Matt and Morgan flew up to Edinburgh the evening of day 7 so we got to spend day 8 together in Edinburgh! Of course the guys had to get in a golf round so Morgan and I shopped all the places the guys would have hated. It was so much fun!
We walked through Edinburgh after breakfast and enjoyed walking around the Edinburgh castle from all sides (except the inside for me... Matt and Morgan went inside the next day). It's so huge! I love how it is positioned on the hill, and you'll see in a later picture how prominent it sits as it can look over the water in the distance. Again, I just think back to hundreds of years ago when the position of this castle could mean days of preparations as they saw the enemy approaching.
This is actually from the entrance to the Edinburgh Castle. This is where (pictures later) the Royal Tattoo took place. It was fun adventuring with Morgan! She moves well for a preggo ;-)
The two pictures below are of the same view. It is from one of the ledges from the castle. So you can see how many miles away the water is, but what a great view. Imagine seeing ships come to shore and have days of preparations. Just amazing to me!
These were taken on the Royal Mile. This is a mile strip of castles and buildings with again, so much architecture! The overall look was more interrupted while we were there because of The Fringe show locations. Seriously, they stuck a show in every nook and cove they could so there was signage everywhere for them. But it was still amazing to walk up and down some of this strip.
And this picture was for my Chloe. She told me right away to get my picture with a bagpiper. This guy was funny, too. He asked me where I was from, to which I replied "United States, Kansas". He then responded with "Are you Dorothy?". I laughed and said "No, but it is funny that we are from Kansas and actually saw Wicked in London, a story that is based in Kansas." His quick response was "Why would you spend time in London?". Of course the residents of Scotland think they are better than those of England!
After walking through a fantastic flea market of vendors, the castle grounds, and through a fascinating Weaving Mill, Morgan really wanted me to have an Afternoon Tea experience.
Where else to have afternoon tea than the Waldorf Astoria? What a stunning building.
This was so neat! Good thing we split the desserts because we would have not put a dent in it otherwise.
Now to the boys. They took a train and a taxi to get to their golf course. While they claimed the rental clubs were difficult to use and it was windy, they did have fun despite their scores. Matt snapped a few pictures of Royce and of the course so he can remember such a pretty links-style course.
A windy day but a happy golfer. I'm so glad Royce got to golf in Scotland. We are thankful Matt was there to 'volunteer' to go with him. It's not everyday he'll be able to have this experience again!
Although the wind may blow the same in Kansas.....
Once we reunited after the tea and golf were compete, Morgan and I had a surprise in store for Matt and Royce. At this time we did not have tickets to the Royal Tattoo yet so we truly felt terrible when they thought we were going to surprise them with tickets to the show. Instead we took them to the lowest floor of the Weaving Mill to the photo booth.
"Suuuurrrrprrriiissseeeeeee............"
Thankfully after taking the pictures and laughing so hard at ourselves we found a scalper and locked in some tickets for the late performance of the Royal Tattoo! We had just enough time for the guys to grab some scotch samples and me to discover that I really like lime in my Captain and Coke.
This was an absolutely perfect ending for our last full day in Scotland. Matt and Morgan were just as excited to see the show as we were. You can think of a combination of half-time show, Olympic opening ceremony, and bagpipe festival. It was just amazing. Several branches of the United States military were represented as well. It was just amazing to sit back and watch the formations, dances, commentary, and hear the music.
The picture below is one of my favorite from the entire trip. I just love the colors, the excitement, and the symbol of topping off our trip with fireworks. It truly was the icing on the cake to see this show while we were there. The odds that we were in Edinburgh during the couple of weeks they have this show is just too cool.
On that note -- Good Night, Edinburgh!
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