Edinburgh

Edinburgh is one of those towns where you step out of the taxi and say '....wow'. The castle sits high on an old volcano in the middle of town. Old buildings. New buildings. Great buildings. Unbelievable.









We checked into the Hudson Hotel which is located in the middle of the New Town and the Old Town sections of Edinburgh. Edinburg has been the capital of Scotland since 1437 and although the newer section is referred to as 'New Town' it was built between 1765 and 1850 and is considered neo-classical in style.
We toured New Town, the Royal Mile in Old Town, the Royal Palace, the Edinburgh Castle. It's all fantastic. The Scottish people are quite friendly and we met many people around town who just wanted to chat and hang out.













Sunday night was the end of the Edinburgh International Festival and was marked with a huge fireworks display at the Castle. The streets were all blocked off and around 250,000 people were estimated to have attended. We met a nice family from outside of the city who talked with us as we watched the show. The fireworks were coordinated with an orchestra and the theme was great American music - Gershwin, Copeland, etc. They kept asking us the name of all of the songs, since we were Americans. Albeit a delightful piece of music from a wonderful Suite, the imagery invoked by "Buckaroo Holiday" is something the Scottish had a hard time envisioning. It was hard to explain to them that 'buckaroo' is not a word we use in everyday American life.