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New Town | Old Town | Out from the centre

- - - New Town - - -

The New Town , itself well over two hundred years old, stands in total contrast to the Old Town: the layout is symmetrical, the streets are broad and straight, and most of the buildings are Neoclassical. Originally intended to be residential, the entire area, right down to the names of its streets, is something of a celebration of the Union, which was then generally regarded as a proud development in Scotland's history. Today the New Town is the bustling hub of the city's professional, commercial and business life, dominated by shops, banks and offices.

The existence of the New Town is chiefly due to the vision of George Drummond , who made schemes for the expansion of the city soon after becoming Lord Provost in 1725. The North Bridge, linking the Old Town with the port of Leith, was built between 1763 and 1772. In 1766, following a public competition, a plan for the New Town by 22-year-old architect James Craig was chosen. Its gridiron pattern was perfectly matched to the site: central George Street, flanked by showpiece squares, was laid out along the main ridge, with parallel Princes Street and Queen Street on either side below, and two smaller streets, Thistle Street and Rose Street in between the three major thoroughfares providing coach houses, artisans' dwellings and shops. Princes and Queen streets were built up on one side only, so as not to block the spectacular views of the Old Town and Fife.

In many ways, the layout of the New Town is its own most remarkable sight, an extraordinary grouping of squares, circuses, terraces, crescents and parks with a few set pieces such as Register House , the north frontage of Charlotte Square and the assemblage of curiosities on and around Calton Hill . However, it also contains assorted Victorian additions, notably the Scott Monument , as well as two of the city's most important public collections - the National Gallery of Scotland and, further afield, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art.

Calton

Of the various extensions to the New Town, the most engaging is Calton , which branches out from the eastern end of Princes Street and encircles a volcanic hill. Waterloo Place forms a ceremonial way from Princes Street to Calton Hill. On its southern side is the sombre and overgrown Old Calton Burial Ground , in which you can see Robert Adam's plain, cylindrical memorial to David Hume and a monument, complete with a statue of Abraham Lincoln, to the Scots who died in the American Civil War. Next door is the massive St Andrew's House , built in the 1930s to house civil servants.

Further on, set majestically in a confined site below Calton Hill, sits one of Edinburgh's greatest buildings, the Grecian Old Royal High School , which for many years was assumed to be where Scotland's new parliament would sit. Less than a year before the first elections, however, it was announced that the building was too small for the parliament envisaged. Across the road, Hamilton also built the Burns Monument , a circular Corinthian temple modelled on the Monument to Lysicrates in Athens, as a memorial to the national bard.

Robert Louis Stevenson reckoned that Calton Hill was the best place to view Edinburgh, "since you can see the castle, which you lose from the castle, and Arthur's Seat, which you cannot see from Arthur's Seat". Though the panoramas from ground level are spectacular enough, those from the top of the Nelson Monument (April-Sept Mon 1-6pm, Tues-Sat 10am-6pm; Oct-March Mon-Sat 10am-3pm; Ł2; joint ticket with Scott Monument Ł4), perched near the summit of Calton Hill, are even better. Begun just two years after Nelson's death at Trafalgar, this is one of Edinburgh's oddest buildings, resembling a gigantic spyglass. Each day at 1pm a white ball drops down a mast at the top of the monument; together with the one o'clock gun fired from the castle battlements these were a daily check for the mariners of Leith who needed accurate chronometers to ensure reliable navigation at sea.

Alongside, the National Monument was begun in 1822 by Playfair to plans by the English architect Charles Cockerell. Had it been completed, it would have been a reasonably accurate replica of the Parthenon, but funds ran out with only twelve columns built. Various later schemes to finish it similarly foundered, earning it the nickname "Edinburgh's Disgrace". Playfair also built the City Observatory for his uncle, the mathematician and astronomer John Playfair. At the opposite end of the complex is the Old Observatory , one of the few surviving buildings by James Craig, designer of the New Town.

Dean Village

Work began on the western end of the New Town in 1822, in a small area of land north of Charlotte Square and west of George Street. Instead of the straight lines of the earlier sections, there were now the gracious curves of Randolph Crescent, Ainslie Place and the magnificent twelve-sided Moray Place. Round the corner from Randolph Crescent, the four-arched Dean Bridge , a bravura feat of 1830s engineering by Thomas Telford, carries the main road high above Edinburgh's placid little river, the Water of Leith. Down to the left lies Dean Village , an old milling community that is one of central Edinburgh's most picturesque yet oddest corners, its atmosphere of decay arrested by the conversion of some of the mills into designer flats. There's now a riverside path which runs almost the entire length of the river; though a little gloomy in parts, ome stretches are charming and colourful.

George Street and Around

The street parallel to Princes Street to the north is George Street , rapidly changing its role from a thoroughfare of august financial institutions to a highbrow version of Princes Street, where the big deals are these days done in designer-label shops. George Street was designed to be the centrepiece of the First New Town, joining two grand squares. At its eastern end lies St Andrew Square , now home to Edinburgh's bus station, which shares space with the city's newest shopping mall. Beside this on the eastern side stands a handsome eighteenth-century town mansion, designed by Sir William Chambers. Headquarters of the Royal Bank of Scotland since 1825, the palatial mid-nineteenth-century banking hall is a symbol of the success of the New Town. Heading west along George Street, on the south side of the street, the oval-shaped church of St Andrew (now known as St Andrew and St George) is chiefly famous as the scene of the 1843 Disruption led by Thomas Chalmers, which split the Church of Scotland in two.

George Street and Around - Charlotte Square

At the western end of George Street, Charlotte Square was designed by Robert Adam in 1791, a year before his death. Once the most exclusive quarter of the city, when the New Town began to change to commercial use, the square maintained its prestige by attracting the offices of the city's most celebrated law firms. The north side of the square is once more the city's premier address, with the official residence of the First Minister of the Scottish Parliament at no. 6 - also the place where the Scottish cabinet meets.

Restored by the National Trust for Scotland (NTS), the lower floors of neighbouring no. 7 are open to the public under the name of the Georgian House (March-Oct Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 2-5pm; Ł5), whose contents give a good idea of what the house must have looked like during the period of the first owner, the head of the clan Lamont. The rooms are decked out in period furniture, including a working barrel organ which plays a selection of Scottish airs, and hung with fine paintings, including portraits by Ramsay and Raeburn. Meanwhile the love affair of the NTS with the square is continued on the south side, most of which they occupy as their main headquarters in Scotland. It's well worth paying a visit to no. 28 to peer at the sumptuous interior. One floor up, a small gallery (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; free) shows a collection of twentieth-century Scottish art, including a number of attractive examples of the work of the Scottish Colourists. Downstairs there's a shop selling National Trust books and souvenirs, as well as a very pleasant café.

Northern New Town

The Northern New Town was the earliest extension to the New Town, begun in 1801, and today roughly covers the area north of Queen Street between India Street to the west and Broughton Street to the east, and as far as Fettes Row to the north. This has survived in far better shape than its predecessor: with the exception of one street, almost all of it is intact, and it has managed to preserve a predominantly residential character.

One of the area's most interesting buildings is the neo-Norman Mansfield Place Church , home of a cycle of murals by the Dublin-born Phoebe Anna Traquair, a leading light in the Scottish Arts and Crafts movement. She laboured for eight years on this decorative scheme, which has all the freshness and luminosity of a medieval manuscript, yet it was almost lost due to leaks and rot in the fabric of the building in recent decades. The building is currently undergoing major refurbishment.

Princes Street

Although allocated only a subsidiary role in the original plan of the New Town, Princes Street had developed into Edinburgh's principal thoroughfare by the middle of the nineteenth century, a role it has retained ever since. Its unobstructed views across to the castle and the Old Town are undeniably magnificent. Indeed, without the views, Princes Street would lose much of its appeal; its northern side, dominated by ugly department stores, is almost always crowded with shoppers, and few of the original eighteenth-century buildings remain.

It was the coming of the railway, which follows a parallel course to the south, that ensured Princes Street's rise to prominence. The tracks are well concealed at the far end of the sunken gardens that replaced the Nor' Loch, which provide ample space to relax or picnic during the summer.

Princes Street - East End

Register House (Mon-Fri 9am-4.45pm; free), Princes Street's most distinguished building, is at its extreme northeastern corner, framing the perspective down North Bridge, and providing a good visual link between the Old and New Towns. It was designed in the 1770s by Robert Adam to hold Scotland's historic records, a function it has maintained ever since. Opposite is one of the few buildings on the south side of Princes Street, the Balmoral Hotel , formerly known as the North British . Among the most luxurious hotels in the city, it has always been associated with the railway, and the timepiece on its bulky clocktower is always kept two minutes fast in order to encourage passengers to hurry to catch their trains.

Princes Street - National Gallery of Scotland

To the rear of the Royal Scottish Academy, the less elaborate National Gallery of Scotland (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; permanent collection free; admission charged for some temporary exhibitions) is another of Playfair's Athenian constructions, built in the 1840s and now housing Scotland's premier collection of pre-twentieth-century European art. Though by no means as vast as national collections elsewhere in Europe, the National Gallery of Scotland benefits not just from a clutch of exquisite Old Masters and Impressionist works, but also from the fact that it is a manageable gallery enlivened by imaginative displays and a pleasantly unrushed atmosphere. Elsewhere in the city, the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and its neighbour the Dean Gallery, display other parts of the National Galleries' collection.

