Walking

Sunday May 19, 2026

Edinburgh

Weather: more sun than not, showers (while we were at Edinburgh Castle) about 10 degrees.

This first picture is of a house for sale on the street where we are staying. Out of curiosity, I looked it up online to see the asking price: £940,000. But that means the vendor won't entertain offers lower than that. If you are interested in the house, you need to make an offer in the vicinity of ask + 20% otherwise, too bad, so sad. Apparently the seller has told her neighbours they "will be happy" with the price. 

We had two excursions planned today: Edinburgh Castle - jammed pack with tourists - and a tour of the Real Mary Close "underground city" - an area of Edinburgh 

Random architecture walking today.

This is a "California Lilac"

Edinburgh Castle is set upon volcanic rock high above the city with a fairly steep climb up to the front gate. Even though the location has evidence of occupation for thousands of years, oldest elements of the castle date back to around 900 AD. The castle changed hands a number of times over the centuries, which is amazing because it looks so formidable. There are endless displays inside and, while we spent about three hours inside, we barely scratched the surface. And even though we are here in "shoulder" season, it was absolutely jam packed. Often it was difficult to move amongst the exhibits because there were so many people trying to squeeze through narrow doorways. I did note that when we entered, signage indicated it was "sold out" for the day and to book online in advance.

Dog cemetery within the walls. The dogs had belonged to various commanders or regiments stationed at the castle.

Check out that caption from 1331.

Our next stop for the day was a walk straight down "The Royal Mile" road to "The Real Mary King's Close". For the record,  a "close" is a street and Mary King was a resident on the street in the mid 1600s. She was a young widow with four children who advocated for the community, had a seat on the civic council and was able to vote - uncommon for a woman of the era. The street was a narrow, steep street that had been covered, along with three adjacent streets, by buildings which were constructed on top of the foundations of old buildings along the close Our tour took us down into homes that had remained after the construction on top of the street. It was grim. Rooms with low overhead, dirt floors in places, fireplaces that did have chimneys but surely, smoke would have billowed in the rooms. This tour was less about "history" and more about "kitsch". We were not allowed to take pictures I'm sure because they felt that would diminish sales of souvenirs. 

At dinner, we talked about how we both wished we had planned longer for Edinburgh. It is a great walking city - and we have done a lot of walking, there are plenty of opportunities for excursions or just looking at architecture or the sites.

Entrance to Edinburgh Castle.

The Royal Mile, a road that stretches from Edinburgh Castle to the Palace of Hollyrood House, the King's official residence in Scotland.