Weekend on the Firth (and Now We Are 31)

After living at our previous hostel for a few days, we decided to book ourselves into somewhere new. Since we didn't really have any obligations this weekend, we found what sounded like a really nice place about 15-20 minutes outside of Edinburgh, so we decided to check ourselves in there for the weekend.

The place was called the Globetrotter Inn, and it was really fantastic. This is a shot of it from the back; it was a pretty big place, but most people were heading in to town on the shuttle, while we just wanted a relaxing weekend outside of town, so there weren't a whole lot of people around most of the time. Anyway, the place had pretty much everything you could need, including a mini-grocery store, kitchens, a pub downstairs that served great food, a cinema, all sorts of things. The only downside was that their internet was dead, so I was a little out of touch, but sometimes I feel like I should disconnect a little more often, so it was a pretty good excuse.

On Saturday morning, we went for a bit of a walk down by the water, where most people were walking their dogs and just taking a walk in the sun. We ended up in Cramond, a quiet little village which, as it turns out, is the oldest found human settlement in Scotland, dating back to the Mesolithic period somewhere around 8500BC. The Romans conquered it around 142AD, and we spent some time roaming around the ruins of the old Roman fort that used to be there.

We walked back to the inn, and spent the rest of the day there just watching Northern Exposure and not doing a whole lot. We went for my birthday dinner in the pub downstairs, which turned into birthday drinks in the pub downstairs, which turned into birthday drinks in the pub downstairs until sometime after 2am. Good times (and a bit of a rough morning) ensued. But all in all, it was a really laid-back birthday.


Now we're back in the city for the week, staying at another place called Budget Backpackers, which came highly recommended to us by someone we met in Bath. And he was definitely right, this is a really great place too. We may head back to the Globetrotter this coming weekend as well.

Stay tuned!