Today we bought a ticket for the hop on hop off buses and toured around the city. It was a fabulous way to get to the key sites really easily as well as get a really good feel for lots of other areas and their history. We spent the morning at the Castle with lots of other tourists. I dread to think what it must be like in summer! This was a fabulous experience with so much to see. I realised just how little I know about Scotland’s history and heritage (in comparison to England). You really need at least 2 hrs to see most of this. Then we hopped back on the bus after a little bit of cashmere scarf shopping and headed to Holyrood Palace. By now it was raining (although we must get used to the fact that forecast rain here is not like the tropical downpours of Queensland…and life continues as normal) and we wandered through the slightly grim rooms of the palace, wondering how anyone ever slept in there without being totally freaked out by the tapestries and the murals on the ceilings. Then it was back on the bus to Princes Street and a short walk home down Leith Street in the misty rain. I’ve decided that Edinburgh is the Edinburgh of Ian rankin rather than the romanticised, sanitised Edinburgh of Alexander McCall Smith. And I think that’s the way I like it.