The innovative and often controversial influence of the National Galleries' flamboyant director, Timothy Clifford, is immediately apparent on the ground floor, where the rooms have been restored to their 1840s appearance, with the pictures hung closely together on claret-coloured walls, often on two levels, and intermingled with sculptures and objets d'art to produce a deliberately cluttered effect.

A free bus (Mon-Sat 11am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; tel 0131/624 6200) runs on the hour between the National Gallery of Scotland, the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and its neighbour the Dean Gallery.

Though individual works are frequently rearranged, the layout is broadly chronological, starting in the upper rooms above the entrance and continuing clockwise around the ground floor. The gallery has a programme of temporary exhibitions, which may mean that some of the paintings described here will not be on display. There are no guided tours; instead, audioguides available in five languages (Ł2) provide commentaries on the gallery's more important works.

Princes Street - National Gallery of Scotland - Early Netherlandish and German Works

Among the gallery's most valuable treasures are the Trinity Panels , the remaining parts of the only surviving pre-Reformation altarpiece made for a Scottish church. Painted by Hugo van der Goes in the mid-fifteenth century, they were commissioned for the Holy Trinity Collegiate Church (which was demolished to make way for Edinburgh's Waverley Station) by its provost Edward Bonkil, who appears in the company of organ-playing angels in the finest and best preserved of the four panels. On the reverse sides are portraits of James III, his son (the future James IV) and Queen Margaret of Denmark. Their feebly characterized heads, which stand in jarring contrast to the superlative figures of the patron saints accompanying them, were modelled from life by an unknown local painter after the altar had been shipped to Edinburgh. The panels are turned every half-hour.

Of the later Netherlandish works, Gerard David is represented by the touchingly anecdotal Three Legends of St Nicholas , while the Portrait of a Man by Quentin Massys is an excellent early example of northern European assimilation of the forms and techniques of the Italian Renaissance.

Princes Street - National Gallery of Scotland - Italian Renaissance Works

The Italian section includes a wonderful array of Renaissance masterpieces, the latest addition to which is a superb painting by Botticelli, The Virgin Adoring the Sleeping Christ Child , which was carefully restored and now positively glows with colour and light. Equally graceful are three works by Raphael , particularly The Bridgewater Madonna and the tondo The Holy Family with a Palm Tree , the latter another example of the striking luminosity restoration can reveal.

Of the four mythological scenes by Titian , the sensuous Three Ages of Man , an allegory of childhood, adulthood and old age, is one of the most accomplished compositions of his early period. The companion pair Diana and Acteon and Diana and Calisto , painted for Philip II of Spain, show the almost impressionistic freedom of his late style. Bassano 's truly regal Adoration of the Kings , a dramatic altarpiece The Deposition of Christ by Tintoretto , and several other works by Veronese , complete a fine Venetian collection.

Princes Street - National Gallery of Scotland - Seventeenth-Century Works

Among the seventeenth-century works, El Greco 's A Fable , painted during his early years in Italy, takes a mysterious subject whose exact meaning is unclear. Indigenous Spanish art is represented by Velázquez 's An Old Woman Cooking Eggs , an astonishingly assured work for a lad of nineteen, and by Zurbarán 's The Immaculate Conception , part of his ambitious decorative scheme of the Carthusian monastery in Jerez.

The series The Seven Sacraments by Poussin are displayed in their own room, whose floor and central octagonal seat repeat some of the motifs in the paintings. The series marks the first attempt to portray scenes from the life of Jesus and the early Christians in an authentic manner, rather than one overlaid by artistic conventions. The result is profoundly touching, with a myriad of imaginative and subtle details.

Rubens ' The Feast of Herod is an archetypal example of his grand manner, in which the gory subject matter is overshadowed by the lively depiction of the delights of the table. The trio of large upright canvases by Van Dyck date from his early Genoese period; of these, The Lomellini Family shows his mastery in creating a definitive dynastic image. Among the four canvases by Rembrandt is the poignant Self-Portrait Aged 51 , and the ripely suggestive Woman in Bed , which probably represents the biblical figure of Sarah on her wedding night, waiting for her husband Tobias to put the devil to flight. Christ in the House of Martha and Mary is the largest and probably the earliest of the thirty or so surviving paintings by Vermeer ; as the only one with a religious subject, it inspired a notorious series of forgeries by Han van Meegeren. There are two portraits by Hals , while his Verdonck stands in animated contrast to Rembrandt's self-portrait.

Princes Street - National Gallery of Scotland - Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Works

Of the large-scale eighteenth-century works, Tiepolo 's The Finding of Moses , a gloriously bravura fantasy (the Pharaoh's daughter and her attendants appear in sixteenth-century garb) stands out. By way of contrast, the gems of the French section are the smaller panels, in particular Watteau 's Fętes Vénitiennes , an effervescent Rococo idyll, and Chardin 's Vase of Flowers , a copybook example of still-life painting. There's also a superb group of early Impressionist works such as Jean Bastien Lepage's beautifully innocent Pas Meche and Camille Pissarro's Kitchen Garden L'Hermitage . Impressionist masters are also well represented; there's a collection of sketches, painting and bronzes by Degas , including the influential Portrait of Diego Marteli , as well as Monet's Haystacks (Snow) and Renoir's Woman Nursing Child . Representing the post-Impressionists are three outstanding examples of Gauguin 's work, including Vision After the Sermon , set in Brittany; Van Gogh 's Olive Trees ; and Cézanne 's The Big Trees - a clear forerunner of modern abstraction.

The gallery's relatively few English paintings are impressive. Hogarth 's Sarah Malcolm , painted in Newgate Prison the day the murderess was executed, once belonged to Horace Walpole. Gainsborough 's The Honourable Mrs Graham is one of his most memorable society portraits, while Constable himself described Dedham Vale as being "perhaps my best". The gallery owns a wonderful array of watercolours by Turner , faithfully displayed each January when damaging sunlight is at its weakest, though visitors at other times of year can enjoy two of his fine Roman views displayed in one of the darker galleries.

Princes Street - National Gallery of Scotland - Scottish Works

On the face of it, the gallery's Scottish collection is something of an anticlimax. There are, however, some important works displayed within a broad European context: Gavin Hamilton 's Achilles Mourning the Death of Patroclus , for example, painted in Rome, is an unquestionably arresting image. Allan Ramsay , who became court painter to George III, is represented by his Portrait of a Lady . The swaggering masculinity of Sir Henry Raeburn 's Sir John Sinclair , featuring the subject in Highland dress, is a fine example of Raeburn's technical mastery. He was equally sure when working on a small scale, as shown in one of the gallery's most popular pictures, The Rev Robert Walker Skating on Duddingston Loch.

Other Scottish painters represented include the versatile Sir David Wilkie , whose huge historical painting, Sir David Baird Discovering the Body of Sultan Tippo Saib , is in marked contrast to the genre scenes displayed in the basement, and Alexander Nasmyth , whose tendency to gild the lily can be seen in his View of Tantallon Castle and the Bass Rock, where the dramatic scenery is further spiced up by the inclusion of a shipwreck.

Princes Street - Scott Monument and the Royal Scottish Academy

Facing the Victorian shopping emporium Jenners, and set within East Princes Street Gardens, the 200ft-high Scott Monument (June-Sept Mon-Sat 9am-8pm, Sun 10am-6pm; March-May & Oct daily 9am-6pm; Nov-Feb daily 9am-4pm; Ł2.50) was erected in memory of the writer by public subscription within a few years of his death. The elaborate Gothic spire was created by George Meikle Kemp, a carpenter and joiner whose only building this is; underneath the archway is a statue of Scott with his deerhound Maida, carved from a thirty-ton block of Carrara marble. Visitors are able to use a tightly winding internal spiral staircase to climb up to a series of platforms which offer some inspiring - if heady - vistas of the city below and hills and firths beyond.

The Princes Street Gardens are bisected by the Mound , which provides one of only two direct road links between the Old and New Towns (the other is the Northbridge). Its name is an accurate description: it was formed in the 1780s by dumping piles of earth and other waste brought from the New Town's building plots. At the foot of the Mound on the Princes Street level are two grand sandstone buildings; nearest to Princes Street, Playfair's Royal Scottish Academy (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 2-5pm; admission varies) is the more elaborate of the two, a Grecian-style Doric temple topped with a statue of Queen Victoria and four sphinxes. The Ł26-million Playfair Project, due for completion in 2005, will eventually see it used as an extension of its more important neighbour, the National Gallery.

Queen Street

Queen Street , the last of the three main streets of the First New Town, is bordered to the north by gardens, and commands sweeping views across to Fife. Occupied mostly by offices, it's the best preserved of the area's three main streets, although it's principally notable for the striking late nineteenth-century home of the National Portrait Gallery.

