"Can we sit where JK Rowling sat?"

Sunday morning I came back from a quick trip to Scotland. Three friends and I spent two days in Edinburgh, and this was definitely one of our quietest, least busy weekend adventures. We arrived in Scotland on Friday morning, and the first thing we did was head to Edinburgh Castle. Edinburgh Castle sits atop Castle Rock, which has hosted human inhabitants since 900 BC. The Castle, though, was built in the 1200s, and was the cite of royal occupation until the 1600s. By the 1700s, its chief purpose was militaristic, and since the 1900s it has primarily served as an historical monument. Edinburgh Castle is huge, and we spent about two hours exploring. The Crown Room and Royal Palace houses the Stone of Destiny and the Great Hall contains a display of armor. St. Margaret's Chapel is the oldest building of the Castle, and it was built to honor David I's mother. The Prisons contain bunks that emulate the beds the prisoners would have actually slept in, and in keeping with the authentic feel of the entire castle, a gun is fired every afternoon at 1:00.

Jewels in the Crown Room

The 1:00 gun

After visiting Edinburgh Castle, we checked into our hostel, Castle Rock, which was only about a stone's throw from the top of the Castle (pun intended). This is probably my favorite hostel I've stayed in so far. First of all, it looked like a castle on the outside, and the inside had lots of stairwells leading in different directions, much like the castle we explored earlier that day. There were a few different lounges, each with a name and a purpose, like The Posh Lounge, which has a fish tank and a piano, and my personal favorite, The Groove Lounge, which houses a record player, a guitar, and is "strictly for grooving." Each dorm room has a theme too, and we were in the Happy Days Room. There were 14 other people in our room, so needless to say I didn't sleep at all, but the hostel was so cool and in a great location, so it was worth it.

The Groove Lounge

That night we went to dinner at Elephant House, which is where JK Rowling started writing Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. When we walked in, the waitress asked us if we wanted to sit in the front or in the back, and one of my friends jokingly responded, "Can we sit where JK Rowling sat?" The waitress gave her one of the biggest eye rolls I've ever seen, and put us at a table at the front of the restaurant. We later found out that JK Rowling sat in the back. Rude. Aside from the waitress, eating at the Elephant House was magical (this time, no pun intended). Being the literature nerd that I am, I couldn't get over how cool it was that I was in the same place as where one of the most influential authors of all time was when she began her writing career. The bathrooms are covered in graffiti that has thank-you messages to JK Rowling and quotes from the books. The messages range from sentimental to funny; one of my favorites was the spell "Alohomora," which is used to unlock doors, and is written on one of the door handles.


Saturday, the weather was uncharacteristically warm and sunny, so we started our day with a hike to the top of Arthur's Seat, which is a dormant volcano. Getting to be outside and enjoy the sunshine, a hike, and the beautiful views, was the highlight of the weekend for me, and I would definitely recommend this to anyone who goes to Scotland. From the top, you can see what feels like all of Scotland, from Edinburgh Castle to the ocean. There's a large grass area on the top, and when we got there we laid down and basked in the sun before heading back down the other side of the mountain.

View from halfway up...

and the view from the top! 

Stereotypical Scotland 

After climbing up Arthur's Seat, we took a stroll down the Royal Mile, which is a series of streets that runs between Edinburgh Castle and Arthur's Seat. There were countless pubs, Scottish wool and cashmere stores, and bagpipe players in kilts lining the streets; basically exactly what I imagined Scotland would be like. The National Gallery isn't far from the Royal Mile either, so we went in there for a little to look at some artwork. Museums aren't my favorite thing, but there were a lot of impressionist paintings there that I really liked and a collection of work by Scottish painters that was really unique.

The Royal Mile

Saturday evening we continued to live out our Harry Potter dreams by walking through Greyfrieirs Graveyard, which is behind Elephant House and inspired many of the characters' names in the books. We saw Tom Riddell's (aka Tom Riddle / Lord Voldemort) and William McGonagall's (inspiration for Professor Minerva McGonagall) graves.


Later that night, we went to dinner with a Canadian girl whom we met at our hostel. When I pictured hostels before I came to Europe, I always imagined them as these giant rooms with lots of beds where people from all over the world became friends. This was the closest experience I had to what I thought a hostel would be like, and it was cool to branch out and explore a new city with someone else who was also new there. After dinner, we went back to Edinburgh Castle. It was really peaceful to walk around at night and see great views of Edinburgh when it was dark.



Edinburgh was great, but it felt very small, and I don't know what we would have done if we hadn't come back on Sunday. As always, I was happy to be back in Dublin. Now I have only one more weekend trip to look forward to: Barcelona!