Edinburgh Day #2: National Museum of Scotland, Dean Village, Circus Lane

After a busy first full day in Scotland, we were happy to see the sun shining when we woke up at the start of our second and, sadly, final day in Edinburgh.

We’d originally planned to climb Arthur’s Seat, but Indy wasn’t feeling up to it with his cold and the weather—admittedly beautiful when we headed out—was forecast to turn rainy with risk of a thunderstorm late morning. Apparently lightning is rare in Edinburgh, but I certainly didn’t want to be standing exposed at the top of a tall cliff when a storm hit!

So we pivoted and headed straight to the National Museum of Scotland. Once again, the most convenient bus stop was by the Scott Monument and we stopped to appreciate some of the views on offer along the way to our destination.

This bridge provides a great vantage to appreciate just how central the main rail station is within the city.

There were plenty of stairs to climb!

We walked up a short stretch of the Royal Mile and stopped to admire the exterior of St. Giles’ Cathedral again.

We happened upon this plaque commemorating the last public execution in the city and Indy decided it would be a great time for a photo re-enactment.

This facial expression basically sums up how he felt about going to yet another museum.

In other words, he wasn’t thrilled. Unfortunately I have no photographic evidence (for the record, because I was too busy playing with him), but this museum has a lot of amazing interactive exhibits for kids. He spent a long time in one particular section that has all sorts of things to try like a wall of lighted circles to measure reaction time, places to test different aerodynamic features on race cars, a quality control station, and an eclectic mix of other interesting things.

Full disclosure: when we got to the less interactive sections, we turned on Wifi on the audiobook phone and he sat on a bench and watched YouTube videos about Minecraft while I wandered around reading plaques.

Some of the most famous items on display at the museum are the (incredibly expressive!!) Lewis Chessmen. They were carved from walrus ivory about 900 years ago, and discovered in the 1800s on the Isle of Lewis. There’s a small connection to Harry Potter books here as well, as these chess pieces are said to have inspired the life-sized chess pieces in the first book.

The “Maiden” was an early guillotine used for executions in Scotland during the 1500s and 1600s.

Let’s chat about Mary, Queen of Scots for a minute, shall we?

She became queen of Scotland when she was six days old, but spent most of her early life in France. After coming back to Scotland, a series of scandals and rebellions (along with a dead husband) forced her to give up the throne. She fled to England where she was put under house arrest for almost two decades before she was accused of plotting against her cousin, Elizabeth I. For that, she was executed in 1587.

I got to see the tomb effigy of Mary that was carved after her execution; it shows her in prayer on top of an ornate sarcophagus (of sorts) supported by lions which are symbols of royalty and strength.

I offered to take Indy on a guided tour through this section of the museum (I was a wealth of knowledge thanks to all those plaques) but he politely declined. Sigh.

He was more enthusiastic about heading to the rooftop terrance. It provided amazing views of the city. And, since entry to the museum is free, it’s a great budget viewpoint to see the skyline.

There’s Edinburgh Castle and Tollbooth Kirk!

The crown-like item on the left is the spire of St. Giles’ Cathedral.

The interior of the museum was also striking. I loved the clean lines of the architecture and all the natural light it provided.

The exhibits were well organized with distinct areas for different foci. Bonus points because the museum map was helpful. One of my frequent pet peeves while travelling is how complicated it can be to “translate” museum maps. The National Museum of Scotland gets a fairly high score from me!

This museum covers just about everything. There’s obviously a big focus on items related to Scotland’s history, but they provide a great overview of energy generation, locomotion, natural history, geology, space, art and fashion.

It didn’t require any effort for Indy to be impressed by an amethyst this size!

The last section I visited was FASCINATING. It was all about how people in Ghana highly regard intricate caskets that reflect the personalities and interests of the deceased; this perfect replica of a Mercedes Benz car is actually a casket!!!

I can’t remember (I did read the plaque but forgot to take a picture to jog my memory) who wore this dress but can you IMAGINE trying to get through doorways? Like Anne’s puffed sleeves, you would most certainly need to turn sideways.

By this point, we’d touched on most of the different sections of the museum. It felt like a place you could go to every day for a week and still have lots left to see. If you happen to be visiting Edinburgh, I’d definitely recommend you make time to stop by this museum.

That said, by this point, Indy was more than ready to leave.

His main request was to find another milkshake. Oh, and he also wanted to find a playground with a zipline.

I did a quick search of local playgrounds and, by coincidence, the one I navigated us to had a zipline. En route we stopped at a cafe that was packed with students (I took that as a good sign; students don’t tend to have much money and when they part with it, they expect decent grub). Indy got his milkshake (again, it was delicious) and I decided to throw caution to the wind and try some HAGGIS.

VEGAN FRIENDS, SKIP THE NEXT PARAGRAPH.

That’s right. One day I’m nibbling on black pudding, the next I’m eating the pulverized heart, liver, and lungs from a sheep. Listen, it’s Scotland’s national dish and I was trying to make this trip as authentic as possible.

