Edinburgh and onward...

Our short visit to Glasgow was followed by another short visit to Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland; a more tourist oriented city compared to Glasgow.  I guess it’s because there’s more attractions that would appeal to tourists like the castle, the Scottish Parliament, and the Royal Mile.  We arrived to Edinburgh amidst a mix of wind and rain.  We checked into our hostel, came outside to walk around to find that the sun was out.  The lady at the hostel in Glasgow had told us about this; the weather changes very quickly and very drastically.  It was still windy, but sunny.  Sunny enough to take pretty pictures of the greenery that surrounded Edinburgh Castle.

Unfortunately, everything was closing as we were venturing into town, so all we have are snapshots of building facades.  This includes the Scottish Parliament, unfortunately.  It was a shame because I grew to like the building and appreciate its details as I walked around the building.  One can only imagine what kind of experience waited, had we been able to take a tour of the building.  Sigh. 

I think Scotland deserves a trip of its very own next time.  The hostels were cheaper and nicer than prices compared to London’s.  Plus seeing all the brochures for the Scottish countryside made me want to stay a bit longer.  As I’m a geek at heart, I wanted to go to Loch Ness…just to go see the infamous home of “Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster”. 

The only Scottish food I was able to try was Haggis; I’m still not sure what was included in the haggis that I tried.  Reading about it will probably turn away a lot of unsure tourists.  But I had to try at least one Scottish dish while I was in Scotland, and was recommended haggis.  It wasn’t so bad taste wise, although it was a little too dry.  If I had the option, I would have poured gravy or stock all over it to give it a more casserole-ish consistency.  But that’s just me.  It was like eating taco meat without the shells or the extra sauce.  The sides of mashed vegetables subdued the spiciness of the meat and really complimented the dish.  It was good; but I don’t think I’ll be trying it again when I visit Scotland. 

After a night in Edinburgh, we caught the afternoon train back to London, so we could catch the morning train to Paris.  That means from 4:45pm to 5:25am, we ‘chilled’ at Pancras International Station because we were too cheap to pay for a hostel in the area.  The station had a 24 hour café, which is where Alex and I played cards, drank tea/hot chocolate/coffee, sketched, and napped before we boarded our early train to Paris.  The reason for this was because the train to Paris from London wasn’t entirely included in our EuroRail Pass; we just got a discount.  A discount off of the first train to leave.  Believe me, it was a huge enough discount to persuade us into buying tickets for the 5:25am train.  After our 3 hour plus train ride, we hauled our exhausted selves onto the Metro to check into our budget hotel outside of the city periphery.