Scottish Holidays

Edinburgh at Christmastime is beautiful and festive. Our flat is located on the ground floor of an apartment building, across the street from a huge meadow park with more than one playground.

Our building's front door, and our kitchen and living room windows on the right.

View from the front of our flat.

After settling into our flat, we explored a bit of the city, the Royal Mile (a shop-lined street winding up a hill to the Edinburgh castle), and Princes Street. During the holidays Edinburgh hosts a huge Christmas Market. The park next to Princes Street is taken over by an enormous ferris wheel, fair rides, and vendors selling hot food, drinks, and gift items. There was even an entire area dedicated to children with rides and visits with Santa. 

On Christmas Eve our friends from Switzerland arrived: Dani, Gunter, Jonah and Eliah. We spent the next few days enjoying time together and fitting in some sightseeing for Dani and her family, as they had never been to Scotland. 

Christmas morning was magical with Logan. It was the first year that he was excited for Santa to come, and he was thrilled to find presents from Santa when he awoke Christmas morning to celebrate Jesus’s birthday. While the gifts were small and few, since we cannot take much with us along our way, Logan was so happy and excited. It was so joyful to see Logan’s excitement while opening presents and playing throughout the day! 

One of Logan’s gifts was a digital camera for toddlers. As you can imagine, he sees us take countless photos on a daily basis. He would hold up his hands and make circles with his fingers and tell us to “say cheese!” Thanks to Santa (and Grandma and Papa), Logan now has his very own digital camera. He absolutely loves it and takes pictures everywhere we go!

We spent lots of time at our flat with Dani’s family, letting the three boys play with all the toys (and fight over them too). It was nice to have other kids around, it was very happy, loud and chaotic! 

Even though the weather was very cold, we made it outside to take the boys to the playground across the street. Logan played best with Eliah (only one year younger than Logan), but he seemed to look up to Jonah (two years older than Logan). He would ask Jonah to hold his hand as we walked to the park. It was precious.

Eliah and Logan at the park.

Logan and Jonah on the way to the park.

After family dinners, sightseeing on a double decker tour bus, lots of playing and fun…Dani and her family headed back to Switzerland on December 29th. While it was sad to see them go, we look forward to a lot of quality time with them in March when we head to their home town in Switzerland as our last stop before we come back to the States!

Dani and Eliah, on our double decker bus tour.

Corey returned to Edinburgh from his Scottish tour on Dec. 26th and remained with us until January 3rd. Monica and Shelby flew in from California on New Year’s Eve and stayed with us until January 8th. We are blessed to have had so many visitors since our arrival in Scotland! It definitely made the holidays joyful and prevented me from feeling too homesick! 

Logan was so happy to see his Auntie Shelby! 

Hugs for Nani when she arrived on New Year's Eve.

New Year’s Eve was pretty low key for me. Shelby, Monica, Corey and I went out to catch the 9pm fireworks below the Edinburgh castle while Taylor stayed home with Logan (who was asleep in bed). After the fireworks, Monica and Shelby went home to sleep, as did I. Corey and Taylor headed out for a great time in Edinburgh. Our host at our flat is a Brit named Sam. He had invited us to celebrate the new year with him, so Taylor and Corey took Sam up on his offer and rang in the new year with live bagpipes and a bunch of drunk Scots! 

Girl time with Monica and Shelby - so nice to spend some quality time with them!

Before Corey left to head back to the US, we all enjoyed traditional tea and scones in Edinburgh, a visit to the National Museum of Scotland, and a tour of the Edinburgh castle. 

Group shot in front of the red telephone booths!

The National Museum of Scotland is a lifesaver! Besides being awesome with dinosaur bones, preserved animals from all over the world, real meteors, trains, old swords and armor…it also has a fantastic play area for toddlers. Oh, and did I mention that it is FREE!? Tourism isn’t cheap, and you don’t find many free things to do while out and about. This museum and its toddler area are amazing. We have had some very cold, wet weather here. Even though there is a playground across the street from our flat, we often cannot enjoy it due to the weather. So it has become an almost daily activity to take Logan to the museum to play for a few hours. They’ve got costumes to dress up in, large legos and wooden blocks, stories to read, shadow puppets behind a light screen, and so much more. We took Shelby and Monica there so they could enjoy the museum, and Logan could play!

The day of the Edinburgh Castle visit we had some very unexpected rain/snow flurries. Even though the weather prediction said no chance of rain, we were caught off guard while touring the castle with the very windy, cold, and wet weather! It was slightly annoying, hilarious and exciting all at the same time!

In front of Edinburgh Castle.

Inside the castle's Great Hall.

Snow flurries at Edinburgh Castle.

A few days into the new year, Corey headed home and the rest of us headed north for a three day tour of the Scottish highlands. We rented a van (which turned out to be a clunky Fiat behemoth), and set off on a very ambitious plan to see as much of the northern highlands as we could fit into the limited amount of daylight here. For those of you who don’t know, it gets light out around 8:45am, and is pitch dark by about 4pm. That doesn’t leave a lot of time for sightseeing the gorgeous landscape of Scotland. But we did our absolute best and fit a ton of sightseeing into a limited amount of time.

Our first day out we hit the road headed for Inverness. We stopped in Pitlochry for lunch at a cute cafe, and ended the day just before dark in Inverness. Our B&B overlooked a splendid view of Inverness castle. It was just a quick pit stop overnight before we headed out the next morning. 

