Review of Cruise to Scotland, Ireland, Northern Europe - May 2019

[GeorgeCharlie]

22 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

Hawes Pier.

 

The X99 bus service is timed to meet all cruise ships scheduled to call at Queensferry and take visitors into Edinburgh city centre. Their schedule for last departure time from Edinburgh to Hawes Pier is here.

 

I didn't look into general information regarding public transportation timing, but you may find your answer here. 

 

 

 

Edited July 21, 2019 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

 

The Waverley Bridge runs south from Princess Street, between the Scott Monument and the Waverley Mall. The bridge forms part of roof of Waverley Train Station and links Edinburgh's historic Old and New towns. If you continue south around the traffic circle you will find Cockburn Street, which curves it way up the hill to High Street.

 

High Street is one of the streets which form the Royal Mile.

 

Part way along Cockburn Street, you will come across Warriston's Close, which is actually a stairway which you can climb to get up to the Royal Mile.

 

 

If you don't feel like climbing all those stairs you can continue along Cockburn Street and it will lead you to the Royal Mile. I'm sure it's a much easier climb then the stairs!

 

If you want to take the stairs back down from the Royal Mile, you have to take Writers' Close north off of High street.

 

I understand there is about 100 steps and they can be very slippery when wet.

Edited July 21, 2019 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

There are many interesting small shops along Cockburn Street. I took a picture of this one, as I thought it looked rather unique.

 

 

On googling the name I find it is actually drop-in center run by the CREW 2000 outreach charity.

 

According to their website, their mission statement is:

Crew exists to reduce harm, challenge perceptions and help people make positive choices about their use of cannabis, stimulant and other drugs and sexual health by providing non-judgmental, credible and up to date information and support.

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

11 hours ago, Himself said:

I am enjoying the review.  Looking forward to Belfast an Dublin.

 

We had a fantastic time in both Belfast and Dublin.

 

We spent most of our time in Belfast on a tour through the countryside north of Belfast, but we did get a driving tour through parts of the city. We had hoped to visit the Titanic museum after we returned from our tour, but it had already closed for the day.

 

In Dublin we took a day tour out to see the countryside and were dropped off in the Temple Bar area, which we walked around in for a while, before taking a taxi over to see an Irish Night Show.

 

More on both stops later in this review.

Edited July 21, 2019 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

For those interested , when you finally make it up Cockburn Street to High Street - you will find a Starbuck's directly across the street. A number of people from the ship when there for the Wi-Fi.🙂

 

Edited July 21, 2019 by GeorgeCharlie

[ontheweb]

7 hours ago, GeorgeCharlie said:

 

The X99 bus service is timed to meet all cruise ships scheduled to call at Queensferry and take visitors into Edinburgh city centre. Their schedule for last departure time from Edinburgh to Hawes Pier is here.

 

I didn't look into general information regarding public transportation timing, but you may find your answer here. 

 

 

 

Thanks, I was just wondering if one could get back to the ship after the Tattoo. It looks possible for August 16th, but not other days in August.

 

As I previously wrote, we missed the last train back to Rosyth and took a cab. Of course when your ship is staying overnight, there is less pressure to catch that last public transportation. And we did not need a tender.

[Krazy Kruizers]

Great reports.

[GeorgeCharlie]

The Royal Mile is a succession of streets forming the main thoroughfare of the Old Town. From the Edinburgh Castle gates at the top of the hill, to the Holyrood Palace gates at the bottom - the street is almost exactly one mile. 

 

The Royal Mile is the busiest tourist street in the Old Town, with a mixture of shops, restaurants/pubs and visitor attractions.

 

Cockburn Street intersects High Street at a point which is about two thirds of the way uphill on the Royal Mile. We decided to go down to Holyrood Palace, then back up the hill to Edinburgh Castle - before returning back down to Cockburn Street to exit the Royal Mile.

 

So we ended up walking the Royal Mile twice!!

[Himself]

11 hours ago, GeorgeCharlie said:

For those interested , when you finally make it up Cockburn Street to High Street - you will find a Starbuck's directly across the street. A number of people from the ship when there for the Wi-Fi.🙂

 

We cannot get away from Starbucks 

[g&gtravel]

Holyrood is a great place to visit, but was closed on the day you (and us) were there on the 19th.  There were unnamed family members in residence that day.  

g&g

[erewhon]

Thank you for your update.

[GeorgeCharlie]

8 hours ago, g&gtravel said:

Holyrood is a great place to visit, but was closed on the day you (and us) were there on the 19th.  There were unnamed family members in residence that day.  

g&g

 

Yes, the gates were closed.

 

And the guards were on duty.

