Day 38, 24 6 2011, Edinburgh to Cockburnspath

We had a good night’s sleep, and I started to agree with Roz, that perhaps I had been a bit rash about the Pirie Hotel.  We went to breakfast, and they had espresso coffee and a buffet style breakfast, so that was very good.  I can’t understand why it is that so many hotels assume their guests like really good coffee during the day, but prefer shit coffee for breakfast.  So I had my fruit and yoghurt and was feeling pretty good, and went to get a couple of rolls, which turned out to be a few days old, so old they crumbled.  THAT IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH.  My opinion of the Pirie Hotel remains unchanged.

We spent last night wandering around the city, and this morning went to the castle, which looks like it was poured over the big rock on which it stands.  Edinburgh Castle is a great castle.  It has been evolving for a thousand years, but somewhere there is a consistency in the design.  It is filled with guns, kilts and all sorts of other memorabilia, including the sort of vermilion-coloured uniforms that say “shoot me first”.  There were thousands of tourists there, but we managed to spend a couple of hours, which may be a record for us.  Of course, a place like this is a testament to human bastardry.  The people in charge here have carelessly visited the most appalling suffering on all sorts of other people, through their immorality, venality and ambition.

I took advantage of a Nero’s coffee, and left around 1.30, following a combination of a bicycle route courtesy of TomTom and the National Cycle Network route 76.  We only rode 68Km today.

Our route was over gently undulating country through farmland on a cool partly sunny day, with little or no wind.  A very pleasant afternoon, and only the second day in Scotland without big hills.

We will definitely be back in England tomorrow, and have been planning how we will get back to mainland Europe, and when.  We should be in Newcastle the day after tomorrow, and will try and get a ferry out on that evening.

This leaves us with a few days riding in Belgium or Holland.  Of course we had to allow a couple of days to get back to Amsterdam to get our flight home, and this next short tour is the result of that consideration.

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