I suppose I had better tell you a little bit about the part of Edinburgh in which we are staying. The Village of Dean by the Waters of Leith sounds like it should be a little hamlet miles out in the country but it is actually only 5 minutes walk to the top end of Princes St, one of Edinburgh's mail thoroughfares. (Although to be perfectly honest, there is not much thoroughfaring being done as many of Edinburgh's streets are being dug up at the moment to install a tram system.) The Village was once home to the Guild of Baxters, and the mills on the Waters of Leith provided Edinburgh with all the ground meal required for bread making. Today, many of the buildings in the area have inscriptions and carvings on them representing the role that the Guild played in the local community. One of the old mills is right across the street from us and has also been turned into apartments; the mill wheels however, are long gone.
There is a lovely footpath that goes along beside the water and we are planning to explore it this afternoon. The streets in Dean Village are very quiet as tere is hardly any through traffic. I am sitting on a wide window ledge in our bedroom on the third floor and have just watched two policemen ride up Dean Path on horses. Their hooves made a wonderful sound on the cobbled street.
The apartment we are in is in an old school. Our apartment is at one end of the building and is arranged around a winding staircase. It is very comfortable, but being on 4 levels means a lot of upping and downing during the day. Yesterday evening as we were enjoying happy hour in the kitchen, we looked out the window to see a group of about 20 people all standing and looking up at us - well, the house really! It looked like one of those walking tours that take place in historic areas. We felt very famous, just by association!
No comments:
Post a Comment