 

 

The High Constables of Holyroodhouse are a small corps of ceremonial guards at the palace. Dating from the early sixteenth century, they now parade whenever the Sovereign, or the Lord High Commissioner of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, is in residence.

[DeeniEncinitas]

Just found your wonderful report!

I really enjoyed your writings and photos👍

Thank you for taking the time to put this all together.

I appreciate it 

Denise😊

[GeorgeCharlie]

10 minutes ago, DeeniEncinitas said:

Just found your wonderful report!

I really enjoyed your writings and photos👍

Thank you for taking the time to put this all together.

I appreciate it 

Denise😊

 

Hi Denise,

 

I would like to thank you - and all the others - who have posted so many kind words regarding my review. They are very much appreciated.

 

I actually don't mind doing the reviews and wish we had done something similar for many of our past travels. Like most people, we now look at pictures of our long past (and some not that long ago) travels and have a hard time remembering very many details of those trips.

 

Cheers,

Bill

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

Holyrood Palace is officially know as the Palace of Holyroodhouse. 

 

 

The palace as it stands today, dates from the 1670's.

 

 

Fountain.

 

 

 

Edited July 22, 2019 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

The Queen's Gallery is an art gallery. It forms part of the palace complex.

 

 

The two boys playing the bagpipes where actually pretty good.

 

 

[DeeniEncinitas]

13 minutes ago, GeorgeCharlie said:

The Queen's Gallery is an art gallery. It forms part of the palace complex.

 

 

The two boys playing the bagpipes where actually pretty good.

 

 

WOW so loved the video of the bagpipe boys ! How precious. We travel all over and I am struck by your photos and write ups. Maybe Northern Europe might be in the cards for us after our 3 other cruises.

Thank you again

Denise😅

[GeorgeCharlie]

9 minutes ago, DeeniEncinitas said:

WOW so loved the video of the bagpipe boys ! How precious. We travel all over and I am struck by your photos and write ups. Maybe Northern Europe might be in the cards for us after our 3 other cruises.

Thank you again

Denise😅

 

If you are interested - I also did a review of our Norway/Iceland/Greenland cruise on the Zuiderdam last fall. You can see it here.

[DeeniEncinitas]

21 minutes ago, GeorgeCharlie said:

 

If you are interested - I also did a review of our Norway/Iceland/Greenland cruise on the Zuiderdam last fall. You can see it here.

Thank you I will look at it👍

Denise😊

[ontheweb]

7 hours ago, GeorgeCharlie said:

 

If you are interested - I also did a review of our Norway/Iceland/Greenland cruise on the Zuiderdam last fall. You can see it here.

Sounds interesting, I will check it out.

[jlocole]

Which cruise did you enjoy more?  Norway / Iceland or  the more recent Scotland one?  We will be on Zuiderdam for Panama cruise next spring, and cruised on her for our 2014 Alaska cruise.

Maybe we can come over and discuss,  (South) Alberta resident here.  (I kid)

[GeorgeCharlie]

1 hour ago, jlocole said:

Which cruise did you enjoy more?  Norway / Iceland or  the more recent Scotland one?  We will be on Zuiderdam for Panama cruise next spring, and cruised on her for our 2014 Alaska cruise.

Maybe we can come over and discuss,  (South) Alberta resident here.  (I kid)

 

Real tough call.

 

But, I think we appreciated the stops on the Norway/Iceland/Greenland cruise more - as we're not big fans of the heavily commercialized sites.

 

Hey, all kidding aside - we're always enjoy hearing about other people's travel experiences. We live a short distance northwest of Edmonton. Maybe we could meet in Red Deer for coffee/lunch sometime. You can contact me at bill at hegy dot ca if you're interested.

 

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

If you have a look at the gate picture in post #37, you will notice a panel on the wall depicting a unicorn.

 

 

This panel originally stood over the gatehouse at this spot.

 

Drawing of the original gatehouse.

 

 

The IR5 inscription is for King James V.

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

While wandering around, we noticed other unicorns - including on top of the Mercat Cross.

 

Unicorn also appears on the British pound coin.

 

Seeing so many depictions of unicorns, made me wonder if the unicorn had any great significance in Scotland.

 

And, yes it does.

 

The unicorn is Scotland's National Animal.

[GeorgeCharlie]

The unicorn is also on the royal coat of arms of the United kingdom.

 

 

 

The Lion and the Unicorn are symbols of the United Kingdom. They are, properly speaking, heraldic supporters appearing in the full royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom. The lion stands for England and the unicorn for Scotland. The combination therefore dates back to the 1603 accession of James I of England who was already James VI of Scotland. By extension, they have also been used in the arms of Hanover in 1837–1866 and the arms of Canada since 1921.