Edinburgh Day 3 Evening

We had High Tea in Edinburgh Castle. Fancy, eh?

A full day is not enough time to absorb all the stories of this castle. Magnificent! Artifacts from pre-Roman times were found at the site, but the rock walls were constructed from the 1300’s through present day. A lot of human history is present. This is a real Castle Rock!

View of castle from north. Our room is to the west of the castle. It’s all uphill to get there.

View from castle, looking north toward the Firth of Forth.

A Church in the castle.

View of city from road going down from castle.

My favorite part was the Renaissance Musician who played 7 ancient instruments and told stories about them and about himself. Some instruments looked difficult to play, and the sounds of others were strange to our current-day ears. The most complicated one was the hurdy-gurdy which sounded a little like the bagpipes. He started and ended his act with that one.

Fun costume!

Reading about the castle prior to arriving here, I had the impression that it dominated the city’s skyline. It might have, historically, but now it is difficult to see from many places, including the area around our hotel. Perhaps it was hard to see in the past, too, because the topography is astonishingly variable and STEEP. Bridges have been built between mounds of rock. The castle sits on a 340 million year old volcanic plug, possibly the throat of a volcano. It stands high, but other volcanic plugs nearby are just as high. Our old friend from yesterday’s excursion, James Hutton, described the volcanics in his studies of the area.

Back to the castle and what we saw today.

Some gold on the outside, was bright in the sunshine today.

The Great Hall stored hundreds of swords on the wall and tens of coats of arms. This was also the room where the musician played. The back wall was decorated with guns!