Edinburgh Escapades - Part 1

Hello Beautiful People!

My fabulous friend Kate is studying in the gorgeous city of Edinburgh and because I love them both lots, I try to visit as often as time and money will allow. Last week was my university reading week, so after a lovely weekend at home, I popped on a train and headed up to bonny Scotland. My Nana had been fancying a little trip to Edinburgh for a while, so she came along with me for the day.

We both have a vague knowledge of the city but not quite enough to find our own way around. So after checking my bag in at the station, we grabbed a couple of visitor maps, and doing our best lost tourist impressions, attempted to make our way to the National Museum of Scotland.

The museum is HUGE! You could easily spend a whole wandering around its lofty halls, looking at its numerous exhibitions. We started off with nosey around the ‘King of the Scots’ exhibition, complete with a cast of Queen Mary’s tomb. 

We then had a play with the interactive exhibits in the science sections, before going to get a good look at the Millennium Clock. It’s worth going to the museum for the clock alone. A huge construction, forged from metal, wood and glass, and covered in creepy gremlin like creatures, the clock towers above you threateningly.  

 

After getting creeped out by the clock, Nana and I hopped in a taxi and headed off the Valvona and Crolla, a fabulous Italian deli and café.

Mine and Kate’s families are massive foodies, so we often find ourselves being sent to Valvona’s with shopping lists of things to bring home. This time my Mum had given the helpful vague instruction of ‘anything that looks yummy’. So the whole shop then!

Hungry after our train journey and museum trip we went straight to the café and stuffed ourselves with prosciutto, artichoke and rocket sandwiches, with steaming mugs of leek and potato soup. 

Once we had recovered our strength we delved into the deli to pick up some yummy treats. Resisting the temptation to blow all my savings on Italian meats and huge wheels of cheese, I demonstrated great fortitude and left with only a couple of bags of pasta and some Amoretti biscuits for the parents.

Nana looking lovely

The sun was shining so we decided to amble towards the Scottish National Gallery. After seeing the umpteenth portrait of yet another saint, we decided it wasn’t really our scene and we nipped next door to the Royal Scottish Gallery and had a look at the New Contemporaries exhibition, which was much more up our street.

This was a really cool interactive projection, so that's me!

 Once we’d had our fill of mental art, we still had a good hour or so until Nana’s train. This meant only one thing, a trip to Lush to fuel my addiction to fabulous smelling cosmetics! I have a serious problem when it comes to Lush, in that I just want to buy EVERYTHING! This time I behaved and limited myself to a few essentials.

The time had come to say goodbye to Nana. She caught a train back home and I grabbed a taxi to Kate’s flat. After making friends with the taxi driver, who reprimanded me for my terrible pronunciation of Scottish street names and argued with me about Rugby, I lugged my book filled case up the never-ending tenement staircase, to be welcomed into Kate’s flat by the heavenly smell of fresh baked bread.

Worn out from a busy day, I collapsed on the sofa whilst Kate made scrummy chicken noodle soup. I always get fed so well by that girl! We snuggled up on the sofa, to watch About Time and have a good catch up. 

Love

S

xxx