SCOTLAND ~ Edinburgh!

My second time here!  The first was negligible, though.  I was here on police academy business, way back in 2007, and my colleague and I (I've even forgotten his name) were invited to the Scottish Police College for a week of exposure.  I gave a couple of lectures.  Don't know if the sargeant who welcomed us still works there, but she was a really lovely person.

Got up at 05.40, packed in the final bits, made myself a cup of tea, hung the laundry that had been washed overnight, then woke up AW as we had agreed, and he drove me to the train station, same as two weeks ago.  Silly me, I did not read the platform number correctly, so missed the train I wanted to catch, so left half an hour later, but it turned out all right as what I had read as departure time for the flight turned out to be the time the gate was going to be closed, so I was actually half an hour 'earlier', but this got eaten up by the EasyJet queues.  No problem, still made it to the gate way on time.  Before going through the whole thing, though, bought some tulip bulbs and wafels, and put them in my check-in luggage, together with the cheese and Dutch sausage, so that 85% of the total weight (less than 10 kg. but I had bought a 15-kg. allowance) was made up of gifts.  I won't be seeing her, though, till the second half of my trip, but 6 nights in Edinburgh should give me enough time to rest my tired, painful arms.

No time for breakfast at home, and no time before departure, and no patience for EasyJet food, and our flight was delayed half an hour, so I stuck with it till we landed, after which I tried to take the bus recommended by my Airbnb hostess, but the driver didn't know what road to stop by, so ended up taking a cab.  No problem.  She was, herself, arriving at Edinburgh from somewhere else, but her partner was at home to show me around.  After settling down and a toilet stop, took the regular bus to town, where I was 'shocked' to discover that the Fringe Festival was going on -- the city centre was one large and fairly thick crowd.  I wanted more than junk food, but while I was looking for a decent place to eat, there was enough to see, watch, and shoot.  This was taken on the Royal Mile en route to the castle.  I also met one of those tamers of wild birds and tried carrying (I don't think that is the right word) a rather large owl -- she was a beauty!  See extra shot.

Just before I got to the esplanade, I noticed a small passageway leading to what looked like a cozy place, and discovered a proper restaurant.  The maitre d asked if I would like to eat, and of course I said 'yes'.  It was only after I had sat down and ordered that I discovered that it was a restaurant that has been patronized by J K Rowling, Roger Federer, Leonardo di Caprio, and other famous people.  I quickly looked at the prices of what I had ordered and was relieved to discover that, compared to other items, they were reasonably affordable ... hahahaha!

Mood improved, I toured the castle.  There's an extra of myself taken by someone else.  I only had a little more than an hour left, so took full advantage of the time, and then decided to call it a day, especially as both my feet had cramp.  I blamed the uneven pavement stones, but I think I was just plain knackered.  Took the bus back to the suburbs, downloaded my photographs, replied to one email from the Viking, then fell into a thankfully deep sleep.