Scotland Weekend Day Two

Time for day two!!  We got on the road bright and early and prepared ourselves for a long day in the car. It was going to be worth it though because that night would find us in Edinburgh!!!  Mommy was able to find a great apartment to stay in and it was even a reasonable walk away from the old town etc.!!  I'm afraid I went a little overboard on the scenic pictures, but I just couldn't decide which ones to do!!  Mind you, they're from inside a car window, so some might not be the greatest quality, but I think the beauty of it counts. :)  Daddy did a great job driving and we were very thankful for safety in the midst of getting used to being on the wrong side of the road.

Once again, we got stuck in bad traffic on the highway (two hours and we would have been there longer!!), so we found a back road to take and ended up enjoying the beautiful drive into Scotland so much that we took the same one once again on the way home!!

This was really strange!!

Beautiful blue and sunny!!

Below is a little taste of English countryside...

A pretty church in the distance

There are tons of stone walls - we loved them!!

A little village - much different architecture than Germany!

A bird and its nest that we saw on the way

Nottingham - wow, you can tell we're in the Old Country!!

It's pretty bad when a biker passes you on the road!! That explains the traffic for you!! :)

Loading back up after a quick stop - it was so nice to be in an English speaking country again!!

Look at those rock walls!!

Last cafe in England - we're getting close!!!

More rock walls and lots of sheep - there are so many sheep in England and Scotland!!

Listening to "Scotland the Brave" was the perfect thing to do while we...

...crossed the Scottish border!!! 

We're in Scotland!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now for a taste of Scottish countryside - the view was spectacular!!!

Hey, not too far to Edinburgh!!

A little lake we passed on the way - it was really quite pretty and I wish we could have gotten a better picture of it!

Isn't this bridge neat?!

Can you tell we're in Scotland? :)

We passed this neat looking structure on the way - it looked a cross between a castle, a cathedral and an abby of some sort.

A little Scottish town

Wow, look at that!!

There was even little bit of snow

I liked this row of trees

We enter Edinburgh!!!

Our first glimpse of the castle

We were happy to see several of these - especially daddy!

It was funny to see the bird on top of this statue

A better glimpse of the castle

Our first stop was an old bookstore.  I had really wanted to go to one because I heard that they have tons of old Henty and Ballantyne books.  We got there just before closing and the gentleman was really nice to still let us look around.  It was an old book and Henty and Ballantyne lover's paradise!!!  The walls were probably 12 feet high and covered in books from floor to ceiling.  They had almost one whole section on Henty and Ballantyne!!!

Look at all of them!!!

My finds of the evening (and early birthday presents from my parents - thank you so much daddy and mommy!) - Gascoyne R.M. Ballantyne 1880 edition, In The Reign of Terror G.A. Henty 1894 edition and The Cornet of Horse G.A. Henty 1954 (not quite as old, but the story looked really good!! :)

Getting settled in to our apartment for the weekend...

Sienna and Sayer in the kitchen

The living room

The colors in this room are so pretty

It was a really nice place

Then we set out on foot in the rain to find some dinner!  Wow, what an adventure!!!

Just a little bit wet

A tire crew at a delicious Italian restaurant 

(yes, I know, we come to Edinburgh and eat Italian! :)

Tuckered out at the end of the day