Location: Edinburgh, Scotland

Sav: Ahhh the time has arrived, our last day in Scotland. We went for brunch at Pep and Fodder, a place I went to when I was here last week that had great coffee. We blogged and chatted about what loose ends we wanted to tie up before leaving Scotland.

First thing was to climb up Calton Hill where there is a monument dedicated to Horatio Nelson to commemorate his victory in the Battle of Trafalgar (1805) against the French and Spanish. The monument itself was really cool looking because it was built to resemble an upturned telescope- a nod to Nelson’s sea-faring background. We climbed all the way to the top to relax while looking out over the city, as we often do on our last day in cities we love. The wind had other plans for us though as it was unbearably cold and loud up there. We took in the view for as long as we could handle the wind, and then made our way down.

We walked down Prince’s street towards our next destination, and along the way we stopped in a few cute shops, one of which was a card store.

Meag: We have a shared weakness for funny cards so when we walked by this shop we had to go in. We spent a solid half an hour in there looking at all the cards and laughing fully out loud. They were hilarious and I wanted to buy all of them but had no idea what or who I would ever use them for. There were punny cards, cartoon cards, dirty joke cards…basically whatever your heart desires. After wiping away cry-laughing tears we both bought a couple. Much to our enjoyment even the employees were hilarious. We were having a nice little chat and one of them asked me what I was doing in Edinburgh and if I was a tourist. When I said yes he then looks at me with this shit-eating grin, and says “Because you have two wrists?” and holds out his wrists in front of me. I gave a bit of a baffled laugh, not quite expecting the card level humour in real life.

Sav: Wait wait but then the dude kept going and said ‘don’t worry I checked first that you weren’t an amputee.’ oh my god has this guy accidentally said that to an amputee?!?

We stumbled upon Cairngorm Coffee Co, a place I really wanted to check out but didn’t think we’d have time for. I didn’t know what to order because everything was kind of odd but I ended up having a turmeric latte -which was bright yellow (off-putting for a drink) but so tasty. Meaghan had pesto and squash toast which was super weird but so delicious. I guess we have a new recipe to try out on our parents!

One place I really wanted to go was Dean Village, a little suburb 30 minutes away. It was gorgeous! I know we say that a lot but I think this legitimately was the most beautiful place we’d seen in Edinburgh- maybe even on the mainland. It was a neighbourhood made up solely of old brick houses and apartment complexes and cobblestone streets. Running through the whole thing was the river The Water Leith that led down to a park with huge green trees, thick mats of ivy everywhere, drooping yellow flower bushes and big stone structures.

We spent almost an hour wandering around Dean and The Water Leith, soaking in the views for the last time this trip.

On the way home we stopped at Mary’s Milk Bar for gelato that was recommended to us by multiple people. I don’t say this lightly (this is the important stuff)- it was better than the best gelato we had in Italy. Ugh drool.

Meag: Everyone in our hostel room was there when we got back, some people were taking part in The Nap Club again which I joined for a couple minutes. We ended up all going together to try out the now infamous burgers at Cloisters, the pub we tried to get to yesterday. It was standing room only so we all huddled together, swapping stories and trying new beers as we waited for our burgers. They were definitely worth the wait!

Sav: Nobody was ready for the banter to end so we made our way back to The Brass Monkey for a couple of ‘last night in Scotland’ beers, since almost everyone in the group was leaving tomorrow as well. Shout out to Maria from Spain, Curtis and Alannah from Canada, and Michael, David, Kyle 1 and Kyle 2 from the states. We had such a wonderful night hanging out with you all (y’all), what an amazing way to end an amazing trip.

Early flights home for us both tomorrow so…

Until the next trip,

S&M

#YXYGirlsgohereandthere