An Edinburgh Adventure

My Heart finds its home in Edinburgh. The sense of homecoming I felt on my first visit to the city has haunted me ever since - how is it possible to feel such sheer belonging in a space that is foreign. The familiarity is still there on all subsequent visits, and I continue to fall deeper and deeper in love.

This most recent visit was different as I was treated to the superior tour guide qualities of my dear friend Jen. A fellow history dork and pub enthusiast, she mingled facts fables and food, with a generous selection of watering holes. My stay was blessed with a surplus of sunshine, and so the slow meanders we took through the winding streets of the old town were warm and relaxed. A great portion of Jen's expertise seem to lie in affordable culinary outings, and thus one day we were treated to a gloriously over stuffed potato from a shop with a rather axiomatic name - The Potato Shop. We devoured these treats in the beautiful Princes Street Gardens at the foot of the castle (once this park was a lake of poo, but we weren't to be deterred). Later was a 4.95 feast of chicken fajitas at a trendy restaurant near the university. This wowed my London wallet, now used to being extorted for a mere muffin. We had steak ciabattas, peppered with political conversation, and fruit cider accompanied by reminiscence - I had forgotten the great luxury of catching up with long absent friends. Jen took me to do a little shopping, and I picked up a pair of perfect green button earrings, and a blue vintage bag (it was a necessary purchase as the strap on mine had gone). I was really pleased with the shopping options in Edinburgh though - Cockburn Street comes highly recommended.

Where I bought me lovely bag

The new (necessary) bag

The new green button earrings

Rory, Tiff, Jen and I indulged in some liquored hot chocolate, while basking in the golden glow off the setting sun streaming though the windows of The Elephant House. This is the bohemian coffee shop where JK Rowling famously penned her first two novels, having not enough money to heat her flat. From these windows she saw the castle, an elite, turretted boarding school, and the Greyfriars cemetry, one of whom's grave stones bares the name Tom Riddle - Enough inspiration me thinks...

Golden Jen, in the magical light of The Elephant House

Being a medieval city Edinburgh is dominated by its castle. A hulking figure huddled on a hill of volcanic rock, it looked unusually cheerful and care free with a spread of freshly sprung at its feet. Edinburgh Castle sits at the summit of the Royal Mile, an ancient pathway that cleaves through the Old City and comes to an end at the Holyrood Palace, the Queens official residence in Edinburgh.

Edinburgh Castle

Deeper into the Old City lies the Graveyard, an historic burial ground filled with immense crypts and mausoleums that dwarf the insignificant remains they house. The site is home to the world's most well documented case of a poltergeist - The McKenzie Poltergeist. Poltergeists are believed to be formed from large concentrations of hormones such as pheromones. While pheromones are the 'sex hormone' they are also released with adrenalin, associated with fear and fright. In the case of the McKenzie Poltergeist, it was first documented after a rather terrifying incident where a tramp landed in a mass of embalmed bodies in the McKenzie mausoleum, which naturally scared the crap out of him. According to the guide, this might have been where the poltergeist originated. Needless to say, it has sent many a tourist screaming out of the cemetery with freaky appearances and aggressive behaviour.

Edinburgh once more overwhelmed me with its beauty and history, its buildings and natural surroundings. It was made all the better by having such a like minded (in most ways, lovely Jen) friend to share it with. The planning for a return during the festival is already under way.