Eight Days in Scotland - Day 7 to Edinburgh

We got a little distracted on our way to Edinburgh, but we did get there eventually.  On our tour of Stirling Castle, the day before, the tour guide had mentioned that the Flanders Moss National Nature Reserve was a good place to see what the landscape would have looked like before it was drained and taken over by sheep farming.  The trail was a short loop on a boardwalk with a viewing platform at the beginning.

Our next stop was the Falkirk Wheel, a wheel that takes the place of a number of locks to move canal boats from one canal to another one 79' above.  There's a boat tour, where you can take a canal boat up the wheel and down a short portion of the canal and around and back down again.  It was short and slow and definitely didn't go far, but still interesting.  I was surprised at how smoothly the wheel moved, and there were some great views from the top.

And finally we really were heading into Edinburgh and city traffic.  It was challenging, as there was lots of construction, but we did fortunately locate a parking garage and a place for our car.  We headed directly to the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, which I was very excited about.  It's free to enter the grounds, but there is an admission for the glasshouses, which is definitely worth it, as they are really the highlight, with plants from all over the world.

We were staying in the Edinburgh Central SYH, it was a big hostel, but comfortable enough and very centrally located, an easy walk from the royal mile.

Our only splurge dinner of the week was at The Gardener's Cottage, a tiny restaurant with an even tinier kitchen in Royal Terrace Gardens.

And after dinner, we took a short walk to the royal mile and up to Edinburgh Castle to see it all lit up.