Queen Street - Scottish National Portrait Gallery

At the eastern end of Queen Street is the Scottish National Portrait Gallery (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; free). The remarkable building is itself a fascinating period piece, its red sandstone exterior, modelled on the Doge's Palace in Venice, encrusted with statues of famous Scots - a theme taken up in the stunning entrance hall, which has a mosaic-like frieze procession by William Hole of great figures from Scotland's past, with heroic murals by the same artist adorning the balcony above.

Temporary exhibitions are mounted in the galleries on the ground floor; elsewhere on this floor are the gallery shop and café. The permanent collection is located on the two upper floors. In contrast to the more global outlook of its sister National Galleries, the Portrait Gallery devotes itself to images of famous Scots - a definition stretched to include anyone with the slightest Scottish connection - and is dominated by Scottish artists. Taken as a whole, the gallery offers an engaging procession through Scottish history, with familiar images of famous Scots such as Bonnie Prince Charlie, Mary, Queen of Scots and Robert Burns.

Highlights include portraits of the philosopher-historian David Hume by Allan Ramsay, and the bard Robert Burns by his friend Alexander Nasmyth, plus a varied group by Raeburn: subjects include Sir Walter Scott, the fiddler Niel Gow and the artist himself. Thomas Gainsborough's John, 4th Duke of Argyll (1768) depicts the man who "pacified" the Highlands after the Jacobite rebellion; though an enemy to many he was feted by the establishment. The star portrait from the nineteenth century is that of physician Sir Alexander Morison by his patient, the mad painter Richard Dadd. Twentieth-century portraits occupy the first floor and include clever photo-montages of sporting stars Stephen Hendry and Alex Ferguson, a larger-than-life bright red bust of socialist Jimmy Reid by Kenny Hunter, and many other royals, inventors, politicians, tycoons and celebrities.

Royal Botanic Garden

Just beyond the northern boundaries of the New Town, with entrances on Inverleith Row and Arboretum Place, is the seventy-acre site of the Royal Botanic Garden (daily: April-Aug 9.30am-7pm; March & Sept 9.30am-6pm; Feb & Oct 9.30am-5pm; Nov-Jan 9.30am-4pm; free), particularly renowned for the rhododendrons, which blaze out in a glorious patchwork of colours in April and May. In the heart of the grounds a group of hothouses designated the Glasshouse Experience (daily: March-Oct 10am-5pm; Nov-Feb 10am-3.30pm; donation requested) displays orchids, giant Amazonian water lilies, and a 200-year-old West Indian palm tree, the latter being in the elegant 1850s glass-topped Palm House. Guided tours (Ł2) of the garden leave from the West Gate on Arboretum Place at 11am and 2pm (April-Sept).

West End and Around

The western extension to the New Town was the last part to be built, deviating from the area's overriding Neoclassicism with a number of Victorian additions, including the city's principal Episcopal church, St Mary's Cathedral . With its proximity to the city centre the West End is now mostly used for offices, with a decent clutch of bars and restaurants, though there is some elegant terraced housing towards its outer edges. Here, enjoying some green space and a dignified setting are two compelling collections of contemporary art, the well-established Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and its newer neighbour, the Dean Gallery . Further out, Edinburgh's Zoo , a popular family attraction, is located on one of the city's prominent rises, Corstorphine Hill.

West End and Around - Dean Gallery

Opposite the Modern Art Gallery, on the other side of Belford Road, is the latest addition to the National Galleries of Scotland, the Dean Gallery (same hours; free), housed in an equally impressive Neoclassical building completed in 1833 as an orphanage and later used as an education centre. The interior has been dramatically refurbished specifically to make room for the work of Edinburgh-born sculptor Sir Eduardo Paolozzi . Visitors are given an awesome introduction to Paolozzi's work by the huge Vulcan - half-man, half-machine - which squeezes into the Great Hall immediately opposite the main entrance. No less persuasive of Paolozzi's dynamic creative talents are the rooms to the right of the main entrance, where his London studio has been expertly recreated, right down to the clutter of half-finished casts, toys and empty pots of glue. In the adjoining room a selection of his sculptures and drawings are exhibited in a more traditional manner.

Also on the ground floor is the Roland Penrose Gallery , which houses an impressive collection of Dada and Surrealist art. Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst and Man Ray are all represented, and look out too for Dali 's The Signal of Anguish and Magritte 's Magic Mirror along with work by Miró and Giacometti - all hung on crowded walls with an assortment of artefacts and ethnic souvenirs gathered by Penrose and his artist companions while travelling.

West End and Around - Edinburgh Zoo

A couple of miles west of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and the Dean Gallery, Edinburgh Zoo (daily: April-Sept 9am-6pm; Oct & March 9am-5pm; Nov-Feb 9am-4.30pm; Ł7) is set on an eighty-acre site on the slopes of Corstorphine Hill (served by buses #2, #26, #31, #36, #69, #85 and #86 from Princes Street). Here you can see over a thousand animals, including a number of endangered species such as white rhinos, red pandas, pygmy hippos and poison-arrow frogs. Making the most of the space offered by the setting, the "African Plains Experience" has a walkway leading you out over the animals to viewing platforms. The zoo's chief claim to fame is its crowd of penguins (the largest number in captivity anywhere in the world), a legacy of Leith's whaling trade in the South Atlantic. The "penguin parade" (April-Sept daily 2.15pm; also on sunny days in March & Oct) has gained something of a cult status.

West End and Around - Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art

Set in spacious wooded grounds at the far northwestern fringe of the New Town, about ten minutes' walk from either the cathedral or Dean Village (or accessed by free shuttle bus), the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art on Belford Road (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; free), was established as the first collection in Britain devoted solely to twentieth-century painting and sculpture. The display space is divided between temporary loan exhibitions and selections from the gallery's own holdings; the latter are arranged thematically, but are almost constantly moved around. What you get to see at any particular time is therefore a matter of chance, though the most important works are nearly always on view.

French painters are particularly well represented, beginning with early twentieth-century work such as Bonnard 's Lane at Vernonnet and Vuillard 's jewel-like Two Seamstresses . There are a few examples of the Fauves, notably Matisse 's The Painting Session and Derain 's dazzlingly brilliant Still Life , as well as a fine group of late canvases by Léger , notably The Constructors . Cubism is represented by Picasso 's Soles and Braque 's Candlestick.

Of works by Americans, Roy Lichtenstein 's In the Car is a fine example of his Pop Art style, while Duane Hanson 's fibreglass Tourists is typically unflinching. English artists on show include Sickert, Nicholson, Spencer, Freud, Hockney and Hirst but, as you'd expect, slightly more space is allocated to Scottish artists. Of particular note are the Colourists, whose works are attracting fancy prices on the art market, as well as ever-growing posthumous critical acclaim. Also worth exploring is the vivid realism of the more recent Edinburgh School, whose members include Anne Redpath, Sir Robin Philipson and William Gillies , and the distinctive styles of contemporary Scots such as John Bellany , a portraitist of striking originality, and the poet-artist-gardener Ian Hamilton Finlay.

West End and Around - Approaches to The Modern Art and Dean Galleries

The most scenic way of getting to the neighbouring Modern Art and Dean galleries is along the Water of Leith walkway , which can be joined at Stockbridge or Dean Village. A free bus runs from outside the National Gallery on the Mound. The only regular public transport running along Belford Road is bus #13, which leaves from the western end of George Street.

New Town | Old Town | Out from the centre

- - - Old Town - - -

The Old Town , although only about a mile long and 300 yards wide, represents the total extent of the twin burghs of Edinburgh and Canongate for the first 650 years of their existence, and its general appearance and character remain indubitably medieval. Containing as it does the majority of the city's most famous tourist sights, it makes by far the best starting point for your explorations.

In addition to the obvious goals of the castle , the Palace of Holyroodhouse and Holyrood Abbey , you'll find scores of historic buildings along the length of the Royal Mile . Inevitably, much of the Old Town is sacrificed to hard-sell tourism, and can be uncomfortably crowded throughout the summer, especially during the Festival. Yet the area remains at the heart of Edinburgh, with daily business of the greatest importance being conducted in Parliament House , home of the Scottish Parliament until 1707 and now the location of Scotland's highest Law Courts, and in the Assembly Hall , temporary home of the new Scottish Parliament. It's well worthwhile extending your explorations to the area immediately to the south of the Royal Mile, and in particular to the stunning new National Museum of Scotland . Close by is the wonderfully varied scenery and breathtaking vantage points of Holyrood Park , an extensive tract of open countryside on the eastern edge of the Old Town which includes Arthur's Seat, the peak which rises so distinctively in the midst of the city.

Cowgate

At the bottom of the valley immediately south of the Royal Mile, and following a roughly parallel course from the Lawnmarket to St Mary's Street, is the Cowgate . One of Edinburgh's oldest surviving streets, it was also formerly one of the city's most prestigious addresses. However, the construction of the great viaducts of George IV Bridge and South Bridge entombed it below street level. In the last decade or so the Cowgate has experienced something of a revival, with various nightclubs and festival venues establishing themselves, though few tourists venture here and the contrast with the neighbouring Royal Mile remains stark.

