concluded the tour: ‘Edinburgh is a city of stories and by visiting the city, you yourself become a part of these stories’.
After the tour we set out for what was supposed to be a quick dinner before our next booked activity. We went to the Grassmarket; a bustling square with many old pubs and good places to eat. So that’s plenty of options, you’d think. We sat down at The Last Drop, a traditional Scottish pub, named for its historical location next to what used to be the gallows (your last drop, get it?). We ordered a pint and some food through the QR-code on our table. Not much later a waiter came to our table saying that we’d ordered food, but the kitchen wasn’t going to open for at least another half an hour. Since we didn’t have a whole lot of time, we decided to cancel our order and try our luck elsewhere. One pint was already half filled but the bartender assured me that his shift was almost over, so he’d be happy to relieve us of it. Getting our money back turned out to be surprisingly complicated, but eventually we got it and moved on to the next pub, the White Hart Inn. There was quite a queue but the kitchen was open. But when it was our turn to order, the barmaid told us that the kitchen was quite busy so the waiting time was at least 45 minutes. So we abandoned this pub as well and moved on to the next. The hungrier we got, the more desperate we became (we hadn’t had a proper meal all day) and we finally managed to get a great meal at the Black Bull.
We had a magical night ahead of us, since we were going to the Cauldron; a potion-making workshop inspired by Harry Potter. Upon entering you receive a wizard robe and a wand after which they take you to your table where you’ll make the potions. We shared our table with a friendly American-Mexican couple. For the first potion we had to tame a magical beast. Each beast provided another drink that you acquired by using your wand. For the other drinks we had to go through a bit of effort. From using the mortar and pestle to stirring in a smoking and bubbling cauldron, the results were absolutely delicious!
The next day we had some time to go out on our own, so we did a bit of research on where we would have our breakfast. We ended up at a place named SEVEN, where Kimberly ordered some waffles with fresh strawberries and I had a vegetarian Scottish breakfast, including some delicious veggie haggis! After our filling breakfast we walked to Edinburgh Castle. Unfortunately it wasn’t possible to get tickets at the spot for that day and we couldn’t enjoy the view from Castle Rock because of the giant stands that were built in preparation for the military tattoo, which yearly attracts well over 200,000 people. So since there was nothing to see or do at the castle, we visited the nearby Whiskey Experience. Even though we both aren’t fond of whiskey, we still very much enjoyed the whole experience. At the end we also got to keep our whiskey glasses that we used for the tasting of a whiskey of our choice. Afterwards we continued to walk in the direction of the Royal Mile, where we visited the Writers Museum. The museum is located inside the beautiful Lady Stair’s House, which is a sight to behold in itself. The museum houses manuscripts and personal items from some of Scotland’s best known writers: Burns, Scott and Stevenson. Following the museum we continued down the Royal Mile and turned into a random close (Scottish word for alley or court) and ended up at Cockburn Street; a picturesque curved street with beautiful medieval houses. We visited some shops and had some lunch at The Wall Coffee And Design House before we departed for Calton Hill, from where we had an iconic view over the old city with the Dugald Stewart Monument right in front of us. After we had properly enjoyed the view, we headed back to Old Town for the Harry Potter tour that we had planned for the afternoon.
Although no Harry Potter scenes were actually filmed in Edinburgh, the city’s still the birthplace of the Potter books since it formed a mayor inspiration for J.K. Rowling. As I mentioned earlier, she got a lot of inspiration for some of the names in her books from walking around the ancient cemetery. Also most of her books were written in the city’s cafes. She wrote her first book from the back room of The Elephant House overlooking Edinburgh Castle but unfortunately this cafe is currently closed for an indefinite amount of time due to a fire that broke out.
After the tour we walked back to New Town, where we had dinner at Lady Libertine; a restaurant with a fancy look, great food and good prices. The reason that we came this way was because we had a fun night planned at the nearby The Stand Comedy Club. The venue promised us a night filled with the best of Scottish comedy. We were joined by a Dutch girl whom we had met the day before during our walking tour. She was currently on a backpacking trip through Scotland by herself. We had told her about the comedy night and she had decided to join us. It was a great line up and we had a great time watching people getting roasted by the comedians. Afterwards we went back to Old Town, where had some drinks at Stramash; a venue with live music located on the popular Cowgate street. The building itself is actually an old restored church, which makes it a really cool location to enjoy some good live music.
The next day we had a busy program ahead of us; we were going on an organized trip to the Highlands! We got up at 7 am, got two coffees with some pastries and hopped on the bus. Our driver was wearing a tartan (kilt) and was complaining about the “heat” in Edinburgh lately. It was around 20 degrees Celsius (70 degrees Fahrenheit) and we were wearing our jeans and sweaters. For Scotland’s standards, the past few days had apparently been quite hot. After a short pitstop at Callander we entered the Highlands and left the Lowlands behind us. As we drove through Glen Coe we couldn’t stop drooling over the view. The green mountains (called a ben in Scottish) were very impressive and the occasional house looked tiny in the shadow of the mountainside. The tallest mountain is the Ben Nevis, which with its height of 1,345 m (4,413 feet) above sea level is also the tallest mountain in the UK.
The tour continued towards the famous and mysterious Loch Ness. There we first visited the ruins of Urquhart Castle with its iconic tower watching out over the lake. Loch Ness is with its length of 37 km (23 miles) the second-largest loch in Scotland. The water of the lake is extremely murky due to the high concentration of peat in the water, an excellent place for a monster to hide. . . According to our guide, National Geographic has even offered a large reward for the person who is able to provide clear images of the beast. What’s more, the BBC actually mentioned that the Scottish Government has a “partly serious, partly fun” plan in place, should the monster ever be found. If you ask me, this breathes even more life into the possible existence of such a creature.
From Urquhart Castle we took a boat across the lake so we could have a chance to search for the creature itself. If I hadn’t had to fight the ice-cold, piercing wind as to not get blown into the lake myself, I might have had a good shot at spotting Nessie. We got off the boat at the Dochgarroch Lock and continued to nearby Inverness. From there we drove all the way back to Edinburgh.
Once back in Edinburgh, we found that all the pubs had already closed their kitchens at around 9 pm, which we found a bit strange. One bartender advised as to go to OX184, an industrial-style late-night bar/restaurant where they would still serve food. We ordered some loaded fries and haggis bon bons (basically deep fried balls of haggis, similar to the Dutch bitterballen), which were quite tasty. After our “dinner” we went back to our hotel since the 12-hour long day trip had made us completely exhausted.
Today was going to be our final day in Edinburgh and we still had a mayor goal we intended to accomplish: climbing Arthur’s Seat. We needed to be fueled up for the climb, so we first had an amazing breakfast at EM’s Kitchen, a very cosy breakfast place near the popular The World’s End pub on High St. After breakfast we walked to the foot of the ancient volcanic rock. Climbing the hill had been Kimberly’s idea since some of her friends had recommended her to do so, since the view from the top is magnificent. In her enthusiasm however, it seemed that she had forgotten how much she hates climbing and before long I could read the look of regret of her face. But with some occasional stops and my cheerleading with Scottish thistles in each hand we finally made it to the top! We sat down on the rocks overlooking the whole region and cracked open our bottles butterscotch beer that we had bought earlier that week at one of the Harry Potter shops. It was a great way to take in the look of the city one last time, before heading back home.
Dawn Under 