Art & history & libraries!

Today was raining most of the day. But I have my raincoat and borrowed Sue's (broken) umbrella and took the tram one stop to the National Gallery. I saw the Andy Goldsworthy exhibit (£17, senior rate) which was great!




Then I walked to the Royal Mile, High Street, where our free walking tour started. On the way I had a very nice meal and got to talk to a mother/daughter from Catalonia at the next table. 

Graeme gave us a very good tour and said he was sure Scotland will someday separate from the U.K. This was after he tucked his name tag into his shirt!

At the end of the 2 hour tour (lots of walking, lots


of stairs), I was the first one to give him money (£20, or $27) and he said I was "magic" because I asked so many good questions. Ha!

On my way back to the National Gallery, I got distracted by the National Library. Although it's a research library,  it had a café, a store, an exhibit and history of café. I loved the exhibit about libraries! 





Comments

  1. AnonymousSeptember 3, 2025 at 4:05 PM

    Love all the pictures, Carla! You did a lot in one day! Claudia

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 2 of hiking trip

Image
Today we went on a long hike in the ancient woods of Glen Finglas with views of Loch Venacher. We expected rain so all of wore rain pants but the rain didn't come until late afternoon.  We walked for less than an hour in Callandar. I bought hand cream at a pharmacy and tea at a café.  Then we walked to Achray Farm serving homemade ice cream and coffee. There were many goats on this woman's farm but only one let us get close to her. I had lavender & chocolate ice cream. The owner is a retired clinical psychologist! We then went to Doune Castle,  made famous by Outlander and Monty Python,  but we were disappointed to hear they were closed for the day. We walked around the castle and the class clown knocked on the main door and almost fell down when a workman came out.  Group pic without Pauline and almost without me: Me, Gaelle, Stephanie (U.S.), Tess (Australia), Alistair (England), Stefan (Netherlands), Tate (Tess' brother, Australia)
Read more

First impressions

Image
I am here in Edinburgh as of an hour ago but I am exhausted,  having hardly slept in my aisle seat.  First impressions of this busy neighborhood near Sue from 5W: it's windy, cloudy, people are pretty friendly, don't order Mexican food (huevos rancheros at Heathrow was weird, with raw red onion), the Airlink was easy and luggage racks plentiful (versus our light rail that has space for 2 suitcases). There was a plastic container with cherry pits but generally I haven't seen much litter or graffiti after my half hour bus ride! I was worried because I hadn't made proper arrangements with Sue but then she emailed me (and hadn't seen my text nor email a half hour before I got hers!). I was even looking at cheap hotels. My eyes hurt and I'm wearing my glasses.
Read more

Money, money, money!

Image
My head is spinning at how expensive everything is in Scotland (okay, I'm not there yet and buses and museums will probably be very cheap)! A private room in a "youth" hostel is $75/night! A hotel room is costing me $161 to $175! Divided by 2 people is not bad but for a solo traveler, it is very costly indeed.  Maybe I won't be eating out more than once every two or three days! A scone and tea for dinner? But it's not just me experiencing the solo traveler syndrome! "Plunging Dollar Leaves American Travelers with Less Buying Power This Summer" https://www.wsj.com/finance/currencies/us-dollar-value-spending-power-travel-aeae581a
Read more