We arrived in Edinburgh at Waverly Station and found the Royal Mile, a mile long stretch between Edinburgh Castle and Holyroodhouse Palace (the Queen's official residence in Scotland). This mile makes up the majority of Old Town, the original city of Edinburgh.
Some Scottish vocabulary (seen on the sign below):
Haggis: Scottish traditional dish made of sheep's intestine
Neeps: mashed turnips
Tatties: mashed potatoes
We found our hostel, dropped off our backpacks, and then attempted to take a free walking tour of the city. It was too cold. We bailed after half an hour and found a warm pub with warm food. We got a bit of history on Old Town, though, before we skipped out on the three hour tour....
We walked up to the castle, which sits perched upon a volcanic rock carved by glaciers during the Ice Age. We saved our visit into the castle for another day and just looked from afar.
At lunch the boys got Guinness and Irish coffee, fish and chips, and beef stew pasty pie. The pub was warm and festive, the food was great and it was a nice opportunity to rest our feet and defrost our toes before heading out into the freezing temperatures again.
After a nap back at the hostel (which was located on the Royal Mile) we found Edinburgh's winter carnival. This time I made Cameron ride on the swings with me, my favourite carnival ride. You can't really make out that it's us in the picture - but trust me, it's us. The carnival was situated off Princes Street, where the brand-name and high end shopping is located. This area of the city is New Town, and it used to be a loch, that they drained to expand.
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