Thursday 24 December

We departed York at 8am this morning, and pushed on through beautiful countryside to Edinburgh. We stopped at a section of Hadrians Wall after some commentary on its history, but having seen pictures and read up on this before, it wasn’t as impressive as we were expecting! 

   
 I think we were shown a worn and small part of the wall because it was closest to the route we were taking, and the travel director was trying to get us to Edinburgh in as little time as possible. Normally a visit to Edinburgh Castle is on the itinerary for day three of this tour, but with Christmas Day being tomorrow, nothing is open so we are attempting to fit in the Castle visit today.

We stopped at a wool mill for a quick lunch of paninis and hot chips, and only five minutes to shop there! 😢 There were some bargain cashmere scarves in clan tartans, but alas I could not find Moffat or Jones anywhere in the shop!! We were in Edinburgh by 1.30pm, and met our local guide who took us on a walking tour and up to Edinburgh Castle. 

   
 We were then given an hour to explore the Castle ourselves, before boarding the bus again for a driving tour of the city, including through the Queen’s palace, Holyrood. We were also given a history of the kilt (with demo from our kilt-wearing guide!), but sadly none of it was new information to me after wearing one to school for years! 😬 We were also shown where JK Rowling wrote the Harry Potter books.

Our accommodation tonight is a Holiday Inn next door to Edinburgh Zoo. It seems to be a fair way out of town, so we ate dinner at the restaurant inside the hotel (Grandpop, you will be pleased to know kids eat free with paying adults!) instead of exploring further. The majority of the tour group went to a traditional Scottish dinner tonight, with bagpipes and traditional entertainment, but we have some children who suddenly need a break from the company of each other, and certainly do not need dinner with a group of strangers! 😕 Tim is sick of getting kids menus at restaurants, Zac cannot sit through a meal without annoying a sibling, and Sam and Belle just cannot sit through a meal…<sigh>. I can’t even threaten that Santa will not come, because he is not coming to us anyway! Despite Belle’s insistence that Santa found her friend Ella when she was overseas and so will therefore find us, I’ve told them repeatedly this will not be a usual Christmas! It’s even stranger to think it is already Christmas in Oz, so goodnight and Merry Christmas! 😀🎄