Day 148, 29 November 2012, Edinburgh, Monument "hill", Old Calton Cemetery, Grayfriars Bobby, St Giles (organ practice, angels playing bagpipes), Police Centre Museum (business card case made from the skin of William Burke, "Irish" serial killer), National Museum of Scotland (Dr Livingstone, I presume), Surgeons Hall Museum (book cover made from the skin of William Burke), Lloyds Banking Museum (the Museum on the Mound), Christmas Market, Lighting of the Christmas Tree, Fireworks off the Castle, near fatal hypothermia, Curry night at The Standing Order to recover.
So many highlights today - many of them free (which is good). Probably one of our favourite things was visiting the banking museum/the Museum on the Mound, where we saw exactly what one million pounds looks like. Unfortunately cancelled notes - 50,000 x £20 notes to be precise. After that we headed to the Christmas Markets which had just opened - hugely atmospheric and full of sparkling lights and the smell of Christmas food. We moved on up to The Mound for the lighting of the large Norwegian Christmas Tree. We were out in the freezing cold for an hour or more, thankfully in our ski clothes. The lighting of the tree was pretty - but the highlight was the unexpected fireworks off Edinburgh Castle. Brought back childhood memories of watching the Edinburgh Tattoo on TV on the other side of the world and thinking how much I'd like to visit Edinburgh one day. It appears that day has come.
PS - our encounters with Dr Livingstone continued today (saw his work in Africa, saw his grave in Westminster Abbey). Today we went to a small exhibit at the museum which included many of the artefacts of his travels - and showed what a feat it was for his two faithful native staff to get his body over 1000 miles of deepest darkest Africa in order to return it to England for burial.