The Big Smoke

Saturday 14 July, Edinburgh

Armed with a map from the hostel and bouyed by a lovely sleep-in, we wandered Edinburgh most of the day. We booked a one-day tour of south-eastern Scotland for tomorrow, bought fudge (yum!), sent email, ate at OBrien's again... life was good. Especially after the O'Brien's chicken and bacon sandwich.

We saw a rather pathetic Anarchist march (middle of the road in every sense of the phrase) and kept wandering. I bought an Irish Language teach-yourself book and CD set, which I fully intend to use one day (please don't snigger), and we spent a few hours looking for highland dancing supplies for Kate's dad, and failing entirely to meet up with a couple of friends that we had hoped to see while we were there. Then we jumped on a tour bus around the centre of the city. The tour was OK - we heard all kinds of stories about the local history - but after having a live guide for most of our holiday, the recording on the bus wasn't quite the same. It was fun, though.

Then we had an evening to kill, so we went and saw Tomb Raider the movie, at the local Edinburgh cinema, where I ate ice-cream (this is unlikely to surprise anyone who knows me well). We topped off the evening of popular culture with some local popular cuisine - dinner at Burger King.