After a very late night last night, due our flight into Edinburgh being late, a certain couple of country bumpkins being last through customs, and then missing the stop for our hotel on the bus into town, we needed to sleep in a bit this morning. After a nice breakfast at the hotel, we headed out into a lovely day for our first taste of Edinburgh. We spent most of it exploring Edinburgh castle and the gardens surrounding it. We did the audio tour, but had to give up about ⅔ of the way through, as we were overwhelmed with both the mind-boggling twists and turns of Scottish/British history, and the sheer number of tourists that were doing the same thing we were! How many of you knew that several Scottish Kings had titles like James the 6th of Scotland and 1st of England?? Anyway here are some random photos from the tour:
Above is the view from near the top of the castle, looking NE out over Edinburgh. In the distance are several landmarks we hope to explore when we’re back next week.
You know I can’t resist stained glass…
…nor flowers! Especially giant rhododendron shrubs.
More stained glass (love that purple).
After grabbing a little ice cream to boost our strength, we headed back to the hotel to meet our old friends Doug & Sue, from Berthoud, CO, who are joining us on the bike tour. I’ve known Doug since kindergarten, and as couples, the four of us have been pals for almost 40 years! It’s so wonderful that they said they wanted to join us when I told them about this bike tour. It’s been way too long in the making.
Anyway, they arrived very shortly after we got back to the hotel, and we went together to pick up the bikes. After doing that, what else could we do but enjoy a lovely sunset warmup ride on one of Edinburgh’s many bike paths:
That’s Sue, Doug & Mallory, respectively. It is so great to be doing this ride together.
Tomorrow, it’s day one; Edinburgh to Dunbar. Stay tuned!
