Edinburgh

Atop Arthur's Seat

As generally happens during school holidays, Tom and I had a day out on the trains. I noticed the previous evening that advance tickets are available at very short notice on Virgin trains, so we managed to get return tickets to Edinburgh for £24, pretty good for a fairly long journey.

Nik dropped us off at Oxenholme station at about 10 o'clock, and our Pendolino (City of Edinburgh, ironically) turned up a few minutes late, but deposited us at Waverley station a few minutes early. The journey past pleasantly enough, with Tom writing up his cub camp diary and me doing a bit of work. Just as well we had things to do, as we managed to get seats with no view at all.

After a quick Trip Advisor search, we had lunch at a restaurant near the station called Tempting Tattie, where Tom had a baked potato filled with a mountain of prawn mayo and I had one with a similarly enormous quantity of delicious peppery haggis.

On the way down

This fortified us enough for our main activity of the day, a brisk stroll up Arthur's Seat, seemingly with every tourist in Scotland - I've never seen so many people up there. After the obligatory photos at the summit, we headed back down via a path I'd never been on before, but which gave great views over the city. We then walked back around the base of Salisbury Crags to the Royal Mile, where we had drinks and cakes, unfortunately sat next to the family from hell. I just don't understand how some parents can allow their children to behave so badly. It took me a great deal of willpower to prevent myself from saying something to them.

We still had a little bit of time before our train home, so we went window shopping along the Royal Mile, where most of the gift shops feature a dazzling array of Highland cows. The temptation was all too much for Tom, so we now have yet another Highland cow (McTavish) to add to the collection. There was one enormous example (Doris according to Tom) in the window of one shop, so I had to ask "how much is that cow in the window?". I decided £550 was probably a bit over budget.

Doris and Tom

After a brief period watching trains at Waverley station (a busy place!), we bought our tea at Marks and Spencer and boarded our train home. This time our seats faced backwards and still had very little view, but we pass the time eating, drinking, playing Top Trumps and, in Tom's case, writing a bit more of his diary.

Nik was there to meet us on the platform when we got back, and once we got home, Tom needed pudding (of course), and was then sent to bed to get some well-earned rest.

Another nice boys' day out. I wonder where we'll go next time.