Day 1 – Saturday (18/07/2015)

We bought our tickets a few months ago Dublin – Glasgow – Dublin by RyanAir for less than 40 euros for the two of us, but the plan from the beginning was to meet Edinburgh. As the ticket to Edinburgh was much more expensive, we thought it would be better (cheaper, that is) to follow the following strategy:

• Dublin – Glasgow (round trip)
• Bus from Glasgow Airport to Buchanan Bus Station in Glasgow (round trip): we took the bus 500, which cost £18 for both of us and is super frequent.
• Glasgow – Edinburgh bus (return): just £4.50 for the two of us on this website here, that is, just over 1 pound each way per person.

We arrived at Edinburgh bus station, which is in what they call New Town (New Town). The buildings are also old and were built from the 18th century onwards, but the old part still has buildings from the medieval period.

We went straight to our hostel, the High Street Hostel (£40 for the 2 of us in a 4 bed room with shared bathroom) which is extremely well located but has tiny bathrooms.

He is next to the Royal Mile, which is the city's main avenue, with many shops, restaurants and of course, pubs. It is on this street that you will find all the souvenirs you can imagine, the most famous object being the kilt,  the Scottish plaid skirt worn by men. I had never seen a man wearing it in person, but after I saw it, I thought it was cute and even wanted to buy it for Celo, but it didn't happen.

We left our backpack (yes, this time we only traveled with one) at the hostel and walked along this avenue to the city's main attraction, the Edinburgh Castle. On the way there, we entered the St Giles' Cathedral, built in 1883, which is very pretty on the outside, but even prettier on the inside. Since they charge a £2 fee for you to take photos inside, I didn't want to pay, but I got a photo from Google for you to see too.

The famous Castle

We continued up the Royal Mile (yes, it is a hill, in fact, the whole city has hills), until we reached the castle. We considered buying tickets online (WE RECOMMEND!), but since we didn't have a printer, we thought it would be better to buy one there and then: total nonsense ever! We got stuck in an unnecessary long line, which certainly affected our usual good mood. Since not everything has only a bad side or only a good side, it was sunny (I even got a tan!) and the girl at the ticket office told us that a ticket would be leaving in less than five minutes. tour free guided tour. There we went…

We did the tour with a gentleman who seemed to be a history teacher, super didactic and with an absurd memory. I was impressed by the amount of dates, names and places mentioned in less than 1 hour of tour. That was a lot of information! Here's a summary:

• The castle was built in the 12th century on top of a volcanic rock that makes it 120 meters above sea level.
• The lowercase St Margaret's Chapel, Built in 1130 to be a chapel for the royal family only, it is currently the oldest building in the city and, fortunately, can be visited and used by ordinary people, like you and me. On the day of our visit, there was even a small wedding taking place there, with only about 20 people. Very chic!
• Be sure to visit the Great Hall, built by James IV of Scotland in the early 16th century. We were able to watch a reenactment of the Battle of Waterloo in there, but it was really hard to understand what those two Scottish actors were saying…
• You can see the cannon up close Monsieur Meg, which is one of the oldest in the world, over 550 years old. It was built for the wedding of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, and King Henry II of France.
• THE Royal Palace This is where the royal chambers used by the last monarchs of the family are located. Stuart, the main one being the room where Queen Mary gave birth to King James VI in 1566 (Birth Chamber)
• What caught our attention the most was the  Crown Room, where are the Scottish royal jewels, (the Crown, the Sword and the Scepter). The crown was made in 1540 from gold, pearls, diamonds and other stones and is beautiful! The 3 pieces were brought to the castle in 1707, which was the year the Kingdom of Great Britain was created. Since 1996, this room has also displayed the Stone of Destiny, which is a stone on which all the Kings of Scotland sat during coronation ceremonies. This stone was taken to England, but thanks to a generous act by Queen Elizabeth II, it was returned to Scotland on the condition that it be taken back to England for future coronations.
• We also visited several museums and war memorials, all very complete, and took the opportunity to enjoy the view from up there.

We got off the castle and walked behind it to see its most interesting view, according to the guy at our hostel. I didn't think it was anything special, but since the walk is relatively short, it was good to see the volcanic rock where the castle was built.

