Staying in Edinburgh

Yeah, really far behind now, but want to chronical.

Edinburgh was fantastic. It is another city, like Plymouth, that far exceeded my expectations. The setting with the castle high above with the craig and tail, volcano landscape was amazing. I’m a castle junkie, and that was awesome to see.

I got in, checked into my not so great hotel room across the street from the rail station. It was very old, but not in a good way. I’m sure the bedspreads were very nice 40 years ago, and the carpets 60.

But, hotel rooms aren’t what I’m visiting, so out I went to the city. I went east toward Carolton hill. There are many monuments and such, and, of course, a geocache. It is called “Athens of the North” for good reason. Easy cache find. Also the only one I got in Scotland.

The next day I got up bright and early to catch a train to Stirling and a bus from there to Doune. I really wanted to make it to Doune castle where they did most of the Monty Python and the Holy Grail filming. I walked through the charming little town toward the castle. As I arrived at the entrance, I went to pull out some cash and found only change. All my notes were gone. Stupid shallow pockets. I estimate I dropped £30-50 on the bus. Guess I made someone’s day. It wasn’t mine though. Luckily they took cards for the small admission fee. The woman working there was very friendly and sympathetic. We actually spoke quite a bit. She asked if I wanted a free audio guide. Of course! It was well worth it, even if it wasn’t free. 😉

I started it up and heard Terry Jones’s voice. Yay! It started something like “In 1974, some friends and I made a very silly movie here… 600 years previously…” it was a fantastic mix of real castle history and some Python mixed in. Mostly that was optional. “If you want to know why this room seems familiar to Python fans, press play now.”

It was fun because they included some retrospectives as well as playing film audio in relevant places. Nothing like hearing the Camelot song in the room they danced, or hearing how the prince just wants… to Sing! while looking out the window of “Swamp Castle”. Or the castle Anthrax scenes. 😉 that building was a lot of places!

I have to point out that visiting all these media inspired places, I am genuinely interested in the places apart from that. Those things are just the impetus for going there in the first place. And there’s also nothing like having Terry Jones describe toilet logistics of 600 years ago.

A brief failed attempt at finding another geocache was still worthwhile. Neat rural area north of the main part of Doune. I’m pretty sure that marks the furthest north I’ve ever been. On land at least.