Edinburgh, Scotland
We have arrived in Edinburgh! After a nine hour layover at JFK, we took an overnight flight direct to Edinburgh, Scotland – home of kilt and haggis and, apparently, the most adorable hairy little brown cows you have ever seen.
This is our first non-solo trip. We’re actually travelling with a group of 9 others from an . . . informal social club . . . of which I am a member. T.U.B.A, or the Thomasville Underground Bar Association, is a self-governing body comprised of many of the Thomasville lawyers and a few honorary Lexington lawyer friends. I am the self-appointed social chair and undertook most of the planning of this Scotland/Ireland vacation for T.U.B.A. and our spouses.
A budget friendly vacation is always some thing Josh and I try to achieve and traveling with others meant we didn’t have rewards points or airline miles to supplement our budget. We had to go back to old fashioned good deals and that resulted in most of our group being stuck in the middle seat on the flight over. It wasn’t terrible, because the flight was overnight, but most of us didn’t sleep much at all.
One thing that certainly helped fight the jet lag is the fact that it is daylight for a ridiculous number of hours here right now. The sun stays out until 10:00 p.m. or so and rises again around 4:00 a.m.
To keep busy, Josh and I meandered through the streets near our hotel in a sleepy fog and a Scottish fog for most of the evening. We saw the weirdly designed Scottish parliament and visited the Edinburgh Museum, which had exhibits on Edinburgh’s history and showcased some of the local fine arts, like fern pattern glassware.
We also visited Canongate Kirk (Kirk is the Scottish word for Church). It was built in 1688 and is the Parrish church for Hollyrood, which is the neighborhood of the Queen’s official residence in Scotland. The church was very small and unassuming – not at all what I anticipated when I learned the Queen had her own special seat right up front. The pews inside were bright Carolina blue and the church was surrounded by a graveyard – which served as the final resting place for Adam Smith (the Scottish economist who wrote The Wealth of Nations), the poet Robert Fergusson and the possible grave of David Rizzio who was the private secretary to Mary Queen of Scots and rumored to be her lover. He was allegedly murdered at dinner by friend of Lord Darnley, Queen Mary’s husband, after the affair was uncovered. Scandalous!
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