At the corner with Niddry Street, which runs down from the High Street near its junction with North Bridge and South Bridge, unprepossessing St Cecilia's Hall (Wed & Sat 2-5pm; also Mon-Sat 10.30am-12.30pm during the Festival; Ł1) was built in the 1760s for the Musical Society of Edinburgh. Inside, Scotland's oldest and most beautiful concert room, oval in shape and setunder a shallow dome, makes a perfect venue for concerts of Baroque and early music, held during the Festival and occasionally at other times of the year. The building is primarily worth visiting for the Russell Collection of antique keyboard instruments.

Edinburgh Castle

The history of Edinburgh, and indeed of Scotland, is indissolubly bound up with its castle (daily: April-Oct 9.30am-6pm; Nov-March 9.30am-5pm; Ł7.50), which dominates the city from its lofty seat atop an extinct volcanic rock. It requires no great imaginative feat to comprehend the strategic importance that underpinned the castle's, and hence Edinburgh's, importance in Scotland: from Princes Street, the north side rears high above an almost sheer rockface; the southern side is equally formidable; the western, where the rock rises in terraces, only marginally less so. Would-be attackers, like modern tourists, were forced to approach the castle from the crag to the east on which the Royal Mile runs down to Holyrood.

The castle's disparate styles reflect its many changes in usage, as well as advances in military architecture: the oldest surviving part, St Margaret's Chapel , is from the twelfth century, while the most recent additions date back to the 1920s. It last saw action in 1745, when the Young Pretender's forces, fresh from their victory at Prestonpans, made a half-hearted attempt to storm it. Subsequently, advances in weapon technology diminished the castle's importance, but under the influence of the Romantic movement it came to be seen as a great national monument.

Though you can easily take in the views and wander round the castle yourself, you might like to join one of the somewhat overheated guided tours , with their talk of war, boiling oil and the roar of the cannon. Alternatively, audioguides with personal headphones are available from a booth just inside the gatehouse. Both the guided tours and audioguides are included in the entrance price.

The Stone of Destiny

Legend has it that the Stone of Destiny (also called the Stone of Scone ) was "Jacob's Pillow", on which he dreamed of the ladder of angels from earth to heaven. Its real history is obscure, but it is known that it was moved from Ireland to Dunadd by missionaries, and thence to Dunstaffnage, from where Kenneth MacAlpine, king of the Dalriada Scots, brought it to the abbey at Scone in 838. There it remained for almost five hundred years, used as a coronation throne on which all kings of Scotland were crowned.

In 1296, an over-eager Edward I stole what he believed to be the Stone and installed it at Westminster Abbey, where, apart from a brief interlude in 1950 when it was removed by Scottish nationalists and hidden in Arbroath for several months, it remained for seven hundred years. All this changed in December 1996 when, after an elaborate ceremony-laden journey from London, the Stone returned to Scotland. Much to the annoyance of the people of Perth and the curators of Scone Palace, it was placed in Edinburgh Castle.

However, speculation surrounds the authenticity of the Stone, for the original is said to have been intricately carved, while the one seen today is a plain block of sandstone. Many believe that the canny monks at Scone palmed this off onto the English king (some say that it's nothing more sacred than the cover for a medieval septic tank), and that the real Stone of Destiny lies hidden in an underground chamber, its whereabouts a mystery to all but the chosen few.

Edinburgh Castle - Crown Square

The eastern side of Crown Square is occupied by the Palace , a surprisingly unassuming edifice built round an octagonal stair turret heightened in the nineteenth century to bear the castle's main flagpole. Begun in the 1430s, the Palace owes its Renaissance appearance to King James IV, though it was remodelled for Mary, Queen of Scots and her consort Henry, Lord Darnley, whose entwined initials (MAH), together with the date 1566, can be seen above one of the doorways. This gives access to a few historic rooms, the most interesting of which is the tiny panelled bedchamber at the extreme southeastern corner, where Mary gave birth to James VI.

Another section of the Palace has recently been refurbished with a detailed audiovisual presentation on the Honours of Scotland , the originals of which are housed in the Crown Room at the very end of the display. Though you might be put off by the slow-moving, claustrophobic queues that shuffle past the displays, the interest in them is justified: these magnificent crown jewels - the only pre-Restoration set in the United Kingdom - serve as one of the most potent images of Scotland's nationhood. They were last used for the Scottish-only coronation of Charles II in 1651, an event which provoked the wrath of Oliver Cromwell, who made exhaustive attempts to have the jewels melted down. Having narrowly escaped his clutches by being smuggled out of the castle and hidden in a rural church, the jewels later served as symbols of the absent monarch at sittings of the Scottish Parliament before being locked away in a chest following the Union of 1707. For over a century they were out of sight and eventually presumed lost, before being rediscovered in 1818 as a result of a search initiated by Sir Walter Scott.

Of the three pieces comprising the Honours, the oldest is the sceptre , given to James IV in 1494 by Pope Alexander VI. Even finer is the sword , a swaggering Italian High Renaissance masterpiece presented to James IV by the great artistic patron Pope Julius II. The jewel-encrusted crown , made for James V by the Scottish goldsmith James Mosman, incorporates the gold circlet worn by Robert the Bruce. The glass case containing the Honours has recently been rearranged to create space for its newest addition, the Stone of Destiny . This remarkably plain object now lies incongruously next to the opulent crown jewels.

The south side of Crown Square is occupied by the Great Hall , built under James IV as a venue for banquets and other ceremonial occasions. It later underwent the indignity of conversion and subdivision, firstly into a barracks, then a hospital. During this time, its hammer-beam roof - the earliest of three in the Old Town - was hidden from view. It was restored towards the end of the nineteenth century, when the hall was decked out in the full-blown Romantic manner. In 1755, the castle church of St Mary on the north side of the square was replaced by a barracks, which in turn was skilfully converted into the quietly reverential Scottish National War Memorial in honour of the 150,000 Scots who fell in World War I.

Edinburgh Castle - Esplanade and Lower Defences

The castle is entered via the Esplanade , a parade ground laid out in the eighteenth century and enclosed a hundred years later by ornamental walls. For most of the year it acts as a coach park, though in July and August huge grandstands are erected for the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, which takes place every night during August, coinciding with the Edinburgh Festival. A shameless and spectacular pageant of swinging kilts and massed pipe bands, the Tattoo makes full use of its dramatic setting.

The gatehouse to the castle is a Romantic-style addition of the 1880s, complete with the last drawbridge ever built in Scotland. It was later adorned with appropriately heroic-looking statues of Sir William Wallace and Robert the Bruce. Standing guard by the drawbridge are real-life soldiers, members of the regiment in residence at the castle; while their presence in full dress uniform is always a hit with camera-toting tourists, it's also a reminder that the castle is still a working military garrison.

Rearing up behind is the most distinctive and impressive feature of the castle's silhouette, the sixteenth-century Half Moon Battery , which marks the outer limit of the actual defences. Once through the gatehouse, continue uphill along Lower Ward, passing through the Portcullis Gate , a handsome Renaissance gateway of the same period as the battery above, marred by the addition of a nineteenth-century upper storey equipped with anachronistic arrow slits rather than gunholes.

Beyond this the wide main path is known as Middle Ward, with the six-gun Argyle Battery to the right. Further west on Mill's Mount Battery , a well-known Edinburgh ritual takes place - the daily firing of the one o'clock gun. Originally designed for the benefit of ships in the Firth of Forth, these days it's an enjoyable ceremony for visitors to watch and a useful time-signal for city-centre office workers. Both batteries offer wonderful panoramic views over Princes Street and the New Town to the coastal towns and hills of Fife across the Forth.

Edinburgh Castle - National War Museum of Scotland

Located in the old hospital buildings, down a ramp between the café/restaurant immediately behind the one o'clock gun and the Governor's House, the National War Museum of Scotland (free), part of the collection of the National Museums of Scotland, is a recently refurbished exhibition covering the last 400 years of Scottish military history. While the various rooms are packed with uniforms, medals, paintings of heroic actions and plenty of interesting memorabilia, the museum manages to convey a reflective, human tone.

Back on Middle Ward, the Governor's House is a 1740s mansion whose harled masonry and crow-stepped gables are archetypal features of vernacular Scottish architecture. It now serves as the officers' mess for members of the garrison, while the governor himself lives in the northern side wing. Behind stands the largest single construction in the castle complex, the New Barracks , built in the 1790s in an austere Neoclassical style. From here a cobbled road then snakes round towards the enclosed citadel at the uppermost point of Castle Rock, entered via Foog's Gate.

Edinburgh Castle - St Margaret's Chapel

At the eastern end of the citadel, St Margaret's Chapel is the oldest surviving building in the castle, and probably also in Edinburgh itself. Used as a powder magazine for 300 years, this tiny Norman church was rediscovered in 1845 and was eventually rededicated in 1934, after sympathetic restoration. Externally, it is plain and severe, but the interior preserves an elaborate zigzag archway dividing the nave from the sanctuary. Although once believed to have been built by the saint herself, and mooted as the site of her death in 1093, its architectural style suggests that it actually dates from about thirty years later, and was thus probably built by King David I as a memorial to his mother.

