Edinburgh

And then there was "Edinborough", the start of our trip. Our Airbnb was perfectly located midway on the Royal Mile. As a regular VRBO traveller it pains me to say, that we now sometimes have to use Airbnb's, just because they are more and more at locations where we want to stay.
 
Our lodging above the bar smack in the middle of the Royal Mile in Old Town
Allan was a perfect host with welcome goodies and a bottle of wine, coffee and tea and toilet paper as well as all bathroom toiletries for a week. We had to only shop for food. Even hotels don't provide that much service.
 
We thank Laura and Michael for a wonderful evening and the lesson in scotch sampling
As we were planning the details of our trip to this country we had long desired to visit, we made contact with the minister who married us in Amsterdam in 2011, then an assistant minister at our Amsterdam Scottish Reformed Church in the Begijnenhof. 
 
Don't think I want to live above this store
  Royal Botanic Gardens
We were the first wedding Michael Mair officiated and he has now his own congregation in a working neighborhood in Edinburgh. That first day in Scotland was a Sunday, so we walked to a park to meet him and his lovely wife Laura during a tent service, held by several local religious institutions, celebrating the start of a children park activities week. 
 
The famous WWII beer drinking soldier bear, who carried munitions for the soldiers
That evening we had dinner and following that did a whiskey tasting of 10 different distilleries.
It was good to be driven back in a cab that evening.
 
 View from Princess Street towards Old Town
Edinburgh has a compact city center. Princess street divides old town to the right looking upwards towards the castle from new town, a completely different landscape, laid out on land gradually sloping to the northern waterside of the Firth of Forth, the large loch-like body of water connecting to the North Sea. 
 
Entrance to the Edinburgh Castle
With traces of human occupation since 8500 BC, this city is an archeologists dream. Earlier mentioned King David I, founded the Royal Burgh in the early 12th century, most likely on the remnants of earlier fortifications on the top of the Royal Mile. 
 
Not easy to conquer in those medieval times
It is a place full of lore that only Scots can compile or describe, like nick naming it Auld Reekie, best describing the aromas that dominated the old town. 
 
Visiting the Royal ship Brittanica is a must do when in Edinburgh
 
Table laid for State Dinners
 
The "cozy private quarters"
 
The engine room; we were told it always looked like that during its working life, spotless
It was here in Edinburgh that in 1724 Margaret Dickson was hanged on the Grass Market gallows. However she "woke up" a few hours later and was set free since her punishment had been meted out.
 
We were there during a week of Jazz Festival and attended a show
Scottish law books had to be amended with the words "until dead", because of her. I wonder if she grew an inch or two from this experience, since she now could keep her head high.
 
Behind the top left window the jealous husband of Queen Mary snatched her private male secretary 
from her and subsequently killed him
It was in Old Town that the precursor of High Rises was invented, as lack of space on this rock outcrop created houses 11 stories high.
One could even say that democracy was realized here, since in those 11 story highrises, noble, judge, cabbie shopkeeper and mechanic, just to name a few, shared the same staircase.
 
In front of this 1617 museum we visited, this owl drew a crowd
 
Pictures of the museum showing 17th century aristocratic living conditions in Old Town
 
The creation of Great Britain emptied the city of politicians and aristocracy. The void however, leaving the brainies behind without supervision of afore mentioned, led to Edinburgh becoming a hotbed of genius, creating a well lauded Faculty of Medicine, doing autopsy research, being supplied by murdering body snatchers, the most famous one among them, William Burke, ending up himself on the table after being hanged for his misdeeds.
 
During that same period New Town was developed and we visited an aristocratic home there
 
Also the Academy of Science and Letters and the Edinburgh Musical Society flourished here.
 
It is thus no wonder that Edinburgh was the birthplace of famous citizens, worth mentioning, my choices at least, and they are: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, JK Rowling, Sir Walter Scott, Alexander Graham Bell, Charles Darwin, James Young Simpson (never heard of him, but he found how Chloroform could be used as Anesthesia), John Knox, John Witherspoon (one of the, once here maligned, signers of the American Declaration of Independence), Adam Smith (my hero in college) and Tony Blair, just to name a few. 
 
Beautiful restaurant setting in Victorian New Town 
New town is a well preserved Victorian neighborhood, build in a period of about 20 years, killing the real estate prices in the old town as the rich left for new large family style housing, away from the smelly 2nd or 3rd floor apartment style living.
 
                                         Much spacier than a home in Old Town could ever be
We visited a home that Britains National trust owns and has furnished in period style. We had dinner in a restaurant called the Dome that was once the surgeons hall of the city, where students were trained. However it was built way over budget and the college of physicians sold the building to the Bank of Scotland. It is always easier to buy with other people's money as banks have been doing for centuries. But really a beautiful building.
 
Sir Walter Scott statue so large I couldn't get him and his statue in one picture; the spire above him rivals church spires
Wide streets, statues, parks, plazas all so different from the the old town cozy clutter of alleys.
 
Couldn't resist showing you another flower from the arboretum
In short it will be a pleasure to return to this city and explore it more.

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