It was… pretty good. It tasted like crumbly meatloaf and wasn’t nearly as strong as I was expecting. I don’t necessarily feel like I need to try it again, but wouldn’t be opposed to doing so.

After about an hour at the playground, we started walking toward Dean Village. This mosaic at the entry to a bank caught my eye: it’s two cornucopias spilling gold coins into a pot below and it says Thrift is blessing. Apparently this comes from a quote in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice when a character is trying to convince others that earning money via interest is a blessing because it’s money earned fairly (i.e. without theft). Apparently, Christian leaders at the time discouraged lending money out and requiring interest.

I stopped to take a picture of this little restaurant scene and Indy honed in on a VERY different aesthetic from the corner of his eye.

One of his favourite movies is the utterly ridiculous (but clean and admittedly hilarious) Jack Black movie, Nacho Libre.

It was an interesting way to advertise a taco shop!

Next up was Dean Village. I had debated skipping this section of town because I knew it was mostly just a scenic stroll and that’s not exactly a siren song to a tween boy.

I am so glad we ended up going because our time spent in Dean Village was one of the highlights of the trip for me.

The kids have this joke about how I’m constantly making comments about how a particular architectural detail reminds me of something that looks like it’s straight from Beauty and the Beast. I’m not entirely sure why I’ve latched onto that specific movie, but I have, and the kids make fun of me for it mercilessly.

Even Indy had to admit that this very definitely looked like something that could have been plucked from the set of Beauty and the Beast.

The gurgling brook! The herons feeding on little fish in the water! Bridges! Cobblestone footpaths! Climbing vines! Flowering roses!

It was so pretty.

I asked Indy to take a picture of me and this was the result. Just use your imagination to adjust the angle of the camera so that you can see the lovely stream and picturesque houses behind me, will you!

We strolled down a side street until we got to another bridge and enjoyed a different vantage point of the same scene.

After his requisite tree pose, Indy started exploring.

When I was hanging up his coat at the end of the day, it took me a minute to figure out why his sleeves were wet. It was very much worth it for the handful of pottery pieces he found buried in the stream.

You can’t really make it out in the picture, but in real life it was very obvious that downstream from Indy there was a blue heron feeding. He was oblivious to the whole thing, but it was a surreal “pinch me” moment.

This was his happiest time of the day. This kid LOVES to explore and get his hands wet and/or dirty.

Another photo attempt with better results this time 🙂

I wanted to go to Circus Lane in Stockbridge, and so we strolled in that direction along the Water of Leith Walkway. It was gorgeous!

He leapfrogged over dozens of posts in Edinburgh, but I’ll spare you all the iterations save one.

Everything was so idyllic and quaint.

The first thing we saw when we got to Stockbridge was this taxi, adorned boot to bonnet as they might say in the UK, with balloons. I really wanted an explanation. Was it this taxi driver’s birthday? Was he doing it to attract business? So many questions, no answers. But it was a fun pop of colour and intrigue.

We stopped by the Stockbridge Market Arch. This is all that remains of the original Stockbridge Market, which operated from 1825-1906. Now the arch is a rather charming reminder of the area’s past, when locals came here to buy fresh meat, fish, fruit, and vegetables. These days, Stockbridge is one of Edinburgh’s most popular neighbourhoods.

He’s getting the hang of this photography thing!!!

The other place I wanted to see in Stockbridge was Circus Lane. These days it’s one of the city’s most photographed streets (it is very charming!). This street was originally built as a service lane for all the stables and coach houses needed to supply the aristocratic homes of nearby Royal Circus. These days there’s nary a horse in sight and it’s a sought-after residential street.

You get a great view of St. Stephen’s Church.

There were flowers everywhere and Indy wanted to stop at every single one and take a whiff! (Earlier in the day he stopped to smell a rose in Dean Village and declared it to be the best-smelling flower he’d come across in his life. High praise!)

Back at it!

We didn’t come across any arches (I also didn’t go looking for them), so Indy thought it would be fun to crouch down and do his standard arch pose in a more confined space.

We made our way to Coree’s house for a final goodbye. Once again, her family graciously hosted us for supper. Indy was especially smitten with their adorable cat. I’m allergic so admired him from afar!

And, FINALLY, I have a picture with Coree. It’s appalling it took me this long to get a photo of the two of us (to be fair, I did take one the preceding day, but it has her son in it as well).

I tried to coach Indy on holding the camera up a bit higher but this was the best we could do. Coree was incredibly generous with her time and knowledge of Edinburgh and is an incredible cook!

By this point in the trip we were both knackered. After parting ways, Indy and I took the bus back to our hotel and pretty much crashed into bed.

Ironically, I had the WORST time getting to sleep this particular night, but it was good to be in a horizontal position after so much walking and exploration.

And that’s a wrap on our time in Scotland.

Your turn:

• What’s the most unusual “local delicacy” you’ve tried?
• Do you literally stop and smell the roses? I try to as much as I can!
• What are your theories about all the balloons on the taxi?