August | 2013 | MidLife Traveller

Monthly Archives: August 2013

August 4, 2013 · 3:05 am

Discovering the buses and the Britannia in Edinburgh

5th June 2013

Aha, I went to the train station just nearby and asked about catching a train to the city, the nicest man at the ticket office gave me a map, took me outside and showed me where to catch a bus to town. Much easier and cheaper than the train he told me. So, armed with my new-found information I then caught another bus from the city down to the port area to see the royal yacht Britannia.

It’s the funniest thing, you go into a shopping centre to access the yacht – who’d have thought? They have the gift shop in the shopping centre, it’s massive, and as the centre is right on the water, they have steps and gangways connecting the two, amazing.

HMY Britannia, Edinburgh

I’m sure it wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea but I was really keen to have a look at it, also, it’s something a bit different to most of what I’ve been seeing. I even had tea and cake in the café on board, not sure I was sitting where the royals sat but you can’t have everything can you.

She was built in 1952-3 and sailed over one million nautical miles and there’s not one nut or bolt or whatever holds ships together on here outside skin. That’s about as technical as I get – the bit about nothing marring the outside skin stuck with me, it’s something I wouldn’t even notice but supposedly is quite significant.

Rolls Royce on board the Britannia

The Rolls Royce car in a special garage on the deck was something you don’t see every day either. Why wouldn’t you take your car with you on a sea voyage? Considering she was decommissioned not that long ago, or so it seems to me, it seems quite dated and not overly elaborate . I remember my family having plastic saucer chairs just like the ones on board. I can’t see we had the same standards or quantity of china or silverware though.

Plastic saucer chairs, Britannia

I had an absolutely great time traipsing around from top to bottom and yet again was sorely tempted in the souvenir shop – but I didn’t break, yay me!

I got back to the city okay but went too far on the next bus. I’d asked the driver if he went near the train station close by the apartment, yes, he said, so on I got. Well, we might have gone near it but we didn’t see it so I was merrily sailing along, way past where I wanted to be. I started to get worried when we went on a bloody freeway – crap, where the f$*k are we going? Anyhow, at the next stop I asked the smug looking so-and-so, and he let me off and gave me directions on how to get back.

He would have to be about the tenth male in England to give me that “how has she made it this far” look. But, on the bright side, I only had to walk back about 15 minutes – I should have just walked from the city, I’d have been better off. Ah well, another lesson learnt today – don’t be lazy – just walk!

Cafe on board the Britannia

Just a tiny selection of the silverware on the Britannia

And just a bit more

Yeah okay, it’s a bit flasher than your average tinny!

Fosters on tap on the Britannia!

Ooooh, love sailor uniforms

Selfie on the Britannia

Wheelhouse Britannia

Engine room Britannia

Britannia engine room

HMY Britannia

First day in Edinburgh

4th June 2013

Do you know, I don’t think I’ve ever been inside a terrace house until Glasgow, I’ve admired them for years and have always wondered what they’d be like inside. Well, I stayed in one in Edinburgh too, in a studio apartment on the ground floor, and it was just gorgeous – except for being able to hear the people in the lower floor apartment getting it on one night! I don’t know about everyone else, but I feel like I’m doing something wrong when I can hear other people’s intimate moments, like a voyeur or something – oh well a pillow over the head does wonders.

My first sight of Edinburgh Castle

It was just a ten minute walk (if you didn’t get lost) to the centre of town. My first morning walking, I visited the red light district, saw lots of interesting signs for lap dances and similar fun, but was too concerned with getting back on track to take any photos. It’s always the way isn’t it? You think of these things after the fact, or at least I do.

Anyhow, I wasn’t too far off course and next thing you know I was at the base of the walls of Edinburgh Castle! Mind you, it took another ten minutes to walk around to the front to get inside. It was the longest queue I’ve come across so far and the hottest too, the weather is just perfect.

Heading to Edinburgh Castle through the stadium for the Tattoo

Edinburgh Castle is not at all as I expected. I always thought it was just a castle, but it seems more like a little settlement perched up on a mountain in the middle of the city. There’s an enormous paved area outside the walls where the Edinburgh Tattoo is held in August and they seemed to have half the grandstands erected already. That was my first surprise, that the tattoo is held outside the castle walls.

Waiting for the cannon to fire at Edinburgh Castle

You could easily spend all day wandering through the different parts of the castle and all the other buildings. I had a lovely lunch at one of the eateries, overlooking the city; it felt like it was a million miles away but really only a few minutes walk. I’d read somewhere that they fire a cannon each day at 1pm so when I came across a huge crowd of people, with cameras and phones held in the air, all pointing in the same direction, I used my amazing powers of deduction and figured they were waiting for the cannon to fire. So, instead of doing the same thing, and because I couldn’t see the cannon either, I started filming them, they were so intent on capturing the exact moment. I almost dropped my camera and wet my pants all at the same time when it went off, it was an absolute monstrous bang! I was in good company though, just about everyone had the same reaction.

Second and biggest surprise was that NOTHING in Edinburgh is free! Everywhere I went I was paying entrance fees, which is normal really and I usually don’t even comment, but having just spent a week in Glasgow where there are free museums and attractions all over the place, it came as a bit of a rude shock.

National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh

I had wandered down Edinburgh’s Royal Mile from the castle, and as you can only window shop, without buying anything for so long, I headed to the National Museum of Scotland. What an unbelievable place, it’s huge and full of Celtic, Viking and Roman history as it relates to Scotland, as well as science and technology, art, you name it, there’s a gallery for it here. I just love wandering the streets. looking at buildings and people, but honestly I could have spent days instead this building instead of just hours.