The battlements in front of the chapel offer the best of all the castle's panoramic views. Just below the battlements there's a small cemetery , the last resting place of the soldiers' pets : it is kept in immaculate condition, particularly when contrasted with the dilapidated state of some of the city's public cemeteries. Continuing eastwards, you skirt the top of the Forewall and Half Moon Batteries, passing the 110-foot Castle Well en route to Crown Square , the highest, most secure and most important section of the entire complex.

Edinburgh Castle - Vaults and the Military Prison

From Crown Square, you can descend to the Vaults , a series of cavernous chambers erected by order of James IV. They were later used as a prison for captured foreign nationals, who have bequeathed a rich legacy of graffiti. One of the rooms houses the famous fifteenth-century siege gun, Mons Meg , which could fire a 500-pound stone nearly two miles. Directly opposite the entrance to the Vaults is the Military Prison , built in 1842, when the design and function of jails was a major topic of public debate. The cells, though designed for solitary confinement, are less forbidding than might be expected.

Grassmarket

At its western end, Cowgate opens out into the Grassmarket , which has played an important role in the murkier aspects of Edinburgh's turbulent history. The public gallows were located here, and it was the scene of numerous riots and other disturbances down the centuries. It was here, in 1736, that Captain Porteous was lynched after he had ordered shots to be fired at the crowd watching a public execution. The notorious duo William Burke and William Hare had their lair in a now-vanished close just off the western end of the Grassmarket, luring to it victims whom they murdered with the intention of selling their bodies to the eminent physician Robert Knox. Eventually, Hare betrayed his partner, who was duly executed in 1829, and Knox's career was finished off as a result.

At the northeastern corner of the Grassmarket are five old tenements of the old West Bow , which formerly zigzagged up to the Royal Mile. The rest of this was replaced in the 1840s by curving Victoria Street , an unusual two-tier thoroughfare, with arcaded shops below, and a pedestrian terrace above. This sweeps up to George IV Bridge and the National Library of Scotland which holds a rich collection of illuminated manuscripts, early printed books, historical documents, and the letters and papers of prominent Scottish literary figures, displayed in regularly changing thematic exhibitions (usually Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 2-5pm; free).

Greyfriars and Around

The statue of Greyfriars Bobby at the southwestern corner of George IV Bridge must rank as Edinburgh's most sentimental tourist attraction. Bobby was a Skye terrier acquired as a working dog by a police constable named John Gray. When Gray died in 1858, Bobby began a vigil on his grave which he maintained until he died fourteen years later. His statue, originally a fountain, was modelled from life, and erected soon after his death; his story has gained international renown, thanks to a spate of cloying books and tear-jerking movies.

The grave Bobby mourned over is in the Greyfriars Kirkyard , which among its clutter of grandiose seventeenth and eighteenth-century funerary monuments boasts the striking mausoleum of the Adam family of architects. Greyfriars is particularly associated with the long struggle to establish Presbyterianism in Scotland: in 1638, it was the setting for the signing of the National Covenant, while in 1679 some 1200 Covenanters were imprisoned in the enclosure at the southwestern end of the yard. Set against the northern wall is the Martyrs' Monument, a defiantly worded memorial commemorating all those who died in pursuit of the eventual victory.

The graveyard rather overshadows Greyfriars Kirk itself, completed in 1620 as the first new church in Edinburgh since the Reformation. It's a real oddball in both layout and design, having a nave and aisles but no chancel, and adopting the anachronistic architectural language of the friary that preceded it, complete with medieval-looking windows, arches and buttresses.

At the western end of Greyfriars Kirkyard is one of the most significant surviving portions of the Flodden Wall , the city fortifications erected in the wake of Scotland's disastrous military defeat of 1513. When open, the gateway beyond offers a short-cut to George Heriot's Hospital , otherwise approached from Lauriston Place to the south. Founded as a home for poor boys by "Jinglin Geordie" Heriot, James VI's goldsmith, it is now one of Edinburgh's most prestigious fee-paying schools; although you can't go inside, you can wander round the quadrangle, whose array of towers, turrets, chimneys, carved doorways and traceried windows is one of the finest achievements of the Scottish Renaissance.

Greyfriars and Around - National Museum of Scotland

Immediately opposite Greyfriars Bobby, on the south side of Chambers Street, stands the striking honey-coloured sandstone National Museum of Scotland (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Tues until 8pm, Sun noon-5pm; free). Opened in 1998 to deserved acclaim, both for its elegant design and for its respectful but imaginative treatment of the nation's treasures, this is undoubtedly Scotland's premier museum. The fresh, open atmosphere of the building is combined with terrific features: specially commissioned art works; the Discovery Centre , specifically aimed at 5- to 14-year-olds; the exhibIT computer bank with databases of the museum's collections; and the Tower Restaurant , a sleek, stylish place with fabulous views which is also open in the evenings.

The main entrance to the museum is at the base of the tower (although it is also possible to enter through the neighbouring Royal Museum of Scotland). Make your way to the information desk in Hawthornden Court , the central atrium of the museum and a useful orientation point; on this level you'll also find the museum shop and access to the Royal Museum café. Free guided tours on different themes take place through the day, and free audioguides give detailed information on artefacts and displays.

Greyfriars and Around - National Museum of Scotland - Level 0

To get to the first section, "Beginnings" , take the lift or stairs from Hawthornden Court down to Level 0. Here, Scotland's story before the arrival of humans is presented with audiovisual displays, artistic recreations and a selection of rocks and fossils, including some Lewisian gneiss, the oldest rock in Europe, and "Lizzie" (Westlothiana lizziae), the oldest known fossil reptile in the world.

The second section, "Early People" , also on Level 0, covers the period from the arrival of the first people to the end of the first millennium AD. This, in many ways, is the most engrossing section of the entire museum, an eloquent testament to the remarkable craftsmanship, artistry and practicality of Scotland's early people. From the doors of the main lift you're confronted by eight giant bronze figures in the distinctive post-industrial style of Edinburgh-born sculptor Sir Eduardo Paolozzi . His trademark incorporation of geometric shapes into the human form allows the figures to "wear" different artefacts. The innovative use of contemporary art is continued with installations by the environmental artist Andy Goldsworthy , who shapes natural materials into sinuously beautiful geometrical patterns. Among the artefacts on display, highlights are the Trappain treasure hoard, 20kg of silver plates, cutlery and goblets found buried in East Lothian, and the Cramond Lioness , a sculpture from a Roman tombstone found recently in the Firth of Forth.

Greyfriars and Around - National Museum of Scotland - Levels 1 and 3

The "Kingdom of the Scots" on Level 1 covers the period between Scotland's development as a single independent nation and the union with England in 1707. At the entrance to the section in Hawthornden Court is the Dupplin Cross , a symbol of the different peoples who united under King Kenneth MacAlpine to form a single kingdom in 843. Star exhibits include the Monymusk reliquary , an intricately decorated box said to have carried the remains of St Columba; the Lewis chessmen , exquisitely idiosyncratic twelfth-century pieces carved from walrus ivory; and the "Maiden", an early form of the guillotine.

Level 3 shows exhibits under the theme "Scotland Transformed" , covering the century or so following the Union of Parliaments in 1707. This was the period which saw the last of the Highland uprisings under Bonnie Prince Charlie (whose silver travelling canteen is on display), yet also witnessed the expansion of trade links with the Americas and developments in industries such as weaving and iron and steel production. Dominating the floor is a reconstructed steam-driven Newcomen engine , which was still being used to pump water from a coal mine in Ayrshire in 1901. Alongside it, in contrast, is part of a thatched, cruck-frame house of the 1720s of a type in which many Scots still lived during this time.

Greyfriars and Around - National Museum of Scotland - Levels 4, 5 and 6

Following the early innovations of steam and mechanical engineering, Scotland went on to pioneer many aspects of heavy engineering, with ship and locomotive production to the fore. Largest of the exhibits in "Industry and Empire" on Level 4 is the steam locomotive Ellesmere . As well as industrial progress, other fields are covered too, including domestic life, leisure activities and the influence of Scots around the world, both as a result of emigration, and through such luminaries as James Watt, Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Robert Louis Stevenson.

For the Twentieth Century Gallery on Level 6, a range of Scots, from schoolchildren to celebrities, were asked to pick a single object to represent the twentieth century. Choices are intriguing, controversial and unexpected, from computers to football strips, cans of Irn Bru to a black Saab convertible. Tony Blair, who went to Fettes School in Edinburgh, chose a guitar, and former Edinburgh milkman Sean Connery a milk bottle. The roof garden , accessed by a lift, offers sweeping views out to the Firth of Forth, the Pentland hills, and across to the castle and Royal Mile skyline.

