Edinburgh; Sunday, 01 March, 2020

Overnight the weather had continued to be vile, and I had quite a nice long lie in with the sound of the rain pounding on the windows occasionally waking me up to turn over, stretch and go back to sleep again.

I eventually got up just after 9 and after a quick shower headed down to Breakfast. I had a leisurly breakfast, watching the rain pound on the windows some more, but with the noticeable lightening of the sky in the distance.

After breakfast, and a bit of time in my room packing the skies eventually started to clear and the rain stopped, do I checked out of the hotel. I caught the tram into town and changed onto a bus out to the Royal Botanical Gardens to have a look around.

The gardens are free to look around, but there is a charge if you want to go into the Greenhouses. I purchased a ticket for the greenhouses at the entrance gate, but the guy in the ticket office did warn me that if the already strong wind picked up any more they would be forced to close the glasshouses, in which case I would be able to come back and get a refund.

I wandered through the gardens, noticing that the wind was indeed strengthening, to the point that just as I turned the corner towards the entrance of the Greenhouses everyone was being ushered out as they had just closed them.

I continued having a walk around the gardens, stopping at the main building to get my ticket refunded and to grab some lunch in the restaurant.

Having looked round the gardens I caught the bus back into town and hopped off as it reached the Royal Mile. I headed up the final part of the hill towards the castle, only to find that the castle too was closed due to the high winds, so instead I walked a couple of steps back down the hill to the Scottish Whisky Experience and had a very pleasant tour and tasting there, including an additional – quite expensive- tasting of my favourite Scottish Whisky, Highland Park.

Suitably self central-heated from the now biting wind, I headed back down the Royal Mile and picked up the bus back over to York Place and picked up the tram from there back to the hotel, timing it perfectly to miss the very heavy shower that passed over whilst I was on the tram.

I quickly zipped into the hotel to pick up my bag and head back to the tramstop, but I didn’t quite do it quick enough missing the tram that was 8 minutes behind the one I’d gotten off by a good minute or so. Thankfully I did make it to the tram shelter just before the next hefty shower passed through so managed to keep dry from that as well. The next tram arrived on time and I caught that back to the airport for my flight back to London

Weather

Heavy Rain Heavy Showers
AM PM
Mild (0-10C, 32-50F)
5ºC/41ºF