Well it took 37 years, but we finally returned to one of our favorite cities from our Honeymoon. Boy things have changed but then, some things were the same as we recalled.
As mentioned in our previous post, Kirkwall had us a bit under the weather and medicine had helped but you still have the groggy feeling for a couple of days – so we took the included bus tour, to see the city and knowing we would stop at the royal mile which is the must see of any tourist. So we took a rather long tender ride from ship to shore (I guess the ship as big as ours, can’t risk getting too close to port) and the 30 minute ride went by fast.
A bus ride through the city highlighted the main buildings, parks and monuments – I even recognized where our Honeymoon hotel was along the Princess street. From the outside, The Holyrood Palace was just like we left it. Even drove the section of the royal mile and saw what I recall as the what I think is the finest lawn bowling field in Scotland – right near Holyrood Palace. I imagine royals and their friends must have played there.
We finally made it to the head of the royal mile at the Edinburgh castle and had a hour to walk around. It was BUSY!! Travel is back in the summer of 2023. Good to see.
The Royal Mile is just a plethora of things; history, architecture, people, shopping and beverages. You just simply enjoy seeing the entire corridor on a sunny day.
Final preparations for the extravaganza of the The Edinburgh International Festival was being made at the castle entrance with large temporary stadium seating in place fore the upcoming performances that attracts numerous spectators.
Weather was moving in, and we felt pretty worn and Gina and I already made it a plan to return to Edinburgh in our future travel plans and plan to stay quite a bit longer, so leaving back the ship a few hours early was agreeable to the both of us.
The cruise down to London-Greenwich was a two day trip with a nice sea day to relax and take a cooking class at Viking’s Kitchen table a special classroom near the main kitchens for the specialty restaurants. Very glad we signed up since it was a great experience. Couldn’t resist having the ravioli that night in Manfredi’s Italian restaurant when we saw it being made fresh.
Next Stop – our final port – London (Greenwich) which will be a day in Greenwich and then disembarking the Viking Mars to go to our post cruise hotel in London. Man, time flew by!