Prologue: The original trip was planned in 2020, the rest is history. When we set about planning this, the original destination was Cuba, but a Canada transit visa thwarted us. We decided to make it Scotland+Ireland. Since we were only 2 months away from the trip, tickets too turned out to be a pain, especially because, thanks to Brexit, pretty much every European airport required a transit visa. And embassies were still reeling under post-Covid volumes. Long story short, we managed to land in Manchester via Doha right when the World Cup started. The adventure continued because there was a rail strike on the day we required a train to take us to Edinburgh. Thankfully, we had an inkling, so we had also bought bus tickets as back up. Absolute lifesaver. But thanks to delayed trains, our bus had to stop midway for more than an hour because we had ‘missed’ a few passengers! All of this meant that our planned time in Edinburgh was curtailed. And now we can begin!
Stay
We’re still not Airbnb people, so Ibis it was – Edinburgh South Bridge. It was about 10 mins from the bus and train stations and pretty much everything we wanted to see was within walking distance. They also served a great (though same) buffet breakfast. Having said that, I’d also recommend looking for options on Princes Street.
See/Do
We visited the Camera Obscura but unless you have children who need to be entertained, I’d skip this. We also went for a Horror Tour, and though the guide did her best, the content itself was not worth the hour.
Eat/Drink
Haggis is a must-try, so long as you’re the kind who is not particular about the components! That, and black pudding, was part of the Ibis breakfast I could get used to!
We visited in winter, and thus had limited daylight time – the sun set at 3.45! But we managed to see pretty much everything we had on our list. We did wish we had allocated a few more days. Overall, I felt Edinburgh exudes a certain character thanks to its rich history, and traditions. Except for the kitchens closing early in some parts, we totally loved the place.