The Grand Tour: Scotland The Brave

On day seven of our cruise we were finally in Scotland. A country I have longed to go to for years. Our ship docked a fair distance from Edinburgh, but we had a shuttle (For a fee) that took us to the train station, and from there we took an express train (About 20 minutes) into the heart of Old Edinburgh. The train station is impressive, and busy, and I would have liked the opportunity to poke around, but we had some serious sightseeing to do. As we walked out of the train station there were several HOHO buses. This time we decided to ride a full circuit first, and then on the second go around get off where it looked appealing. Our first stop was to see the statue of Grayfriars Bobby , the famous faithful dog, that kept watch over his master’s grave for so many years. Then we went to Grayfriars Church to see Bobby’s grave, and finally it was off to the nearby pub to try Haggis. Now Haggis has never sounded appealing to me, but I wanted to give it a go. We got an appetizer size, that was served with a dollop of mash potatoes (Could have used butter & salt), mashed turnips (Delicious). As for the haggis itself, the taste wasn’t bad, but I didn’t care for the texture. My husband really enjoyed it though.

After that we went to the National Museum of Scotland which was free, to see the Mary, Queen of Scots exhibition, which was not free.

Back on the bus we made our way to the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the official residence of The Queen when in Scotland. If the Queen is there, it is of course closed to the public, but August usually finds her at Balmoral, so we were able to tour. It’s very pretty as castles go, not as opulent as one might expect for a queen, or king’s residence. There was one room that had been the bedroom of Many, Queen of Scots, which had her bed and other personal items, and that was neat to see. All too soon we had to head back to the railway station, catch the train to meet the shuttle, and get back to the ship for the main event; The Tattoo.