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The day was sweltering as we left Cambridge. After initial delays in traffic, the convoy made good progress north; it grew cooler, and as the cars passed Newcastle, tendrils of fog swept in and thickened until we found ourselves driving through a cloud.

It reached its thickest about sixty miles short of Edinburgh. Unable to see more than a few dozen metres ahead, I half-expected to see bolts of lightning as we passed the "Scotland welcomes you" sign. The fog lifted, however, and it grew warm again as we entered the city.

It was still a little misty as we unloaded. We ended up leaving the cars in a side street near Queen Mary's bathhouse. The drive had taken eight hours; tired, some of us elected to spend the evening in; I, however, joined the group venturing out in search of food. Gawping at the architecture and interesting juxtapositions of shop fronts, we travelled up the Royal Mile in search of haggis.

There are no photos of the haggis. It did not stay on the plates for long enough.

Morning saw us much refreshed. We left the apartments to the sounds of the A-Team opening theme being played by a small child to encourage people to visit a nearby school fair. Ignoring this, we travelled towards the castle.

The Royal Mile is not a street along which one can travel fast. For one thing, it's quite a slope, at least near its start; for another, one keeps being distracted by wanting to take pictures of all the funky buildings.

Still, we did eventually reach the castle. Inside, we caught the last of the brass band peformance that followed the 21-gun salute in honour of HRH Prince Philip's birthday; as they dispersed, the battlements were reopened to the public and I was able to take a series of shots for a panorama (warning: large image).

We also took the first of our WednesdayAnime on Tour pictures at this point.

Some hours and another panoramic sequence later, we were castled out.

It was clearly time to break for lunch. Passing more funky nooks, we travelled towards the main event.

Chocolate Soup called out to us. People's eyes lit up as they saw the menu; they attacked the counter, and jaws dropped as the orders arrived.

People, it seemed, approved of the venue, and all agreed that the place definitely merited a WednesdayAnime on Tour shot or two.

The afternoon was relatively unremarkable. The girls went girly-shopping; the guys went geeky-shopping (and later used the results to geekify the apartment). I did spot some nice graffitti.

Another meal of haggis followed, and disappeared as fast as the first one. If haggis is around long enough for a photo, it's around long enough to be eaten.

All that haggis went to my head, and I dragged Nagi past a bunch of random stone animals and up the base of Arthur's Seat. In the end, the road we'd chosen only went to the base of the crags, so we only got about halfway up; still, we ended up rather bedraggled with just that! It was a rather nice sunset.

Evening was spent watching A-Team episodes and playing Guitar Hero.

The next morning we went to see Scott Memorial. Inside, it turns out, it has a small chamber with stained glass windows containing an audio tour of Sir Walter Scott's life. It also has a lot of narrow passageways, spiral staircases and progressively higher platforms. I am sorry to say that vertigo made me wimp out one platform short of reaching the top.

The afternoon progressed in ritual fashion: chocolating out at Chocolate Soup, followed by boys and girls going separate ways.

We saw more fun buildings, a random Tardis...

There was no haggis that day.

Sunset that evening was met upon the highly panoramic Calton Hill. We stayed a while; then I made people get up so we could check out the view from the other side of the hill before we headed back for a dose of the A-Team.

And thus it ended. The next morning we headed back to Cambridge..

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June 2006 - WednesdayAnime on tour in Edinburgh