Edinburgh Castle

Thursday we started our day by taking Nigel (our rental car) back. That sounds really simple but our travel agent (aka- Me) mistakenly thought it would be a good idea to arrange the car drop off point to be at Waverly Station- which means that I forced my husband to drive the car right in the very heart of Edinburgh, to a drop of location we couldn't seem to find...Oops. Brynt is pretty much super man, he kept his cool and after circling around three or four times, and just about giving up, we found the tiniest sign that directed us to the basically hidden underground entrance to the parking garage. Thank Goodness!
  We had devoted basically the whole day to seeing Edinbugh Castle, which was a good idea because we spent almost the whole day there. This castle, unlike some of the others we have seen, is not just one large structure, it is a military fortress set atop a huge hill.

The castle is more of a small city, there are lots of buildings, intertwined, jumbled up, high and low... its amazing!

We were able to take a brief tour right when we got their which gave us a great overview of what some of the main structures and what each of their history was.
The oldest structure is the Chapel of St. Margaret. It was finished in 1130 by Queen Margaret's son in honor of his mother who had been killed. Her husband was Malcom II who is the one that killed Macbeth. Anyway, back to the chapel. It is tiny compared to the rest of the buildings, and really not very special looking from the outside but the inside is a really extraordinary little chapel, and it was incredible to sit in something nearly 900 years old that is still in use today (in fact, there was a christening happening the day we were there).

The Palace is where the Honours of Scotland (Crown Jewels) and the Stone of Destiny are housed. You can't take pictures of the jewels, but they were amazing.

One of the most powerful buildings we entered was the Scottish National War Memorial. This building was established after WWI and honors all the Scottish men and women in all military branches who have been killed in war since that time. We walked around looking at the stained glass, the words engraved in stone and the the gravity of the many books lining the walls that were filled with names. Brynt made an interesting point as we left, there were people lined up and crunched together to see the crown jewels but only a few in the war memorial, sometimes its sad to see what we value most.

After the war memorial it was almost 1 O'clock so we waited for the the 1 O'clock cannon  to go off. The Scots are know for their frugality and thrift- I have heard things like, " A Scotsman has deep pockets and short arms" and all throughout our trip we were told stories and saw examples of this. Their is a joke that is applies to the  one O'clock gun as well, Why one and not twelve? Well, firing one is cheaper :) The truth of it was that the gun is fired at one to alert ships in the harbor of the exact time. This is no longer needed, but the tradition still goes on.

We then made our way to the Great Hall. This building is amazing, though only the roof is completely original, it was the 1400s (might be 1500s), in Victorian times the walls and windows were redecorated. They are fantastic though, and the roof is amazing.

While there were able to see a presentation done on Queen Margaret, super fun and educational.

Ok, I am realizing that if I keep going on like this, this post will be incredibly long. By this point in our day at the castle we were realizing (as we had many times on this trip) that learning history is like trying to drink from a fire hose... or Niagara Falls. There is so much, and it literally makes your brain hurt.
We also visited the original Tower,

The prisoner of war prison,

Three exhibits of different branches of the military and their history as well as the National War Museum (and yes, all of these things are housed within the Castle).

After leaving the castle we decided to walk down the Royal Mile down to the Palace of Holyrood.

Though the all the shops along the mile are very touristy, the buildings and atmosphere are fantastic. The buildings in Edinburgh are old and interesting, and there is a relaxed fun about the city that I really loved.

We were having so much fun walking that we decide to just walk all the way back to our B&B, this was 6 miles away but we talked and hardly noticed the distance. it did start raining on us for the last mile, but honestly it wasn't that big of a deal. We did pick up one more bag of Jammy Doughnuts on the way home, I will treasures that flavor forever :)