Insight Guides Great Breaks Edinburgh

Insight Guides

• Publisher: Insight
• ISBN:
  9781786710024
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Crescita personale
• Subtopic: Viaggi

Great Breaks Edinburgh is a compact travel guide that combines snappy text with full-colour photography to highlight the very best that this lively city has to offer. The Walks and Tours section suggests various routes around the city in order to discover the key sights that you will not want to miss; from a wander around the historic scenery and bustling pubs of the Old Town and Edinburgh Castle, to the ancient buildings and spectacular views of the Palace of Holyroodhouse and Arthur's Seat. Each walk offers a selection of places to eat and drink as you go and clear maps plot all the major sights.

The Overview chapter offers some historical context to your trip and suggests some venues to experience Edinburgh's vibrant entertainment and festival scene along the way. The Travel Tips section lists the active pursuits and themed holidays you could try, along with essential practical information and our selective hotel recommendations. Edinburgh's Top 10 helps you to plan how best to spend your time and experience the very best of Scotland's capital.

About Insight Guides: Insight Guides has over 40 years' experience of publishing high-quality, visual travel guides. We produce around 400 full-color print guide books and maps as well as picture-packed eBooks to meet different travelers' needs. Insight Guides' unique combination of beautiful travel photography and focus on history and culture together create a unique visual reference and planning tool to inspire your next adventure.

'Insight Guides has spawned many imitators but is still the best of its type.' - Wanderlust Magazine

Tour 1: Old Town and Edinburgh Castle

This walk of the heart of the old city is just over 1.5 miles (2km), so you can easily do it in half a day, but, if you wish to spend an hour or two at each sight, this is a full day’s walk

Highlights

The Grassmarket

Greyfriars Tolbooth and Highland Kirk

Royal Mile

Writers’ Museum

Camera Obscura

Scotch Whisky Experience

Edinburgh Castle

Edinburgh’s most important historical sight and the centre of the city’s tourism, the Castle is built on a dramatic piece of volcanic rock that survived the last Ice Age and protected a ridge of rock behind it from advancing glaciers. The resulting ‘crag and tail’ created a site for a well-protected town on raised ground between two valleys and beneath the towering fortress. The ‘tail’ leading down from the Castle supports the Royal Mile, so called because it runs the length of it, for 1 mile and 106yds (1.9km) down to the Palace of Holyroodhouse (for more information, click here).

The route begins at the historic Grassmarket, lurking below the south-facing drop of the castle rock, before leading up to George IV Bridge – one of many bridges crossing the valleys up to the Castle ‘tail’ – and now lined with tall buildings. Taking in one of Britain’s most impressive cityscapes from Greyfriars churchyard, the route continues to the upper reaches of the Royal Mile itself, providing a deep history, intriguing sights and fascinating range of museums. It ends with a tour of Edinburgh Castle, including a visit to the city’s oldest building, St Margaret’s Chapel.

The Castle in the morning light.

Douglas Macgilvray/Apa Publications

Bagpiper on the Royal Mile.

Douglas Macgilvray/Apa Publications

Old Town

Grassmarket

The cobbled Grassmarket 1 [map], has long since shaken off its down-at-heel reputation and now houses hotels, great pubs, cafés and restaurants, which in summer offer refreshments al fresco. Most of the tall tenements here were built in the 19th century, though a few older buildings survive, such as the atmospheric White Hart Inn, and at the east end close to Victoria Street, an early 17th-century stone house, constructed when most of Edinburgh was still built of wood. Nearby is one of the old wells sunk to supply Edinburgh with its first clean water in the late 17th century. Long ago the monks of the Greyfriars Franciscan convent held cattle sales here, but the Grassmarket is better known as the location of the public gallows where executions took place until the 18th century, often providing entertainment for the jeering mob.

West Bow Wizard

Victoria Street replaced the upper West Bow, which had zig-zagged steeply up to the Lawnmarket, causing consternation to those trying to haul goods to market. It is said to be haunted by a galloping headless charger ridden by a 17th-century resident, Major Weir, the ‘Wizard of the West Bow’, who was executed after confessing to a string of depravities.

West Bow in the times of the infamous Major Weir.

Public domain

The Covenanters’ Memorial, where the gibbet stood, was created in 1937 and recalls the many martyrs who died alongside common criminals. The hanging of religious dissenters peaked in the 1680s under Catholic James II, but the original Covenanters were signatories of the National Covenant of 1638, opposing imposition of the English form of Protestantism (for more information, click here).

The Grassmarket

The Grassmarket has some interesting small shops wedged between the restaurants and bars, and adjoining Victoria Street offers a wide range of curio shopping, with great vintage clothing to be found at Swish (No. 22–4). For hand-made Scottish woollies try Bill Baber Knitwear Design (66 Grassmarket), while Clarksons of Edinburgh at 87 West Bow is an exclusive jewellers specialising in gold wedding rings. For kids and child-like adults, Aha Ha Ha (99 West Bow) is a joke shop and fancy dress venue that is something of an institution.

Victoria Street is lined with a variety of shops.

Mockford & Bonetti/Apa Publications

A much more modern addition to the Grassmarket has been Scotland’s National Centre for Dance, Dance Base (www.dancebase.co.uk), located at the northwestern end of the square. With an exciting programme of workshops and classes for all ages alongside a full festival line-up of events, it’s well worth finding out what’s on.

Beautiful stained glass inside Greyfriars Kirk.

Douglas Macgilvray/Apa Publications

Statue of Greyfriars Bobby, who was buried near to his master, just inside the entrance to the churchyard.

Mockford & Bonetti/Apa Publications

West Bow

At West Bow, where the well stands, the wide Grassmarket splits into narrower roads. The Cowgate runs east along the lower edge of the Old Town, beneath the high arches of George IV and South Bridges. Once a route for cattle on their way to the grazings on the Burgh Muir, the street became fash...

Table of contents

• How To Use This E-Book
• Edinburgh’s Top 10
• Overview: An Enlightened Capital
• Entertainment
• Tour 1: Old Town and Edinburgh Castle
• Tour 2: Royal Mile and Scottish Parliament
• Feature: Literary Edinburgh
• Tour 3: Palace of Holyroodhouse and Arthur’s Seat
• Tour 4: South Side Museums and University
• Feature: A City of Festivals
• Tour 5: East Princes Street and Calton Hill
• Tour 6: West Princes Street and New Town
• Tour 7: Water of Leith to Stockbridge and Dean
• Feature: Botanic Oasis
• Tour 8: Leith
• Tour 9: Excursion to Firth of Forth
• Tour 10: Excursion to Edinburgh Zoo, Linlithgow and Falkirk
• Tour 11: Excursion South to Roslin and Pentland Hills
• Tour 12: Excursion East along the Coast
• Active Pursuits
• Themed Holidays
• Practical Information
• Accommodation