Edinburgh

CC Site
13^th - 15^th May

A beautiful sunny day – at last – and a lovely drive fifty-five miles up the A68 to Edinburgh. Into the city from the east and along the side of the Firth of Forth through Leith to Silverknowes. Leith used to be the docks area and was a bit of a hairy place. There are still many lands there, multi-storey stone-built tenements, but they seem to have been well restored and look great. I got the feeling that Leith was being gentrified, probably since the Royal Yacht Britannia has been moored here.

Edinburgh Castle

Fantastic site, probably the best I've been on. My English bus-pass doesn't work here in Scotland, but there is a special minibus from the site to the city centre leaving every thirty minutes and a fiver return. Sat outside and had a read, then cycled up to Morrison's to get a few bits. On the way back the sky went black, thunder and lightning abounded and I got totally drenched. Then, a masterstroke, I upset my neighbour. When I came back from the toilet a huge Hymer had arrived on the next pitch. When the bloke came out to plug in, I said, pointing at his van “Are you my daddy?” He looked askance and said “I beg your pardon?” Oh dear. I explained 'you know, big Hymer, little Hymer...............' but he just looked and went away. Oh no, I'll have to go out before dawn and return after dusk now for the next three days. Or I could put my cycling balaklava on back- to-front and pretend to be someone else.

Wednesday morning, and off on the minibus to the city. From one end of Prince's Street to the other, nearly a mile of opportunities for retail therapy and conspicuous consumption, all of them resisted successfully. Just like Guildford High Street but a lot longer. Interleaved with shops of designer names were shops of tourist tat (having said that I nearly bought a tam o'shanter with a bright ginger wig attached.) Waverley Station, though, that's another matter. It's one of the great railway stations, twenty platforms under a glass roof, fabulous.

Over North Bridge, up a precipitous narrow flight of ancient steps on to the Royal Mile. After another fifteen minutes of the Fleece-a-Tourist Campaign, I couldn't take any more and managed to get off the beaten track up South Bridge, into a land of charity shops where I started to feel human again. Two major finds, unread titles by Håkan Nesser and Pierre Magnan, both very rare. A good week's reading there. 

Down to Greyfriars Kirk to see the grave of Greyfriars Bobby and the little statue of him on the side of the street. There might be someone in the world who doesn't know the story. Greyfriars Bobby was a Skye Terrier whose owner died in 1858 and was buried in the churchyard and who sat by his grave for fourteen years until he himself died in 1872 and was buried in the churchyard. In the Daily Mail in 2011, a certain Dr Bondeson, described as a senior lecturer from Cardiff University, exploded the myth of the story. The estimable professor is quoted as saying 'In my opinion, all the theories about the dog’s life are about as full of holes as a piece of Swiss cheese. After five years of research, I believe he was an unwitting impostor who made use of the sentimental notions of how a dog should behave to get a good life for himself.’ Well, thank you very much, Professor, well done. I bet you told your children there is no Father Christmas as well.



Greyfriars Bobby's grave

 

Statue of Greyfriars Bobby

I was really quite tired by now, not being a very good walker, but decided to 'do' Rose Street in its entirety. This is a street which runs parallel to Prince's Street for most of its length and which used to be, in effect, two rows of pubs facing each other across a narrow lane. Really, when I went there in 1963, almost every premises was licensed. Now, it's down to just fourteen pubs, a sad decline but still quite a challenge for the pub crawler.

I didn't dare go into a pub, so I went into a barber's instead and got my head sharpened. £16-50 and no OAP concession! £16.50! That's more than twice what I normally pay. £16.50! The sooner they secede the better.

Now I'm watching the Scottish Championship play-offs on the BBC Gaelic-language channel, Cowdenbeath versus Dunfermline, two very near neighbours in Fife. It looks to be about the same standard as the English Division Two. No wonder Scotland can no longer field a decent national team. Dunfermline have a great little left-winger who has just severely clogged a full-back twice his size. He's carrying an extravagant quiff on the front of his head. Surely some mistake, as it must slow him down. The referee has rather a manic gleam in his eye. Alert ground staff, early baths indicated. The Cowdenbeath faithful sound very chirpy. They have a history of gallant graveyard humour, as they christened their team “The Blue Brazil” a few years ago. I wish I could understand their chants and songs, which sound very colourful.

I've only just discovered that Jimmy Nicholl, ex-Manchester United and Northern Ireland full back, is manager of Cowdenbeath. He achieved immortality when managing Raith Rovers. They were drawn away in the Cup to Rangers, who were then all-powerful and they would probably do well to keep the score to single figures. Nicholl was asked by an interviewer how he would approach the match.

“We'll just have to exploit their weakness at home, “ he said.

”What weakness?” the incredulous interviewer asked.

“Well, the pies aren't too good, are they?” was the priceless reply.

Quiet last day. Cycled to Morrison's without getting drenched then cycled west along the Firth of Forth to Cramond Island. This is reached by a causeway, submerged at high tide. It was bombed by mistake during the war and some clever person realised the mistake had been made because it looked a bit like a ship. So they piled earth on it to make it even more ship-like and it was regularly bombed after that – but never sunk.

Had a barbecue, Tesco Finest steakburgers and chicken kebabs, the chicken marinated in Greek yoghurt, feta, lime juice, oregano and rosemary. Green pepper, mushrooms and red onion on the skewers. Mmmm.

For the first time I wish I had stayed here an extra day, because there are lots of brilliant cycle paths throughout the city and I would have liked to explore the docks. Would also have liked to visit a pub near the Hearts ground at Tynecastle which a Scottish friend told me about. The proper name of the pub is The Athletic Arms, but it's known as The Diggers, its nickname coming from its proximity to a cemetery, whose gravediggers would visit the pub at the end of the working day to wash the dust from their throats. Its decor makes no concessions to modern taste: cracked linoleum, threadbare upholstered benches and wobbly tables. There is no juke-box and only a couple of ancient fruit machines. Apart from a few photographs of the Scotland football team, circa 1974, that's it. This is a pub where people go to drink, not to admire the surroundings. Beer brewed in Scotland mainly comes in two distinct varieties: 'Special', also known as 'Seventy Shilling', because that's how much tax was paid on a barrel many years ago; and 'Heavy', or 'Eighty Shilling'. Heavy is darker in colour, stronger, and more full-bodied than Special. There are sixteen beer taps in The Diggers: one for Guinness, one for lager, and the other 14 for Heavy. People drinking anything else tend to go somewhere else: legend has it that on busy nights anyone ordering lager will be politely directed to another pub 50 yards down the road.

The entry for The Diggers in the CAMRA Good Beer Guide simply says “Mecca”.

The older I get the more I realise that memories, even the most vivid and trusted memories, are suspect. In 1963 I went on a school CCF trip to Rosyth on the Firth of Forth. We were taken out on a night patrol to the mouth of the Firth and into the North Sea in a very small fishery patrol vessel and it was a very rough trip. When we came back the following morning we went to visit Edinburgh and I can clearly remember walking up Prince's Street and seeing the horizon at the top of the hill rising and falling just like the bows of the boat had the previous night. Except that Prince's Street is dead flat. How strange. I do remember correctly, though, that we went to the pictures and saw "Mysterious Island", brilliant, with giant crab and turkey and pirates and Captain Nemo and the Nautilus.
 
Wonderful sign in the window of a sandwich shop . "Breakfast yourself". A new verb.