Last day in Scotland

My dogs are barking tonight. I've walked more in the last three days than I have since, well, since China. I don't think my feet and knees ever really recovered from all the stairs and walking in Beijing and Shanghai, and I have to add Edinburgh cobblestones to the list of foot and knee unfriendly surfaces. Okay, I think my middle age griping about aches and pains is out of the way for now.

Edinburgh is a lovely city, at least the bit of it I've seen. We're staying in dorms at University of Edinburgh, and just behind our rooms is Holyrood Park and the craggy peak called Arthur's Seat. I can't tell you a thing about it except that it's really pretty from a distance. I'd penciled it in for tonight. I thought we'd hike up and have a picnic, but we were way too tired. We spent the day walking through the Princes Garden below Edinburgh Castle with John after a nice lunch. John left for his conference in Dundee, and we toured the Castle itself, we shopped for souvenirs, and we had dinner on Rose Street, a long street filled with pubs and restaurants. My favorite part of the day was the Garden, I think. The flowers were spectacular: roses, thistle, lavender, wax begonia, fox glove. There's a view of the castle from the garden that is amazing. John guided us over to a big fountain in the center of the park where you can a nice shot of the fountain with the castle up behind it.

























Scotland's national flower, the thistle!











Here're some shots inside the Castle grounds.






This cobblestone killed me.





We actually had some sunshine on our last day.






Tomorrow we head to London to start the study abroad scouting. The kids seemed happy to be involved. I do think that their feedback will be helpful. All in all, I have to say that the Scotland leg of the trip was great. We all had a good time, and we left feeling like we'd like to return to Edinburgh and St. Andrews one day.


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