The next leg of our England with kids journey, was a trip into Scotland. We took the LNER bullet train north from York to Edinburgh, Scotland. We only had a few days in Scotland to see so much! Again, we stayed in an AirBnB.
Something to note: we packed lightly with plans to wash our clothes at least once during the trip. In the UK it seems to be expected to wash very small loads and hang them out to dry. This is confusing to me in a place that receives so little sun, but that is the reality. So a washer/dryer in Scotland was a little box that indeed washed AND dried clothes. The drying ability of this machine is abysmal, though. Count on washers in AirBnBs, but no functional dryers, at least for family sized laundry.
On our Italy trip, with just two of us, my daughter and I washed just necessary laundry each night, slept with the windows open, and found it dry the next morning. It is much more difficult to do traveling with several kids, in a wetter, cooler climate. Jeans and sweatshirts take whole 24 hours. Plan accordingly.
Right away we went to eat, in the historic part of Edinburgh, known as Old Town, in a little spot off Royal Mile, called Tempting Tattie. Baked potatoes with lots of fun toppings are a big thing in Scotland. I don’t know exactly how they cook these potatoes, but they have mastered the art. They are fabulous. We enjoyed the Tartan Tikka and the MacDaddy most.
After a quick, filling meal there we shopped on the famous Royal Mile. It is very pretty to walk down this quaint, hilly street. There are some famous and historic spots along the way. There are also a million gift shops selling exactly the same items, which was disappointing. The most fun was peeking into the “closes”, those small side streets, with quaint sounding names and odd shapes and sizes.
We opted not to take a tour of Edinburgh castle, but it is romantic and imposing from the outside. The tour we did take was the best guided tour of our trip!
We had another great counter service meal at Oink on Victoria Street in Edinburgh. Its a long line, a short menu, and worth it! And this comes from a southern gal that loves her (American) BBQ.
Our tour of Edinburgh brought us through the highlights of the city. Our guide, Phil, was wonderful – entertaining, informative, and thorough. We saw the Walter Scott Memorial, heard the Old Town stories, walked by John Knox’s strange parking lot grave, and spent some time in Greyfriar’s Kirkyard (a huge church graveyard). We loved the story of the faithful little dog, Greyfriar’s Bobby, and watched the adorable Disney movie when we got home.
Our guide told us the story of underdog poet William McGonagall. He even recited some of him hilariously bad poetry. We spent extra time in Greyfriars, looking for Tom Riddle’s grave.
One of the sights my oldest daughter longed to see was the Scottish Highlands. Though we did not venture very far north, we went a bit up into the rural highlands to go ziplining at Go Ape! Aberfoyle. Having ziplined in possibly the most beautiful spot in the world, Kualoa Ranch, Hawaii. anything else is a bit of a letdown. But it was exciting and fun, with a bit of of treetop climbing.
Since you must be at least 10 years old to zipline, our youngest was not eligible. There were beautiful hiking trails surrounding the ziplining headquarters and that is what she and I did. There was a beautiful waterfall, hobbit holes to hide in, hammocks to rest in, and other fun things to see and do along the trail. Close by there is a Visitor’s Center with a small cafe, clean bathrooms, and nature exhibits.
After the hike and a bite to eat we were ready to see some Scottish sites. We drove through a number of small towns, but stopped for fried haggis in the resort town of Balloch. We walked around the Loch a bit and through the charming little town. Then we drove up further and stopped in the tiny, adorable town of Balmaha. We parked in the Visitor Center parking lot, where the trailhead to Conic Hill begins. We walked across the street for ice cream, came back out to our rental car to discover a flat tire.
So we ended up spending the rest of the day there. Scottish people are very kind and friendly. We had to make lots of phone calls over wifi. Signal was not good. The tiny hotel staff kindly let us hang out in the lobby for hours. We shopped in the little gift shop, then went back into the ice cream shop and had tea and scones with jam and clotted cream.
While we waited for a tow truck (which was supposed to be 90 minutes, due to the rural location) a few of us, including my 7 year old, decided to go ahead and hike Conic Hill. It was an easy hike until the “Christmas tree forest” as my kiddo called to refreshing pines we walked through. After the pines the hill became a rocky incline for a LONG way. My 7 year old and I made it to an inspiring overlook. Then a descending hiker told us we have a long way to go yet. That was discouraging after the climb to get to that point. We decided to hang out and enjoy the view for a while.
My little one and I played in the rocks while my 22 year old headed further up by herself. What did we play? Mostly finding fairies, gnomes and the occasional nasty miniature troll in the rock crevices. We pounded weeds into “flour” with rocks and made pretend campfires. When my daughter came back, we headed back (good thing, too, since I needed her to interpret the tow driver’s Glasgow accent).
We ended up having dinner at the hotel’s popular restaurant. We ate outside, but ended up needing an inside table due to the flocks of bugs that attacked as soon as the sun went down. Back home we call them no see ‘ums. They were a pestilence after dark!
We actually rented a car in Scotland from Turo. The family we rented from was very pleasant. The country roads are very narrow and driving on the other side of the road is disorienting. The result is a tendency to bump into curbs. That is probably what happened to us. Turo’s roadside assistance is handled by a third party. It was hours of phone calls and lots of frustration until we were able to get the car towed and hop on a bus from Balmaha to Balloch. Two cabs from Balloch to Glasgow and an Uber XL from Glasgow back to Edinburgh. There was no other way to get it done. We never got reimbursed for the trip back to Edinburgh and we had to pay for the tire. I don’t think we will use Turo again.
That said, you cannot find a nicer group of people than the ones that tired to help us on this journey: hostess and hotel front desk at the Oak Tree Inn, tow truck drivers, cab drivers, and servers at St. Mocha Coffee Shop. We never would have spent that much time walking around and seeing different views of Loch Lomond without the flat tire. My daughter wanted to feel the real Scotland and that was a big taste of it!
