Edinburgh, Scotland

Whew, vacations can be tiring! Luckily they are also a lot of fun, so it's all well worth the loss of a few Z's to be able to see new and exciting places. For our third anniversary we booked a trip through Ryanair.com and found ourselves in the capitol of Scotland, Edinburgh.
Only a short trip from where we live, we were able to take advantage of arriving in Scotland around noon, and using the beautiful weather to tour about the area closest to our apartment. From almost every point in the city you can see the castle- it’s a huge structure sitting atop volcanic rock, and impressive from all angles. We were drawn to the top- albeit the long way around through areas tourists weren’t allowed and reached the entrance with the help of a park ranger. We were given a short tour of the castle then left to ourselves to explore the place. Visiting the crown jewels and the dog cemetery were two of the highlights of the experience- but for smaller versions of the Archers, the cannons were the place to be, and to sit.
After leaving the castle, we were shown first hand how quickly Scottish weather can change, and hastily found activities to do while indoors. Somehow we managed to find ourselves in the Scotch Whiskey Appreciation Society museum where J. was able to brush up even more on his knowledge of the grain drink. W. and I found a children's museum- Camera Obscura, and we enjoyed and hour or so trying out different science experiments. In all it was a great way to spend the afternoon in Scotland.
The rest of the trip is a bit of a blur, but we were able to see so much of Edinburgh. We took a tour on the Royal Yacht Britannia, visited Holyrood Palace, Saw the National Gallery of Scotland, the National Portrait Gallery of Scotland, walked through the new Parliament building (I would have never done this unless J. hadn't insisted) strolled the Royal Mile, Princes Street, Kings Street, Queen's street, and about 100 miles of other streets whose names change every block.
I think that we were able to get a good feel of the city after our 5 day stay, and I can say for two of the three of us, we will be definitely be going back!
Here's a link to kodak.com for the pictures- there's too many to post on here..... Enjoy!
http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=c41lnrbo.5died5ic&x=0&y=-hh6q54&localeid=en_US