Edinburgh

According to our guide, Scotland's big products are whiskey and wool.  Indeed, on the way in from the airport (and from the air) we saw many green fields dotted with sheep, including many, many lambs (in fact I ate one today :-)).  Near our hotel is Edinburgh castle, and the streets leading up to it (and I do mean UP - this whole place is up and down hills) are lined with sellers of all things wool or whiskey.  I mean to visit some of those places today, although it looks mostly like finished wool goods rather than yarn.  As the afternoon is free, I'll also look up yarn stores and see what I find.  We had a private tour of the castle today before the hordes showed up.

Built on a formidable hill.

The view looking into "New" Edinburgh from the castle.

More "New" Edinburgh.

A cemetery for military dogs.  The castle is still a working military installation.

Many years of coal smoke have turned much of the city's stones black.

Lovely little park.

Cannon big enough to crawl into (but they politely request that you don't)

So many cobblestones.  I think about how many hours of work went into the streets of the city.

Our guide Tom wears his kilt and bares his knees every day, although the wind and chill are fierce.

Fancy drainpipe.

Can't get this rotated, but the top ones are William Wallace and Robert the Bruce.

Sword as tall as me.

We have had some really good gluten-free meals.  Our hosts Bob and Ruth (or the travel agency) have taken care of everything and checked ahead of time.  They had the hotel rearrange the breakfast buffet to make sure the gluten and gluten-free foods were not touching or sharing utensils.  They tell us what's not safe.  They arranged menus ahead of time at each restaurant, and I am having to severely restrain myself from finishing everything to ensure that I can still wear the pants I brought.  I will go walk after this to try to work some of it off.

I rented a wifi device to stay connected, but I'm having trouble keeping the battery charged, so I may have to complain and get a replacement or refund.  It took me about 5 minutes in the hotel room to figure out how to turn on the lights - you have to put your door key card in a slot or nothing turns on, including outlets.  So I can't leave it charging while I go out unless I get a second room card.  That took some getting used to, and figuring out where the flush button for each toilet is.  Tomorrow we move onward to Glasgow, after dinner and a show tonight.  We never did get an agenda, so we don't know much ahead of time - just get on the bus and off we go.

There are at least two crocheters in the group (who are all middle-aged or older except one who is too perky), one of whom brought yarn and makes baby blankets for Project Linus.  I have been knitting whenever I have to wait for something - Cassiope at night in the hotel when I can focus on the pattern, and a plain stockinette cap with sock-weight yarn when I don't want to deal with a pattern.  There's a backup project, but I don't think I'll get to it.  The flight over was too dark - it was a brand new plane, and when I hit the button on the screen in front of me, my neighbor's light came on instead of mine, so somebody got some wiring wrong.  And that didn't make me at all anxious about how well the rest of the wiring was...

More from Glasgow.  For now, I have to look up Edinburgh yarn shops and go look at woolens.