June 17th, 2012

Day 28: Dublin, Ireland & Edinburgh, Scotland

Happy birthday Andrew! And Happy Father’s Day pops!! (and to all the Dad’s out there!)

This morning started really early at about 3:30. I woke up in Dublin, got the last of my stuff packed into my backpack and hailed a cab to the airport. I was unnecessarily early as per usual, and after I cleared security, I spent the rest of the time half-sleeping in a really comfortable armchair in the Starbucks lounge area.

My flight went very smoothly, only about 40 minutes to Edinburgh! I tried to sleep the whole time to make up for lost time last night, but to no avail. I arrived at the airport, got some GBPs out of the ATM, and then hopped on a bus to the city center! The last stop on the bus was a 5 minute walk from my hostel (which is right on the Royal Mile) so I dropped in there to get settled!

I was unable to check in until 2pm, but they held on to my luggage for me and I got the things I’d need for the day into a bag. I talked to the girl behind the desk (a very pleasant German girl who’s been living in Edinburgh for about 7 years) about things to do and she gave me some great suggestions! The weather was pretty shifty it’d been raining on and off all morning- but I decided to go on a walking tour at 11 with Sandeman’s Free Walking Tours. I knew they did these tours in other places that are on my agenda, but not here!

I lucked out with an awesome tour guide, Neale, and we got started on our tour around the city right at 11. I was actually the only one from America on the tour (and maybe this is my subconscious ethnocentrism coming out) but I was kind of surprised! I was outnumbered by Australians, Germans, a few Brazilians and some girls from China! We did short introductions and it seemed to be a really great group.

The first stop we made was to the City Hall-type building (the official name escapes me) where Neale ran through about 2,000 years of Scotland’s history. We talked a bit about the events depicted in the movie ‘Braveheart’, the Scottish-English relations, the original tribes who settled Scotland, etc.

From there, we moved on to the (name) right across the way. It used to be the place for public punishment, as well as a place for very important announcements. Neale said that if someone was caught stealing, their ear would be nailed to the wooden door along the side and the members of the town were able to throw rotten vegetables (& sometimes even human waste!) at them for the next 24 hours as their punishment. A thief would also have the option of ripping their ear from the door scarring it irreparably) thereby permanently marking them as a criminal. Pretty sick stuff! Luckily we were assured that this no longer happens as a measure of justice.

I don’t have a photo trail of where we next and in what order because it was raining and I didn’t want to ruin my camera, but I can recount some places!

We visited a courtyard where Robert Burns, most recently voted THE most influential Scottsman ever, lived. He is famous for his poetry about love and about Scottish culture and independence. We walked by Edinburgh Castle, which is a very very impressive structure, and also saw a temporary stadium that had been set up in preparation for the Edinburgh festival in August. We went by the shop that J.K. Rowling wrote many of her Harry Potter books in, and also visited the school and graveyard that she also frequented for inspiration. The school was an old gothic style school that was originally for orphans (very nice coincidence, Harry) and I saw several names that were utilized in the books on the headstones in the graveyard (such as McGonagall and Riddle)!

Edinburgh Castle

The Elephant House!

We ended in the East Gardens in New Town on Princes Street, and then a few of the Australians and I joined Neale as he went to the Sandeman hangout, a bar called 1780. At 1780, I bought a ticket for the pub crawl later that night and also had some lunch- Haggis! It’s one of those ‘When in Rome’ experiences, and the way the bar prepared it was actually absolutely delicious. I was too eager to eat, otherwise I would have taken a photo of the dish (sorry!), but it was a circular layered plating of mashed potatoes on the bottom, turnips in the middle, and seasoned haggis on top. Delicious!

Afterwards, I came back to the hostel to officially check in and put my stuff away in a locker. I got myself settled in, did a bit of looking around online for things to do and then decided just to go for another walk since it looked like the rain was letting up. A lot of things close early on Sunday, so I just did a bit more sightseeing to parts of the city I hadn’t yet been to!

The intersection near my hostel

Standard U.K.

Ah, life's necessities

From Northbridge

Greyfriars Bobby's symbolic headstone! Greyfriar used to mind the graveyard/church grounds here, and he had a loyal pup named Bobby, who even after Greyfriar died, returned to visit his master's gravestone every day!

Adam Smith, the father of economics (I think)

The hostel I’m at offers a great deal on dinner for the night with Burgers and chips for only 3.5gbp so that’s what I did for dinner. Afterwards,  I got ready and went just around the corner to meet up with the group for our first pub on the pub crawl. We went to some pretty great spots overall and had an awesome time!