Greyfriars and Around - Royal Museum of Scotland

Interlinked with the National Museum, though also with its own entrance, is the Royal Museum of Scotland (same hours; free), a dignified Venetian-style palace with a cast-iron interior which contains an extraordinarily eclectic range of exhibits, from exotic stuffed animals to colonial loot. The sculpture in the lofty entrance hall includes a superb Assyrian relief from the royal palace at Nimrud and a totem pole from British Columbia. Also on the ground floor are the Power Collections , with a double-action beam engine designed by James Watt in 1786 alongside the control desk from Hunterston "A" nuclear reactor. Upstairs there's a fine array of Egyptian mummies, ceramics from ancient Greece to the present day, costumes, jewellery, natural-history displays and a splendid selection of European decorative art, including some stunning French silverware made during the reign of Louis XIV.

Greyfriars and Around - University of Edinburgh

Immediately alongside the Royal Museum is the earliest surviving part of the University of Edinburgh , variously referred to as Old College or Old Quad, although nowadays it houses only a few university departments; the main campus colonizes the streets and squares to the south. Founded in 1582 by James VI (later James I of England), the university is now the largest in Scotland, with over 13,000 students.

The Old College was designed by Robert Adam, but was built after his death in a considerably modified form by William Playfair (1789-1857), one of Edinburgh's greatest architects. The small Talbot Rice Art Gallery (Tues-Sat 10am-5pm; free), housed in the southwest corner of the Old College, displays in rather lacklustre fashion some of the university's large art and bronze collection, though touring and temporary avant-garde exhibitions are mounted here on a regular basis. The show held during the Festival is normally of a high standard.

Holyrood

At the foot of Canongate lies Holyrood , Edinburgh's royal quarter, the legend of whose foundation in 1128 is described in a fifteenth-century manuscript which is still kept there. The story goes that King David I, son of Malcolm Canmore and St Margaret, went out hunting one day and was suddenly confronted by a stag who threw him from his horse and seemed ready to gore him. In desperation, the king tried to protect himself by grasping its antlers, but instead found himself holding a crucifix, whereupon the animal ran off. In a dream that night, he heard a voice commanding him to "make a house for Canons devoted to the Cross"; he duly obeyed, naming the abbey Holyrood (rood being an alternative name for a cross). A more prosaic explanation is that David, the most pious of all Scotland's monarchs, simply acquired a relic of the True Cross and decided to build a suitable home for it.

Holyrood soon became a favoured royal residence , its situation in a secluded valley making it far more agreeable than the draughty castle. At first, monarchs lodged in the monastic guest house, to which a wing for the exclusive use of the court was added during the reign of James II. This was transformed into a full-blown palace for James IV, which in turn was replaced by a much larger building for Charles II, although he never actually lived there. Indeed, it was something of a white elephant until Queen Victoria started making regular trips to her northern kingdom, a custom that has been maintained by her successors.

Admissions to Holyrood

Guided tours of Holyrood take place from November to March only; at other times of the year, you're free to move around at your own pace. It is worth remembering that Holyrood is still a working palace, so the buildings are closed to the public for long periods during state functions: you won't be able to visit for a fortnight in the middle of May, and during the annual royal visit which usually takes place in the last two weeks of June and the first in July.

Holyrood - Holyrood Abbey

In the grounds of the Palace are the wonderfully evocative ruins of Holyrood Abbey . The only surviving fragment of King David's original Norman church is a doorway in the far southeastern corner. Most of the remainder dates from a late twelfth- and early thirteenth-century rebuilding in the Early Gothic style.

The surviving parts of the west front , including one of the twin towers and the elaborately carved entrance portal, show how resplendent the abbey must once have been. Unfortunately, its sacking by the English in 1547, followed by the demolition of the transept and chancel during the Reformation, all but destroyed the building.

Holyrood - Holyrood Park

Holyrood Park , or Queen's Park - a natural wilderness in the very heart of the modern city - is unquestionably one of Edinburgh's main assets, as locals (though relatively few tourists) readily appreciate. Packed into an area no more than five miles in diameter is an amazing variety of landscapes - hills, crags, moorland, marshes, glens, lochs and fields - representing something of a microcosm of Scotland's scenery. The park is a great place for outdoor activities, with toddlers, cyclists and rock-climbers all being catered for. A single tarred road, the Queen's Drive , circles the park. In a small stone-built gate lodge at the entrance to the park from Holyrood Road, the Holyrood Park Ranger Service has a small information point (Mon-Thurs 10am-4pm, Fri 10am-3.30pm) where you can pick up a map of suggested walks or find out about ranger-led walks which depart from the lodge at 2pm on Wednesdays. Note that some time in 2002 the ranger service will move to a brand-new Park HQ in the area behind the Palace of Holyroodhouse.

Two of the most rewarding walks begin opposite the southern gates of the palace: one, a pathway nicknamed the Radical Road, traverses the ridge immediately below the Salisbury Crags , one of the main features of the Edinburgh skyline, while you can also walk along the top of the basalt crags, from where there are excellent views of the Palace of Holyroodhouse and Holyrood Abbey.

From the palace gates, the best way to follow Queen's Drive is in a clockwise direction. Soon you arrive at St Margaret's Loch , a nineteenth-century artificial pond, above which stand the scanty ruins of St Anthony's Chapel , another fine vantage point. From here, the road's loop is one-way only for vehicular traffic, ascending to Dunsapie Loch , again an artificial stretch of water, which makes an excellent foil to the crag behind.

This is the usual starting point for the ascent of Arthur's Seat , a majestic extinct volcano rising 823ft above sea level. The Seat is Edinburgh's single most prominent landmark, resembling a huge crouched lion when seen from the west. The views from the top are all you'd expect, covering the entire city and much of the Firth of Forth; on a clear day, you can even see the southernmost mountains of the Highlands.

From Dunsapie Loch, Queen's Drive continues round beneath the summit to meet itself again at a roundabout near the southern point of the Salisbury Crags. At a second roundabout the second exit leads out of the park; the first exit takes you beneath Samson's Ribs , a group of basalt pillars strikingly reminiscent of the Hebridean island of Staffa, and onto Duddingston Loch , the only natural stretch of water in the park, now a bird sanctuary. Perched above it, just outside the park boundary, Duddingston Kirk dates back in part to the twelfth century and is the focus of one of the most unspoilt old villages within modern Edinburgh. In the village, the Sheep Heid Inn is a great spot to pull in for a drink or a bar meal, and you can also try your hand at the traditional skittle alley.

Holyrood - Our Dynamic Earth

On the Holyrood Road, beneath a pin-cushion of white metal struts which make it look like a miniature version of London's Millennium Dome, Our Dynamic Earth (April-Oct daily 10am-6pm; Nov-March Wed-Sat 10am-5pm; Ł7.95), is a hi-tech attraction about the natural world aimed mainly at families. A "time machine" elevator takes you to a room where the creation of the universe, 15 billion years ago, is described using wide-screen video graphics, eerie music and a sonorous commentary. Subsequent galleries describe the formation of the earth and continents with crashing sound-effects and a shaking floor, the calmer grandeur of glaciers and oceans being explored through magnificent large-screen landscape footage. The "Casualties and Survivors" gallery describes the history of life on earth, from primordial swamps to life-size models of some of the odd creatures who once inhabited the earth, with interactive computer screens and special effects at every turn.

Holyrood - Palace of Holyroodhouse

In its present form, the Palace of Holyroodhouse (daily: April-Oct 9.30am-6pm; Nov-March 9.30am-4.30pm; Ł6.50) is largely a seventeenth-century creation, planned for Charles II. However, the tower house of the old palace was skilfully incorporated to form the northwestern block, with a virtual mirror-image of it erected as a counterbalance at the other end. Inside, the State Apartments , as Charles II's palace is known, are decked out with oak panelling, tapestries, portraits and decorative paintings, all overshadowed by the magnificent white stucco ceilings , especially in the Morning Drawing Room. The most eye-catching chamber, however, is the Great Gallery , which takes up the entire first floor of the northern wing. During the 1745 sojourn of the Young Pretender this was the setting for a banquet, described in detail in Scott's novel Waverley , and it is still used for big ceremonial occasions. Along the walls are 89 portraits commissioned from the seventeenth-century Dutch artist Jacob de Wit to illustrate the royal lineage of Scotland from its mythical origins in the fourth century BC; the result is unintentionally hilarious, as it is clear that the artist's imagination was taxed to bursting point by the need to paint so many different facial types without having an inkling as to what the subjects actually looked like.

The oldest parts of the palace, the Historical Apartments , are mainly of note for their associations with Mary, Queen of Scots and in particular for the brutal murder, organized by her husband, Lord Darnley, of her private secretary, David Rizzio, who was stabbed 56 times and dragged from the small closet, through the Queen's Bedchamber, and into the Outer Chamber. Until a few years ago, visitors were shown apparently indelible bloodstains on the floor of the latter, but these are now admitted to be fakes and have been covered up. A display cabinet in the same room shows some pieces of needlework woven by the deposed queen while in English captivity; another case has an outstanding miniature portrait of her by the French court painter, François Clouet.

