No real rush this morning but we wanted to take the shuttle to the local station and then take a train to Edinburgh but then found out that the shuttle was going to Dunfermline and so the next choice was taxi to the station and their was an American couple that had already ordered a cab and so we joined them but after a short discussion agreed to halves by taking the taxi directly to Edinburgh City centre. And so off we went with me in the front of the vehicle trying to hold a conversation with a Scottish gentleman with a strong accent and so I understood perhaps 40% and just nodded and said yes several times which kept him happy. Somehow we got on to politics which he said he had no interest in and that all this blarney about the Scots hating the Brits is all SNP and newspaper talk and he hates it.
However we also talked about football and we reached a good agreement on how bad Chelsea football club is these days. We don't think the driver new downtown Edinburgh to well as he dropped the American couple about 400 metres from where they wanted to be, ah well. However we found a Weatherspoon's pub and stopped for a cup of tea and a technical stop. before then walking further in to the centre to locate the open top tour bus which we intended to take as Edinburgh is rather hilly and Noels knees are not in good shape for lots of walking.
We picked up the tourist bus and it took us on a tour around the town with stops at the Castle, Government House and the various museums and it is quite busy with many cafe’s and bars looking quite busy particularly up by the castle. There did not appear to be many, if any, empty shops which is always nice but we understand that this is actually the exception as many smaller towns are suffering with closed shops according to Trevor the Head Chef. Noel took quite a few photos but to upload them using the ship Wi-Fi would take forever and day and due to the file size may not be possible and so I decided to review and correct them when i get home later this week and then will add them back to the blog.
We decided to take a taxi back to the ship and located an Uber at a good price only to run into big traffic jams caused by road marking and then entrance to the Port/Cruise Terminal is not well signposted and so we got lost for about 15 minutes. Well I said Cruise terminal which actual rather a large tent with absolutely nothing in it, rather a misnomer.
I am a bit cross with myself after running around to get the letter to my sister printed and ready for posting we arrived back at the ship with it still in my bag, damn!! so will have to post in Newcastle tomorrow. Sorry Annette.
Having returned to the ship we went for a cup of tea and biccies in the lounge and Jen did some reading and Noel catching up with yesterdays blog and starting on todays. What I have learnt over the years that if you do not complete it at the time but leave it for a couple of days you forget stuff.
We went back the Colonnade for dinner with Noel watching what he ate as he has had some problems today and following dinner we went to see the comedian Steve Stephens again and puts on a good show and then back to the room for bed before 1030