My cousins woke up just after midnight this morning! Talk about crazy jet lag... I woke up at a more reasonable time, though, and met them downstairs for breakfast. I tried a piece of their haggis (which tasted rather disturbingly like sausage (or maybe sausages taste disturbingly like haggis)). Black pudding is OK, but like the haggis, I don't think I'd make a habit of eating it.
We visited Edinburgh Castle today. This is where they keep the Scottish crown jewels. Unfortunately, you're not allowed to take photos of
the jewels (and there's a guard watching them all the time, so you can even sneak a picture!), so I don't have any pictures of the actual jewels,
but I got plenty of pictures of the view around the castle. It's actually pretty spectacular. It sits on top of this enormous
hill, right in the middle of Edinburgh.
We were at the castle for pretty much the whole day, because there's just so much of it to see. They have a museum on Scottish warfare, and
on all the wars and things the Scots have fought in. There's about 3 dozen souvenier shops (though they all sell pretty much the same thing)
and of course, the actual crown jewels. Along with the crown jewels, they also have the Stone of Destiny, which until 1996 had been kept
in Westminster Abbey, and is what the monarch has sat on while being crowned for something like 600 years. To me, it just looks like on piece
of sandstone with some iron rings in it. But still, it's impressive the age of it.
We also happened to be there while a wedding was in progress. The bride turned up half an hour late, and even when she got there, there was some discussion, I believe, on how she was going to walk down the cobble stones in her high heels, but eventually she got out of the car. I wasn't so impressed with all of that, though, as I was with her car. It was easily the longest stretch limo I've ever seen! Though a horrible shade of purple (which matched the bride maid's dresses, of course).
We had dinner in our favourite little restaurant again. Yum!