UK Trip - Day 3
Today's trip started early. We had two giant places to cover and only one day to do so.
Today's agenda - Edinburgh Castle and Holyrood Palace!!!
We headed out at early morning to the castle first since it was quite a climb and we needed our energy.
It took us four hours to get through the castle but we did stop to have tea at Queen Anne's Tea Room... This lady doesn't move in empty tummy.
Today is the last weekend of Edinburgh Festival. Which means the Royal Mile was packed end to end. We finally made it to the bus stop to go to Holyrood Palace on the other end of the Royal Mile.
We went for the whole shebang even though my feet were crying for mercy.
They don't allow to take pictures within the Palace since it's a working Palace and is the residence of British Monarchy when they visit Scotland. Also, Scotland state related works are done here. However, the Palace is filled with priceless fabrics, artifacts, paintings etc. However, for me the highlight of the Palace was two paintings - one called Africa and the other India, painted by a Belgian painter who never visited either country and just painted whatever he could imagine. Talk about culture appropriation at its finest!!!
After the Palace, we landed in the Abbey which fell into ruins. If you ask me, the Abbey was more impressive with its Gothic architecture than the palace with its over-the-top displays.
The garden was gorgeous. I could just curl up under one of the trees to read a book while the evening breeze blows through my hair.
But since I have other priorities namely dinner, we got a move on to the Queen's Gallery.
Now let me tell you, we could have easily skipped that. May be that's why there's no option to just pick the Palace and the garden. They figure that if they give that choice, no one will visit the gallery.
However, today was a tiring day. We came out totally tired and starving. We looked around for some place to eat. There was a fancy looking pub on one side of the street right by the Palace and a hole in the wall looking place across the pub.
We tried our luck at the pub first. They said that they only have pizza until 6. Whaaaat? Just pizza until 6 and it's only 5? Mad or what? Hole in the wall it is.
We crossed the street and entered a quint little shop called "Oink". No point in guessing what they serve. Ah well, hungries can't be grumpies. So we ordered food and man, was it awesome or what!!! Best Pulled Pork Sandwich Ever and super cheap. Probably the cheapest meal we had since we came in Scotland and totally worth the money.
One thing for sure. Since we came to Scotland, we haven't had any disappointing meal. Everyone of them had been absolutely delicious. Talk about luck!!!
Decided to end the day with "Tattoo" - Scottish Military Show at Edinburgh Castle!!!
We managed to snag not only the last couple of tickets (at three times the prize) but also got lucky when the ticket guy exchanged our to tickets with tickets with better view absolutely free.
But the surprise of the day was Indian Navy performing at Scottish Military Tattoo for India's 70th year of Independence. I will share that video later. We were a little disappointed though that Canada didn't participate on their 150th year of confederation. But the show was awesome regardless.
After the show we dragged ourselves to bed. Tomorrow we are heading to Oban!!!
Today's agenda - Edinburgh Castle and Holyrood Palace!!!
We headed out at early morning to the castle first since it was quite a climb and we needed our energy.
It took us four hours to get through the castle but we did stop to have tea at Queen Anne's Tea Room... This lady doesn't move in empty tummy.
Today is the last weekend of Edinburgh Festival. Which means the Royal Mile was packed end to end. We finally made it to the bus stop to go to Holyrood Palace on the other end of the Royal Mile.
We went for the whole shebang even though my feet were crying for mercy.
They don't allow to take pictures within the Palace since it's a working Palace and is the residence of British Monarchy when they visit Scotland. Also, Scotland state related works are done here. However, the Palace is filled with priceless fabrics, artifacts, paintings etc. However, for me the highlight of the Palace was two paintings - one called Africa and the other India, painted by a Belgian painter who never visited either country and just painted whatever he could imagine. Talk about culture appropriation at its finest!!!
After the Palace, we landed in the Abbey which fell into ruins. If you ask me, the Abbey was more impressive with its Gothic architecture than the palace with its over-the-top displays.
The garden was gorgeous. I could just curl up under one of the trees to read a book while the evening breeze blows through my hair.
But since I have other priorities namely dinner, we got a move on to the Queen's Gallery.
Now let me tell you, we could have easily skipped that. May be that's why there's no option to just pick the Palace and the garden. They figure that if they give that choice, no one will visit the gallery.
However, today was a tiring day. We came out totally tired and starving. We looked around for some place to eat. There was a fancy looking pub on one side of the street right by the Palace and a hole in the wall looking place across the pub.
We tried our luck at the pub first. They said that they only have pizza until 6. Whaaaat? Just pizza until 6 and it's only 5? Mad or what? Hole in the wall it is.
We crossed the street and entered a quint little shop called "Oink". No point in guessing what they serve. Ah well, hungries can't be grumpies. So we ordered food and man, was it awesome or what!!! Best Pulled Pork Sandwich Ever and super cheap. Probably the cheapest meal we had since we came in Scotland and totally worth the money.
One thing for sure. Since we came to Scotland, we haven't had any disappointing meal. Everyone of them had been absolutely delicious. Talk about luck!!!
Decided to end the day with "Tattoo" - Scottish Military Show at Edinburgh Castle!!!
We managed to snag not only the last couple of tickets (at three times the prize) but also got lucky when the ticket guy exchanged our to tickets with tickets with better view absolutely free.
But the surprise of the day was Indian Navy performing at Scottish Military Tattoo for India's 70th year of Independence. I will share that video later. We were a little disappointed though that Canada didn't participate on their 150th year of confederation. But the show was awesome regardless.
After the show we dragged ourselves to bed. Tomorrow we are heading to Oban!!!
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