TLDR – New shoes, walking the royal mile. Climbing to Arthurs seat in Holyrood Park, visiting the National Museum of Scotland Then we fly home.
Shopping – Childhood Museum – stuff
We set off around 0900 with the goal of buying the girl’s new shoes. Their shoes are passed the end of life, and the drenching they went through yesturday didn’t help. While getting dressed Maddex tore a few teeth from the bottom of his jacket zipper. Guess we need a new jacket too. Two teeth gone at the bottom of the zipper = dead zipper and jacket is not very functional. First, stop the Mountain Warehouse. No jacket in Maddex size and our price range. Next Trespass, where we found a bright blue jacket for Maddex. Around the corner, we walked into Primark where we found new shoes for all of the girls. Trying on new shoes we noticed Khaleesi’s socks were drenched, so the girls all got new socks along with their new shoes. Khaleesi and Milas old shoes went in the rubbish, Roxi’s shoes might have a bit more life in them we kept them. Maddex’s Jacket we gave to homeless women in front of the shop to use as a blanket for her legs.
With new shoes on our feet and a warm Maddex in a new jacket, we carried on towards the castle growing out of a stone hilltop. Walking on the no car tourist street looking in the window of a Scottish tourist shop Mom sees a pink tartan purse she liked. Michelle is not normally a fan of purses. When she finds one she likes it’s a rare thing. For the rest of the trip we stopped at nearly every Scottish stuff shop looking for the right purse at the right price – We never found one we could justify buying.
At the top of the royal mile, we came to the entrance of the castle courtyard, BAM Kara appeared from some stairs directly in front of us. Not sure how that timing happened so perfectly but it did. We walked about the courtyard a bit and looked into a tour of the castle. We took it last time we were here and were not up to pay 50e to tour it again. Kara bought a ticket and took the tour. We went back down the royal mile checking out more tourist shops hiding in covered side streets or shops to avoid the sporadic rain.
Next to one rain hiding spot we found the Edinburgh Childhood Museum. It’s free, dry and looks entertaining; we toured. The Museum had some creepy dolls and fun toys in it. 4 stories of kids’ toys and uniforms to entertain us, keep us dry, and toilets. The rain was letting up – back home we walked for more Maddex playing games on the switch and the girls watching Sam and cat on Netflix. I have a feeling we will finish the show on this trip. The show only has 40 episodes. In the US they called it one season, in the UK that would be a 9-year run…
Holyrood park
Instead of walking into town along princess street today we’ve decided to take the tram to the last stop, York place. Then find our way to Holyrood Park. We stopped by the queen’s gallery at the palace at Holyroodhouse. They had a Divinci exhibit we skipped. In the gift shop, there were a bunch of Corgi things the kids were fascinated with for a few minutes. Then they started to look towards some fancy tea sets on the wall. Time to leave before the walls come tumbling down. Roxi was chatting don’t touch anything but I still wanted to get out before the place exploded.
The park entrance is connected to the Holyroodhouse for the most part, Next stop some park trails. The trail started off paved then quickly turned to mud and stone. We parked the pram behind some bushes on the side of the trail next to another pram and set off to climb to Arthur’s Seat. Roxi started off holding my hand on some rocks then told me ” Dad I don’t need any help I can do this all on my own” – Both Mila and Maddex are reporting they really miss climbing mountains and wish we did more hiking; Noted, we will do more hiking! Michelle and I have both missed it and are excited to see the kids enjoy it so much.
It looks like we gained about 200 meters over 1km of walking. Not bad at all for adults. Super impressive for a 3-year-old with tiny legs. Some of the stones we stepped over were waist high for Roxi and Khaleesi. I picked Roxi up over a few of them Martian gravity ( 3.72076 ms−2) style. Like the honey badger she is nothing slowed Roxi down climbing the hill. I’m extremely impressed and proud of Roxi and Khaleesi both for making up to the top without a complaint. Standing at the top we took in the view for a bit. At one point there was a strong wind gust that almost blew Roxi and Khaleesi off the mountain top. They screamed, Mila screamed, Michelle screamed – we grabbed the girls and no one blew away. DRAMA!! not long after that we started the trek back down. On the way down we made a diversion to some Ruins of an Abby and explored.
Lunch and a big Museum
Back down at the bottom we picked up the pram and carried on to a playground for a bit. Mila found monkey bars, I peed in the bushes, and Maddex found a spinning thing. – Lunchtime!! Maddex found a Tesco a few blocks away and navigated us there with the phone. Sushi, sandwiches, and crisps for lunch. Across the street from Tesco, we found a building of the Edinburgh college with a nice courtyard in the middle. We sat there on the stone and ate lunch.
To warm-up, the next stop was the Edinburgh National Museum of Scotland. We figured the kids would be entertained for 10-20 minutes. Nope, they were fascinated for a few hours. They did not want to miss an exhibit! The Museum had a perfect mix of things for the kids to touch and things for them to see. You never know what they are going to enjoy or how long they are going to last. Pleasantly surprised being able to tour every floor of the museum and take in almost everything.
After the Museum, Khaleesi and Roxi climbed into the stroller wanting a break. They both passed out on the walk back. Mila claimed to be sleepwalking she was so tired. 35 minutes later we are home for the night. We all had a great day.
Headed to the airport
Our flight home is Another afternoon flight. We slow packed in the morning, ate the rest of the food in the house, cleaned the flat and watched the BFG. Even with our paced morning we still have three or five hours before our flight leaves. It’s about 12 km to the airport and we can walk near the tram the whole way. We might as well walk as far as we can. We made it about 8km before it started to lash then snow on us.
We made the right choice buying round trip tram tickets. We ran onto the tram at the Saughton stop drenched from the rain and snow. Roxi was shivering from the wet and cold. We covered her up with the towel to dry her and warm her. At the airport we found a nice prep station before security we stopped at to dispose of our snacks and bag up our personal EDC items. No line at security, we were done and on the other side relaxed with loads of time to spare; such a pleasant civilized airport.
We found Kara at the Yo with a drink. Said hi then walked the whole of the airport shopping area exploring waiting to be assigned a gate. On the walk to the gate we found a climbing play area the kids screamed and ran in for half an hour. Top five airport experience – low stress and place for the kids to play; A+. Flight, bus, LUAS and we’re home.
Bonus Pictures
Holyrood Park and Museum pictures
