.... and the rain , rain , rain ; came down , down , down in rushing , rising, rivulets......
Today was the day we had been looking forward to for the months preceding the trip: the Perseids meteor shower.... the best display of meteors all year ... showering Earth at a rate of 100 a minute. The shower will be beautiful; just nowhere in the UK!!!
What to do instead? I mean realistically , there is no point in driving 2 hours to Dalmellington and then climbing a mountain in the pouring rain. David's scopes are great and can see through haze, but this is full blown cloud cover with persistent rain, not gentle showers , but rain in bucket loads accompanied by blowing winds. If the rain wasn't a deterrent enough, the road with washed out areas, slick bridges with no sides and strong crosswinds was.... school starts in a week and I would like to be there.
Our intrepid band, not to be dissuaded by the weather ,at least on a small scale , donned our Gore-Tex and loaded onto the bus for Edinburgh. We would enjoy the day , we told our selves . We had chatted about the Edinburgh Castle , Mary King's Close , Greyfriars Bobby , Greyfriars Kirk and the weaver's exhibit over breakfast. In addition, the Edinburgh International Fringe Festival #into the unknown..... is going on , and we figured that the rain would discourage many people that might have entertained ideas of attending. Our bus ride in was uneventful and the rain actually slacked off a bit as we were dropped off at Waverly station to begin our climb up to High Street ( The Royal Mile ) and start our explore. Cutting through a close , we decided would cut our climb time in half and as we exited Advocate's Close, the rain began again in earnest. Pulling our hoods close about our faces, we headed up the hill. As we watched the crowd ebb and flow, and the rain pick up in intensity, I made the executive decision that if we were planning visits to some of our attractions of choice, we would need to purchase tickets now , even if the times were in the afternoon.... and so we did! Mary King's Close ticket purchased... off and up the hill or castle rock as it is called to buy Edinburgh Castle tickets. Cool thing about castle rock is that it is volcanic. Now I don't mean just little pieces of volcanic stuff, but rather the remains of a massive volcanic neck that had weathered away over the millennia .....for an earth science teacher, that is just too cool.
Working our way through the crowd, we decided that it wasn't as crowed as we anticipated and so maybe the thing to do would be to visit the castle now..... tickets purchased ; rain intensifies; group didn't realize that there wasn't that much of the site that was indoors and is now standing on the top of castle rock in the rain , mist and wind.... welcome to North Sea weather.
The castle was old , medieval and been the home to many monarchs, prisoners of war and I am sure an unhappy visitor or two.... it was damp, drafty and cold this day and I can only imagine the conditions in the 14th century. BUT, it was engaging and inspiring and caused your imagination to run amok as it was easy to pretend that you were part of history since the whole of present day Edinburgh was shrouded in mist and clouds..... we could feel alone , even though we were in a crowd because faces were hidden and all that was visible were colors of clothing or the humps of umbrellas...
Castle touring done, bones chilled, we left the relative dryness of the building to start our descent to the present day ( down the Royal Mile )and we spied a whiskey tasting....I hate whiskey, but the idea of warming the bones was greater than my dislike of that golden liquid. This was a blend of whiskey and mead that was actually made into a liquor ...it was a wee dram , but it warmed the soul.....
Lunch called and we dropped into a wee pub near the castle and had some soup to warm up and then headed to the weaver's exhibit. It was small and unfortunately not as extensive as I would have like, but it gave you a great perspective on the expansive machinery needed to create the huge amount of tartan necessary to feed the nation's appetite for the plaids. I was very pleased to see that the weaver's guild had created a tartan called the World Peace Tartan and that it had been endorsed by the UN......
Time for the Mary King's Close adventure and it was an adventure... a population living under the city... subjected to the plague and other diseases ; living in housing levels up to 10 on top of each other. The poorest of the poor and the wealthiest all living in one place. Even Mary , Queen of Scots spent a night in the close on her way to Level
n Castle... The close was shut down as the city expanded since it is illegal to live under ground in Scotland. So , how did the closes get away with it centuries ago? They had open areas over the walkways and that counted as not underground. Best story was the gentleman who lived in the house with the wall paper that was painted with arsenic so that there was a lovely green color. He was eventually asked to leave his home, but refused because he couldn't take his most prized possession: the first indoor , working toilet ; a toilet of which he was so proud that it was placed in a direct line with the front door ... which he kept open so that he might wave to people as he was engaged in the logo.....
