Adventure Before Dementia!

 

A life-long bucket list item for me has been to travel first class overseas, on a plane where the first class seats recline into a bed. My children told me to go for it and when I said, but yes, that would be spending your inheritance, they just laughed. So... I'm going for it.  Adventure Before Dementia – my new motto. 

I arrive at the Minneapolis airport with additional time to spare, as a first-class ticket grants access to exclusive benefits, one of which is access to the airport lounges. I'm feeling rather special at this point. In case you haven't been in a lounge, there are free drinks and a hot food buffet. Pretty fancy. When I finally get to my gate, I find that they were unloading the passengers that had already been loaded because there was a half inch hole in the fire shield. It took several hours to fix and by that time I knew I was going to miss my connection in Amsterdam to Edinburgh. My flight to Edinburgh was supposed to leave from Amsterdam at 10 a.m. They put me on a flight that left Amsterdam at 10 pm which meant that I didn't get to my hotel until 1 am. I had purposely scheduled myself to arrive a day early before the tour and I had now lost that day. Oh well, as they say – it is what it is. I still had some time before the tour orientation to run around a little bit.

Found in the airport - all Viking fans need one of these

The first-class pods

Look how many different ways you can adjust your seat!

A very nice hotel room indeed

I was within walking distance of the Royal Mile. At the upper end of the Mile, is Edinburgh Castle – at the bottom end is Holyrood Palace. In between are all the tourist shops selling kilts, whiskey and wool items. 

We've all heard the story or watched the movie of Greyfriars Bobby

The Scots have a habit of putting traffic cones on the heads of their statures.  The local authorities constantly remove the cones only to have the cone replaced in a matter of hours by the locals.

St. Giles Cathedral - construction started in 1124

 I'm heading down to the Palace end of the Royal Mile.  I had to walk by the Scottish Parliament which was celebrating it's 25^th year anniversary. To celebrate this event, King Charles had flown in and spent the night in the palace.

The Royal Mile
Bagpipers on every other corner

Never saw the King but I did see his helicopter fly in to pick him up. 
Holyrood Palace in the background

One of the first things I wanted to do was to climb Arthur's Seat. Arthur's Seat is an extinct volcano right next to Holyrood Palace. Climbing Arthur's Seat took me a couple of hours, with several rest stops along the way. I realized that I no longer walk and climb as fast as I used to do as many, many younger folk passed me by. The important thing is that I made it.

See all those tiny people up on top - that is where I'm heading

Edinburgh and the Firth of Forth

Holyrood Palace is the principal royal residence in Scotland since the 16^th century. King Charles spends one week a year here at the beginning of summer. Mary, Queen of Scots lived here until her personal secretary was stabbed to death in front of her. She decided that Holyrood was not secure enough, so she moved up the Royal Mile to Edinburgh Castle which is more of a fortress than Holyrood.

Holyrood Palace

Inner Courtyard