We passed by Princes Street Gardens, which is a very central and organized park and then we walked along the city's main shopping street, Princess Street. We went to Jamie Oliver's restaurant, Jamie's Italian, which is in George Street. The restaurant is a bit hidden, inside a building, but it has a really cool atmosphere. We thought the food was good, but I have to admit that we expected a lot more (damn high expectations). I thought the bill was expensive (30 pounds for two pasta dishes + two beers), but after walking around the city a lot, I realized that you can't find a decent meal for less than that. This pound is not easy…

A secret pub

With our bellies properly full, we went to see the pub secret of the city, the Panda and Sons, which is located on the left corner of Queen Street. It is said to be secret because its facade has nothing to do with a bar: it is a barber shop and to get to the bar, you have to go down a staircase and enter through a door disguised as a shelf. It is really cool!

We took advantage of the fact that it was still daylight at 10 pm and walked around the city a little more. We thought the architecture was beautiful, both in the new and old parts. It was cloudy and cold (10º in the middle of summer!!) and we were a little discouraged, I admit, but I imagine it would be wonderful to visit the city in the sun. The energy is different, right?

We ended the day in a pub on the Royal Mile, the The Royal Mile (how original!), because our hostel gave a £1 discount for every beer consumed. Marcelinho loved it! While we were there, the security guard removed some drunk people to avoid trouble. I don't know if this is common in Dublin as well, because I've never noticed, but I thought the atmosphere in the place was strange.

Day 2 – Sunday (19/07/2015)

We had just woken up when someone accidentally activated the deafening fire alarm. We had to go down the 7 floors still in our pajamas to figure out this misunderstanding. Arghhh! We had breakfast at a really cool place on our street, the Joanna's Place. The food was great, the owner is a sweetheart, the place is lovely, but the bill was quite high (17 pounds) for the breakfast.

We went down to Royal Mile towards the city's second most important attraction, the Holyhood Palace, which is the residence of the British royal family when they are in the city. We even thought about paying almost £12 each to visit it, but after the saleswoman told us that we wouldn't have access to the rooms that the royal family currently uses, we gave up.

Exercise for the strong

We decided to climb the Holyrood Park until the Arthur's Seat to see what is considered the best view of the whole city. The guy at our hostel said it would take 40 minutes to climb, but I think it took us twice that long because we ended up doing the longest route, which involved a lot of ups and downs (we passed by Salisbury Crags – take a look at Google Maps). After we noticed that there is a route that is much faster and that many children even took. I think you can park the car or walk straight to the lake Dunsapie Loch and from there climb to the peak. Here's a tip! Either way, the important thing is reach the top warmly wrapped up and see this wonderful view:

When we got down there, there was a medieval fair going on next to the Holyrood Palace, with several stands of typical foods and traditions and all the exhibitors dressed in character. I thought it was great and I could tell that the locals were enjoying it too. The feeling is that they really appreciate the traditions…may they continue like this!

Greyfriars Bobby

From there we went to the restaurant Greyfriars Bobby, which pays homage to a dog who visited his owner's grave for 14 years until the day he himself died. He and his owner are buried in the cemetery next to the restaurant and there is a statue of the little animal right in front of the establishment. We thought the food was good, but expensive for what it was, and since it was a tourist spot, the service was horrible. The worst part was having to wait 20 minutes for a table, when there were 4 empty the whole time… We actually sat at one of them.

National Museum of Scotland

We quickly entered the National Museum of Scotland, which is in front of the restaurant and has free entry. The place is huge and has 4 museums: The National Museum of Scotland, National War Museum, National Museum of Rural Life and the National Museum of Flight. Since we had less than an hour to explore, we decided to visit only the Scotland museum. The museum is very rich in objects and information, and the structure of the building is beautiful. We weren't able to explore it carefully, since we didn't get the audio guide and only had the pamphlet that talked about the main attractions, but I imagine it would be a very interesting place to visit at a leisurely pace.

We picked up our backpacks at the hostel and walked to the bus station to catch our bus to Glasgow. Once there, we caught the 500 bus again and were quickly at the airport. We had some delicious snacks at the restaurant. EAT and when we were going to our boarding gate, I noticed that some people were taking pictures with a guy with a black eye. I mentioned it to Celo, but he ignored me at first and continued to use the Internet from the airport.

The embarrassment of the trip…

After a while, we came across this boy with a black eye and Celo came to the conclusion that it was the Irish fighter. Conor McGregor, who is currently the leader of one of the UFC categories. I quickly took out my camera and asked him to take a picture with Celo, who turned green with embarrassment. Guys, it's not every day that we see a champion, right...no matter what! We were super excited about the event, but at the same time we wondered about it. the reason the champion is traveling with us on RyanAir, without any glamour. It was necessary to get on the plane to hear the flight attendant congratulate the fighter Paddy Holohan, also Irish, for having won the fight in Glasgow. HAHAHA…holy ignorance!!!