Holyrood - Scottish Parliament Site

Immediately opposite Abbey Strand, the massive construction site between the Royal Mile and Holyrood Road is where the new Scottish Parliament is being built. For decades, campaigners for home rule for Scotland envisaged the Old Royal High School building on Calton Hill as the place where the long-awaited Scottish Parliament would sit. In the run-up to the devolution referendum, however, the Scottish Office unexpectedly announced that the Old Royal High School was too small to accommodate the proposed parliament and its offices, and a disused brewery at the foot of the Royal Mile was identified as the ideal location. Originally designed by the late Catalan architect Enric Miralles , the structure will cost something in the region of Ł100 million.

While the building is being completed, a temporary visitor centre (daily 10am-4pm; free) has been established on Holyrood Road, next door to Dynamic Earth, where you can view plans, models and computer images of the proposed structure.

Royal Mile

The Royal Mile , the name given to the ridge linking the castle with Holyrood, was described by Daniel Defoe, in 1724, as "the largest, longest and finest street for Buildings and Number of Inhabitants, not in Bretain only, but in the World". Almost exactly a mile in length, it is divided into four separate streets - Castlehill, Lawnmarket, High Street and Canongate . From these, branching out in a herringbone pattern, are a series of tightly packed closes and steep lanes entered via archways known as "pends". After the construction of the New Town, much of the housing along the Royal Mile degenerated into a notorious slum, but has since shaken off that reputation, becoming once again a highly desirable place to live. Although marred somewhat by rather too many tacky tourist shops and the odd misjudged new development, it is still among the most evocative parts of the city, and one that particularly rewards detailed exploration.

Royal Mile - Canongate

For over seven hundred years, the district through which Canongate runs was a burgh in its own right, officially separate from the capital, which was entered through the Netherbow Port. A notorious slum area even into the 1960s, it has been the subject of some of the most ambitious restoration programmes in the Old Town, though the lack of harmony between the buildings renovated in different decades can be seen fairly clearly. For such a central district, it's interesting to note that most of the buildings here are residential, and by no means are they all bijou apartments. The development of the Canongate is ongoing, particularly at its lower end around the site of the new parliament building. This section of the Royal Mile features an eclectic range of shops, from a gallery of historic maps and sea charts to genuine bagpipe makers.

Near the top of Canongate, a good example of the restoration work can be seen at Chessel's Court , a mid-eighteenth-century development with fanciful Rococo chimneys. Over the road the Morocco Land is a reasonably faithful reproduction of an old tenement, incorporating the original bust of a Moor from which its name derives.

Dominated by a turreted steeple and an odd external box clock, the late sixteenth-century Canongate Tolbooth , a little further down the north side of the street, has served both as the headquarters of the burgh administration and as a prison, and now houses The People's Story (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, also Sun 2-5pm during the Festival; free), a lively museum devoted to the everyday life and work of Edinburgh people down the centuries. Next door, Canongate Kirk was built in the 1680s to a curiously archaic design, still Renaissance in outline, and built to a cruciform plan wholly at odds with the ideals and requirements of Protestant worship. Its churchyard, one of the city's most exclusive cemeteries, commands a superb view across to Calton Hill. Among those buried here are Adam Smith, Mrs Agnes McLehose (better known as Robert Burns' "Clarinda") and Robert Fergusson, regarded by some as Edinburgh's greatest poet, despite his death at the age of 24; his headstone was donated by Burns, a fervent admirer, who also wrote the inscription.

Opposite the church, the Museum of Edinburgh in Huntly House (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, also Sun 2-5pm during the Festival; free) includes a quirky array of old shop signs, some dating back to the eighteenth century, as well as displays on indigenous industries such as glass, silver, pottery and clockmaking. Also on view is the original version of the National Covenant of 1638; modern science has failed to resolve whether or not some of the signatories signed with their own blood, as tradition has it.

Among the intriguing series of closes and entries on this stretch of Canongate, Dunbar's Close , on the north side of the street, has a beautiful seventeenth-century walled garden tucked in behind the tenements. Opposite this is the entry to Crichton's Close, through which you'll find the Scottish Poetry Library (Mon-Fri noon-6pm, Sat noon-4pm; free), a small island of modern architectural eloquence amid a sea of construction work and large-scale developments. At the very foot of the street, the entrance to the residential Whitehorse Close was once the site of the inn from where stagecoaches began the journey to London. Stridently quaint, it drips with the characteristic features of Scottish vernacular architecture: crow-stepped gables, dormer windows, overhanging upper storeys and curving outside stairways.

Royal Mile - Castlehill

The narrow uppermost stretch of the Royal Mile is known as Castlehill . The first building on the northern side of the street as you leave the Castle Esplanade is the former reservoir for the Old Town, which has been converted into the Edinburgh Old Town Weaving Centre (daily 9am-5.30pm). Very much a commercial enterprise, the centre contains various large shops selling kilts, rugs and other tartan adornments while noisy looms rhytmically churn the stuff out on the floors below. You can see these up close and try your hand at weaving on a self-guided tour (Ł4), or for Ł7 dress up in rather ridiculous-looking ancient tartan dress and have your photo snapped.

On the corner of the wall of the Weaving Centre facing the castle, a pretty Art Nouveau Witches' Fountain commemorates the three hundred or more women burnt at the spot on charges of sorcery, the last of whom died in 1722. Rising up behind is Ramsay Gardens , surely some of the most picturesque city-centre flats in the world. The oldest part is the octagonal Goose Pie House, home of the eighteenth-century poet Allan Ramsay, while the rest dates from the 1890s.

Opposite the Weaving Centre at the top of the southern side of Castlehill, the so-called Cannonball House takes its name from the cannonball embedded in its masonry, which according to legend was the result of a poorly targeted shot fired by the castle garrison at Bonnie Prince Charlie's encampment at Holyrood. The truth is far more prosaic: the ball marks the gravitation height of the city's first piped water supply. Alongside, the Scotch Whisky Heritage Centre (daily: June-Sept 9.30am-6.30pm; Oct-May 10am-5.30pm; Ł6.50; barrel-ride only Ł4.50) gives the lowdown on all aspects of Scotland's national beverage. The full tour starts off with a free dram (a measure) of whisky and then launches into a detailed explanation of how it's made, with a film, a brief lecture and a visit from an entertaining "ghost" who explains some of the specialized art of blending whisky. The climax is a gimmicky ride in a moving "barrel" through a series of uninspiring historical tableaux; there's little on offer here which you won't find done rather better on a tour of a real distillery.

Across the street, the Outlook Tower (April-Oct Mon-Fri 9.30am-6pm, Sat & Sun 10am-6pm; Nov-March daily 10am-5pm; Ł4.25) has been one of Edinburgh's top tourist attractions since 1853, when the original seventeenth-century tenement was equipped with a camera obscura . It makes a good introduction to the city: live images are beamed through a periscope mounted at the highest point of the tower onto a white table in the auditorium, accompanied by a running commentary. For the best views, visit at noon when there are fewer shadows.

A few doors further on is the Assembly Hall , normally used as the meeting place of the annual General Assembly of the Church of Scotland but, since May 1999, the home of the Scottish Parliament while it awaits more permanent accommodation. It is possible to visit the debating chamber of the parliament by going to the public entrance in Milne's Court, one of the closes off the Royal Mile just past the Assembly Hall (Mon-Fri 10am-noon & 2-4pm; free). When the parliament is in session, you can sit and watch the debates from the large public gallery - tickets are available on an ad hoc basis either from the desk at the public entrance or from the Scottish Parliament visitor centre on the corner of George IV Bridge and High Street (tel 0131/348 5000, ). The best time to see a debate is First Minister's Questions on Thursday afternoon; if the house is not in session, it is still possible to view the empty debating chamber from the public gallery.

The imposing black church building opposite the Assembly Hall at the foot of Castlehill is The Hub (daily 8am-late; tel 0131/473 2010, ), also known as "Edinburgh's Festival Centre". Although the Festival only takes place for three weeks every August and early September, The Hub is open year round, providing performance, rehearsal and exhibition space, a ticket centre and a café. The building was constructed in 1845 to designs by James Gillespie Graham and Augustus Pugin, one of the co-architects of the Houses of Parliament in London. On the ground floor is the Hub Café (daily 8am-11pm); also worth checking out is the main hall upstairs, where the original neo-Gothic woodwork and high-vaulted ceiling is enlivened with a fabulous fabric design in Rastafarian colours. Permanent works of art have been incorporated into the centre, including over 200 delightful foot-high sculptures by Scottish sculptor Jill Watson, depicting festival performers and audiences.

Royal Mile - High Kirk of St Giles

Across George IV Bridge is the third section of the Royal Mile, known as the High Street , which occupies two blocks either side of the intersection between North Bridge and South Bridge. The dominant building of the southern side of the street is the High Kirk of St Giles (April-Sept Mon-Fri 9am-7pm, Sat 9am-5pm, Sun 1-5pm; Oct-March Mon-Sat 9am-5pm, Sun 1-5pm; free) which closes off Parliament Square from High Street. The sole parish church of medieval Edinburgh, where John Knox launched and directed the Scottish Reformation, the Kirk is almost invariably referred to as a cathedral, although it has been the seat of a bishop on only two brief and unhappy occasions in the seventeenth century. According to one of the city's best-known legends, the attempt in 1637 to introduce the English prayer book, and thus episcopal government, so incensed a humble stallholder named Jenny Geddes that she hurled her stool at the preacher, prompting the rest of the congregation to chase the offending clergy out of the building. A tablet in the north aisle marks the spot from where she let rip.