I will let you think about that.........
Today was the day we had been looking forward to for the months preceding the trip: the Perseids meteor shower.... the best display of meteors all year ... showering Earth at a rate of 100 a minute. The shower will be beautiful; just nowhere in the UK!!!
What to do instead? I mean realistically , there is no point in driving 2 hours to Dalmellington and then climbing a mountain in the pouring rain. David's scopes are great and can see through haze, but this is full blown cloud cover with persistent rain, not gentle showers , but rain in bucket loads accompanied by blowing winds. If the rain wasn't a deterrent enough, the road with washed out areas, slick bridges with no sides and strong crosswinds was.... school starts in a week and I would like to be there.
Our intrepid band, not to be dissuaded by the weather ,at least on a small scale , donned our Gore-Tex and loaded onto the bus for Edinburgh. We would enjoy the day , we told our selves . We had chatted about the Edinburgh Castle , Mary King's Close , Greyfriars Bobby , Greyfriars Kirk and the weaver's exhibit over breakfast. In addition, the Edinburgh International Fringe Festival #into the unknown..... is going on , and we figured that the rain would discourage many people that might have entertained ideas of attending. Our bus ride in was uneventful and the rain actually slacked off a bit as we were dropped off at Waverly station to begin our climb up to High Street ( The Royal Mile ) and start our explore. Cutting through a close , we decided would cut our climb time in half and as we exited Advocate's Close, the rain began again in earnest. Pulling our hoods close about our faces, we headed up the hill. As we watched the crowd ebb and flow, and the rain pick up in intensity, I made the executive decision that if we were planning visits to some of our attractions of choice, we would need to purchase tickets now , even if the times were in the afternoon.... and so we did! Mary King's Close ticket purchased... off and up the hill or castle rock as it is called to buy Edinburgh Castle tickets. Cool thing about castle rock is that it is volcanic. Now I don't mean just little pieces of volcanic stuff, but rather the remains of a massive volcanic neck that had weathered away over the millennia .....for an earth science teacher, that is just too cool.
Working our way through the crowd, we decided that it wasn't as crowed as we anticipated and so maybe the thing to do would be to visit the castle now..... tickets purchased ; rain intensifies; group didn't realize that there wasn't that much of the site that was indoors and is now standing on the top of castle rock in the rain , mist and wind.... welcome to North Sea weather.
The castle was old , medieval and been the home to many monarchs, prisoners of war and I am sure an unhappy visitor or two.... it was damp, drafty and cold this day and I can only imagine the conditions in the 14th century. BUT, it was engaging and inspiring and caused your imagination to run amok as it was easy to pretend that you were part of history since the whole of present day Edinburgh was shrouded in mist and clouds..... we could feel alone , even though we were in a crowd because faces were hidden and all that was visible were colors of clothing or the humps of umbrellas...
Castle touring done, bones chilled, we left the relative dryness of the building to start our descent to the present day ( down the Royal Mile )and we spied a whiskey tasting....I hate whiskey, but the idea of warming the bones was greater than my dislike of that golden liquid. This was a blend of whiskey and mead that was actually made into a liquor ...it was a wee dram , but it warmed the soul.....
Lunch called and we dropped into a wee pub near the castle and had some soup to warm up and then headed to the weaver's exhibit. It was small and unfortunately not as extensive as I would have like, but it gave you a great perspective on the expansive machinery needed to create the huge amount of tartan necessary to feed the nation's appetite for the plaids. I was very pleased to see that the weaver's guild had created a tartan called the World Peace Tartan and that it had been endorsed by the UN......
Time for the Mary King's Close adventure and it was an adventure... a population living under the city... subjected to the plague and other diseases ; living in housing levels up to 10 on top of each other. The poorest of the poor and the wealthiest all living in one place. Even Mary , Queen of Scots spent a night in the close on her way to Level
n Castle... The close was shut down as the city expanded since it is illegal to live under ground in Scotland. So , how did the closes get away with it centuries ago? They had open areas over the walkways and that counted as not underground. Best story was the gentleman who lived in the house with the wall paper that was painted with arsenic so that there was a lovely green color. He was eventually asked to leave his home, but refused because he couldn't take his most prized possession: the first indoor , working toilet ; a toilet of which he was so proud that it was placed in a direct line with the front door ... which he kept open so that he might wave to people as he was engaged in the logo.....
I will let you think about that.........
No comments:
Post a Comment