View from the B&B of Inverness Castle.

Out and about in Inverness.

Our first stop were some standing stones called Clava Cairns. Conveniently located next to the Culloden battlefield (another huge part of Scottish history), the standing stones have been there for an estimated 4,000 years. These standing stones were an old burial site. I am a huge fan of an historical fiction series of books called The Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon. In these books the lead character, Claire, passes back 200 years through time by entering these standing stones outside of Inverness. Despite the fact that it is totally fictional, I enjoyed seeing a place that was so important in some of my favorite books.

We headed out again after pausing beside the Culloden battlefield to reflect on the dramatic history that took place there (1,500 Scottish clansmen were slaughtered by the English redcoats in a battle that would be a turning point in Scottish history, ultimately leading to the persecution and destruction of Scottish clans for decades to come).

Next stop was a quick lunch to go from a cute Scottish town, and then Dunvegan castle, nestled along Loch Ness. 

The scenery driving through Scotland was repeatedly breathtaking. Green rolling hills rose into the sky and were capped with snow. The clouds were magnificent shades of color reflecting the sun which never gets very high in the sky. Sheep and highland cows graze alongside the narrow highways. Stone walls separate one farm from the next. Logan loved the hairy highlander cows and constantly pointed out his "friend Harry."

Logan loved the hairy highlander cows and constantly pointed out his "friend Harry."

The last stop of the day before we finished at our hotel was Eilean Donan castle. This castle is a famous site in Scotland, and is recognized all over the world. Situated on an island surrounded by three great sea lochs, the castle has come to Hollywood fame by being featured in numerous films, including Highlander and James Bond, The World is Not Enough. 

We finally made our way to our House Hotel, The Duisdale, on the Isle of Skye in northwestern Scotland. Connected to the mainland by a bridge, the Isle of Skye is renowned for its stunning scenery. We checked into the hotel which was a lovely and cozy place, more like staying at a friend’s mansion. With a large common room full of comfy furniture and a coal fire burning, it was just what we needed to unwind after a long day. 

The next morning we toured Skye. First was breakfast at the hotel, traditional Scottish breakfast. We started with Scottish porridge oatmeal with your choice of cream, honey, maple syrup, or a shot of whisky. I opted for the cream and maple syrup and it was creamy delicious. Taylor got the shot of whisky, and as instructed by our server, poured half into his oatmeal and drank the rest. Next up was a plate of eggs, bacon (slab of fried ham), sausage, black pudding, haggis, sautéed mushrooms, fried tomato and toast. If you look into the ingredients in black pudding or haggis, you might be tempted to skip trying them altogether. But, if you ignore the thought of what they are made with and just opt to taste some traditional food - you’d be pleasantly surprised. Both Taylor and I loved the black pudding, and enjoyed the haggis too.

On our list in Skye was a unique rock formation called the Old Man of Storr (we simply saw it and drove right by). Then we stopped at a “view point” where we encountered the strongest wind I’ve ever been in (besides my last trip to Scotland in 2007 when I specifically remembered wind like nothing I’ve ever experienced in my life). I truly believe if I hadn’t picked up Logan, he would have been blown away!

Old Man of Storr rock formation in the distance.

Crazy wind!

Gorgeous views.

Next up, Kilt Rock, another gorgeous rock formation of vertical lava lines looking like a Scot’s kilt. 

Kilt Rock, still very very windy. Logan didn't like the wind much at all!

Sheep in the road, cows along the side pastures, Pringles to snack on (along with grapes, bananas, nuts, and granola bars), Logan napping in his car seat with his favorite truck clutched in his hand, gorgeous mountains and lots of wind and cold.

We made our way to find the Fairy Glen in Uig, although we were never really sure if we found it, we did enjoy a simple hike through some gorgeous Scottish hillside.

Last stop of the day was at Skye’s only whisky distillery, Talisker (clever note - Scotch whisky spelling does not have an “e” in it like any other whiskey that is not made in Scotland). Unfortunately, children under the age of 8 are not allowed in the distillery for tours, so Shelby kindly stayed in the van with Logan while Monica, Taylor and I toured the distillery. I had never been to one before and it was fascinating to see how Scotch is made! At the end of the tour we were each given a small glass of whisky, which I had to add lots of water to mine to try to get it down, and I still didn’t finish it. I guess it’s an acquired taste!

Finally the next morning we made the very long trek home to Edinburgh, stopping only quickly for lunch and to take some pictures in Stirling at the Wallace Monument (Mel Gibson’s Braveheart tells a loose story of William Wallace), and the Stirling castle. 

It was four days of many hours in the car to see many of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen. We dragged Shelby and Monica all over northern Scotland hoping that they too could enjoy the beauty of this country that Taylor and I had both enjoyed before. We all had a great time, and were glad to make it back to Edinburgh!

With one last day before Monica and Shelby headed home, we enjoyed some tea and shopping. Logan loved every minute that he had with his Nani (Monica) and Auntie Shel Shel. It was sad to see them go, but we will be home soon, and that helped with saying goodbye.

Now we have some time to rest, relax, do laundry, and enjoy life in Edinburgh. There will be lots of trips to the museum over the next week, and then our friend Alan arrives from the US to spend a week here with us! More to come from Scotland!