Alcala, Spain Fall 2007: Edinburgh, Scotland

After two days in Fort William I hopped back on the train to take me to Edinburgh. The contrast between these two Scottish cities couldn't have been greater. Fort William: small-quiet town, very out-doors oriented, not very many people around. Edinburgh: huge city, somewhat confusing streets, and FULL of people. Edinburgh is a great city, don't get me wrong, but if you go anytime in August you are going when half of Europe may also be there as there are several festivals going on at once. There were tons of theater productions, city tours, lectures, art shows, etc. all happening all the time. Street performers where everywhere and the whole place was just full of life and different art forms. Another thing to be warned about is that Edinburgh can be a hard city to get oriented to as the streets seem to run over and under each other, which makes it a tad confusing when you are visiting the first time. But, rest at ease, people are very friendly and willing to direct you on your way.

My hostel was about 15 minutes away but I highly recommend it as it is right along the water, very peaceful, and has a beautiful surrounding area. It is called "The Globetrotter Inn Edinburgh". They even provide a shuttle service in and out of the center of Edinburgh for a cheap price. It was just a nice escape from the busy and fun-filled city life of Edinburgh. Another recommendation is to go to "Henderson's Salad Table" (94 Hanover St.) for cheap Vegetarian/Vegan/Organic food.

I only had 24hrs in this great city, so i took a free city tour that was offered due to the festival. I also explored the inside of St. Giles Cathedral which had an interesting exhibit on sex trafficking. I did a good bit of aimless wandering around the Royal Mile just to get a feel for the place and checked out a landscape photography exhibit of a local artist. One highlight had to be (this one is for you dad) seeing the William Wallace look-a-like, I had an overwhelming desire to scream "Freedom!", but I resisted the urge.

Clearly I cannot go anywhere without doing something related to books, so in Edinburgh I did a few things. First, i went in search of Nicolson's Restaurant, the place rumored to be where J.K. Rowling began/wrote parts of Harry Potter. However, the restaurant is no longer in existence and has now been replaced by a Chinese Buffet. However, I did take a picture of the plaque which commemorated the spot and was approved by J.K. Rowling herself. I also went to a cafe called "Elephant House", which also claims to be a cafe Rowling wrote in. Even if you are not a Harry Potter fan, this cafe is charming in itself. It has good tea (I had vanilla), a good view of Edinburgh Castle, and has elephants in all shapes and sizes (no real ones of course) everywhere.

The next book-related thing I did, was to take the "Book Lovers Tour", offered by the festival. My guide (Allen Foster) was great, very funny, and knew a lot about the literary richness of the city. He has written a book on the topic actually. Edinburgh is called "The City of Literature", but many of the sites we went to are unmarked. Thus, without a guide (or his book), you would not know such places existed. We learned about "Johnson's Dictionary" (the one before Oxford's), rubbed the toe of a Hume statue (in hopes that his wisdom would rub off onto us), saw the "Heart of Midlothian" (image in a Sir Walter Scott novel with the same title), saw the school Doyle attended/was inspired to create Sherlock Holmes (after a man named Dr. Bell: coined the phrase "you see but you do not observe"), showed us the building that used to be a hospital (now the geography building for the University of Edinburgh) where Stevenson was inspired to create the characters "Long John Silver", and went to a grave yard that had the grave of William Topaz McGonagall (a Scottish poet famous for writing bad poetry) whose name was used by J.K. Rowling to create Professor McGonagall.

The tour was great, I would highly recommend it and anything written by Allen Foster as he was a great guide and one of his books (he has written a few) would be a great asset to any trip if you can't have him guide you in person. I would also recommend going to the Writer's Museum if you are at all interested in Scottish authors.

Another thing I really enjoyed about Edinburgh was the number of second hand book shops around. There are few places I'd rather be than a used book store, so walking around Edinburgh was somewhat like being in Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory: I just wanted to have a taste of each one.

HIGHLIGHT OF EDINBURGH: Taking the Book Lovers Tour from Allen Foster.

1. St. Giles Cathedral