- Royal Botanical Gardens
- Water of Leith & St Bernard's Well
- Dean Village
- La Plaza Bistro
- The Georgian House
- Edinburgh Castle (shut down!)
- Royal Mile
- Rose Street Brewery
Walking today was probably a record for our trip - 9.5 miles! I told Yelena that I could just walk with her back and forth to work everyday, moving forward, and we could keep up this level of activity.
We started out this morning walking north to the Royal Botanical Gardens. It was about a mile from our suite, through mostly residential, urban area. We got a latte and croissant along the way. The garden is in a 70 acre area and access is free to the public. Many, many species of trees, shrubs and plants, it's a peaceful break from the city hubbub. We wandered for about an hour, checking out different spots and resting at the on-site cafe.
We continued west, following along the Water of Leith, which is a river that flows through the city of Edinburgh and exits into the bay at the Port of Leith. There is a very scenic walkway that follows along it's banks. Very recommended! We walked all the way west until reaching Dean Village, a scenic historical village previously mentioned by our distillery tour guide. I thought Dean Village was less worthwhile than the hike to get there. The village is scenic, I suppose, but small and not much to do once there.
So we started our hike back to the city center. I forgot to mention that when walking around the soccer fields west of the botanical gardens, we were nearly blown out feet. The wind was incredibly strong.
We sat down to eat at La Plaza Bistro just on the walk back from Dean Village. I had a brie and bacon sandwich, hoping to relive sandwich magic from a couple days ago, but it was not to be. This one was a fine sandwich, but couldn't replicate the original. I did however have a "Sunshine" smoothie, which is basically all the fruits, blended with OJ.
While eating, we got an email from our castle reservation stating that our ticket was being refunded because they were closing the castle due to high winds. The castle is on top of a mountain, so I would imagine high winds could be very dangerous. As I mentioned before, we were nearly swept off our feet walking across a soccer area.
"The Georgian House" was not far from us after lunch, and on the city pass, so we stopped there next. It's a historical, preserved home from the 1800s, with dining, drawing room, kitchen, etc as it was over 200 years ago. The gist of it, unless you were the manor lord, life sucked! Servants worked non-stop, in hot cramped quarters to supply the food and drink for the lord's frequent parties. It was very important to show off wealth through food, silverware, plate ware, etc. The house had VERY enthusiastic volunteers from a local historical society in every floor. They were very kind and informative, but I was always edging toward a room exit as they told us about the next tray or toasting fork.
After the Georgian House, we returned to base to consider afternoon options. We decided to walk up to the castle anyway to see how close we could get. The answer was "not very close at all" as they had the entire approach at the end of High Street closed (a couple hundred yards out). So we walked around outside, snapped some photos, and walked back down the Royal Mile.
We decided to head back to Rose Street, in the new town side of things, for dinner. We opted for the Rose Street Brewery for dinner. Yelena had gnocchi and I had sausage, haggis blended, and mash. AND, a sticky toffee pudding for dessert. Why did I wait until our last night in the UK to start getting pudding? Yum.
Back home and packing for the run trip tomorrow.