In the early nineteenth century, St Giles received a much-needed but over-drastic restoration, covering most of the Gothic exterior with a smooth stone coating that gives it a certain Georgian dignity while sacrificing its medieval character almost completely. The only part to survive this treatment is the late fifteenth-century tower, whose resplendent crown spire is formed by eight flying buttresses. The interior has survived in much better shape. Especially notable are the four massive piers supporting the tower, which date back, at least in part, to the church's Norman predecessor. Look out for the great west window , whose dedication to Robbie Burns in 1985 caused enormous controversy: as a hardened drinker and womanizer, the national bard was far from being an upholder of accepted Presbyterian values.

At the southeastern corner of St Giles, the Thistle Chapel was built by Sir Robert Lorimer in 1911 as the private chapel of the sixteen knights of the Most Noble Order of the Thistle, the highest chivalric order in Scotland. Self-consciously derivative of St George's Chapel in Windsor, it's an exquisite piece of craftsmanship, with an elaborate ribbed vault, huge drooping bosses, and extravagantly ornate stalls.

Royal Mile - John Knox

The Protestant reformer John Knox has been alternately credited with, or blamed for, the distinctive national culture that emerged from the Calvinist Reformation, which has cast its shadow over Scottish history and the Scottish character right up to the present.

Little is known about Knox's early years: he was born between 1505 and 1514 in East Lothian, and trained for the priesthood at St Andrews University under John Major, author of a History of Great Britain that advocated the union of Scotland and England. Ordained in 1540, Knox then served as a private tutor, in league with Scotland's first significant Protestant leader, George Wishart . After Wishart was burnt at the stake for heresy in 1546, Knox became involved with the group who had carried out the revenge murder of the Scottish primate, Cardinal David Beaton, subsequently taking over his castle in St Andrews. The following year this was captured by the French, and Knox was carted off to work as a galley slave.

He was freed in 1548, as a result of the intervention of the English, who invited him to play an evangelizing role in the spread of their own Reformation. When the Catholic Mary Tudor acceded to the English throne in 1553, Knox fled to the continent, ending up as minister to the English-speaking community in Geneva, which was then in the grip of the theocratic government of the Frenchman Jean Calvin . Knox was quickly won over to his radical version of Protestantism, declaring Geneva to be "the most perfect school of Christ since the days of the Apostles". In exile, Knox wrote his infamous treatise, The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women , a specific attack on the three Catholic women then ruling Scotland, England and France, which has made his name synonymous with misogyny ever since.

When Knox was allowed to return to Scotland in 1555, he took over as spiritual leader of the Reformation, becoming minister of St Giles in Edinburgh, where he established a reputation as a charismatic preacher. However, the establishment of Protestantism as the official religion of Scotland in 1560 was dependent on the forging of an alliance with Elizabeth I, which Knox himself rigorously championed. Although the return of Mary, Queen of Scots the following year placed a Catholic monarch on the Scottish throne, reputedly Knox was always able to retain the upper hand in his famous disputes with her.

For all his considerable influence, Knox was not responsible for many of the features which have created the popular image of Scottish Presbyterianism - and of Knox himself - as austere and joyless. A man of refined cultural tastes, he did not encourage the iconoclasm that destroyed so many of Scotland's churches and works of art: indeed, much of this was carried out by English hands. Nor did he promote unbending Sabbatarianism, an obsessive work ethic or even the inflexible view of the doctrine of predestination favoured by his far more fanatical successors. Ironically, though, by fostering an irrevocable rift in the "Auld Alliance" with France, he did do more than anyone else to ensure that Scotland's future was to be linked with that of England.

Royal Mile - Lawnmarket

Below the Tolbooth Kirk, the Royal Mile opens out into the broader expanse of Lawnmarket , which, as its name suggests, was once a marketplace. At its northern end is the entry to Milne's Court , whose excellently restored tenements now serve as student residences, and immediately beyond, James Court , one of Edinburgh's most fashionable addresses prior to the advent of the New Town; David Hume and James Boswell were among those who lived there.

Back on Lawnmarket itself, Gladstone's Land (April-Oct Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 2-5pm; Ł3.50) takes its name from the merchant Thomas Gledstane [sic], who in 1617 acquired a modest dwelling on the site, transforming it into a magnificent six-storey mansion. The arcaded ground floor, the only authentic example left of what was once a common feature of Royal Mile houses, has been restored to illustrate its early function as a shopping booth. Several other rooms have been kitted out in authentic period style to give an impression of the lifestyle of a well-to-do household of the late seventeenth century; the Painted Chamber, with its decorated wooden ceiling and wall friezes, is particularly impressive.

A few paces further on, steps lead down to Lady Stair's Close, in which stands the Writers' Museum (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm; also Sun 2-5pm during the Festival; free), housed in Lady Stair's House, another fine seventeenth-century residence. Dedicated to the three lions of Scottish literature - Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson - the museum shows off various manuscripts, first editions and portraits, plus personal mementoes (among them locks of hair and walking sticks). Continuing the literary theme, the courtyard outside, called the Makars' Court after the Scots word for the "maker" of poetry or prose, has quotations by Scotland's most famous writers and poets inscribed on paving stones.

On the south side of Lawnmarket is Brodie's Close , named after the father of one of Edinburgh's most morbid characters, Deacon William Brodie, apparent pillar of society by day, burglar by night. Following his eventual capture, he managed to escape to Holland, but was betrayed, brought back to Edinburgh and hanged in 1788 on gallows of his own design. His ruse of trying to cheat death by secretly wearing an iron collar under his shirt failed. You can visit the popular Deacon Brodie's Tavern on the corner of the Lawnmarket and Bank Street and ruminate over a beer on the connections between Brodie, Robert Louis Stevenson's similarly themed tale Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde , and the various split personalities of Edinburgh itself, not least its Old Town and New Town.

Royal Mile - Robert Louis Stevenson

Though Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-94) is sometimes dismissed for his straight-up writing style, he was undoubtedly one of the best-loved writers of his generation, whose travelogues, novels, short stories and essays remain enormously popular more than a century after his death.

Born in Edinburgh into a distinguished family of engineers, Stevenson was a sickly child, with a solitary childhood dominated by his governess, Alison "Cummie" Cunningham, who regaled him with tales drawn from Calvinist folklore. Sent to the university to study engineering, Stevenson rebelled against his upbringing by spending much of his time in the lowlife howffs and brothels of the city, and eventually switching to law. Although called to the bar in 1875, by then he had decided to channel his energies into literature: his early successes were two travelogues , An Inland Voyage and Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes , kaleidoscopic jottings based on his journeys in France, where he went to escape Scotland's weather, which was damaging his health. It was there that he met Fanny Osbourne, an American ten years his senior, who was estranged from her husband and had two children in tow. His voyage to join her in San Francisco formed the basis for his most important factual work, The Amateur Emigrant , a vivid firsthand account of the great nineteenth-century European migration to the United States.

Having married the now-divorced Fanny, Stevenson began an elusive search for an agreeable climate that led to Switzerland, the French Riviera and the Scottish Highlands. He belatedly turned to the novel, achieving immediate acclaim in 1881 for Treasure Island . In 1886, his most famous short story, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde , despite its nominal London setting, offered a vivid evocation of Edinburgh's Old Town - an allegory of its dual personality of prosperity and squalor, and an analysis of its Calvinistic preoccupations with guilt and damnation. The same year saw the publication of the historical romance Kidnapped , an adventure novel which exemplified Stevenson's view that literature should seek above all to entertain.

In 1887 Stevenson left Britain for good, travelling first to the United States; a year later, he set sail for the South Seas, and eventually settled in Samoa ; his last works include a number of stories with a local setting, such as the grimly realistic The Ebb Tide and The Beach of Falesŕ . He died suddenly from a brain haemorrhage in 1894 and was buried on the top of Mount Vaea overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

Royal Mile - Lower High Street

Beyond the intersection of North Bridge and South Bridge, Trinity Apse is a poignant reminder of the fifteenth-century Holy Trinity Collegiate Church, formerly one of Edinburgh's most outstanding buildings, but demolished in 1848 to make way for an extension to Waverley Station. The stones were carefully numbered and stored on Calton Hill so that it could be reassembled at a later date, but many were pilfered before sufficient funds became available, and only the apse could be reconstructed on this new site. It's now home to a Brass Rubbing Centre (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm; Sun noon-5pm during the Festival only; last rubbing sold 1hr before closing; free), where you can rub your own impressions from Pictish crosses and medieval church brasses from Ł1.20 upwards.

On the other side of High Street, the noisy Museum of Childhood (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm; also Sun noon-5pm during the Festival; free) was, oddly enough, founded by an eccentric local councillor who heartily disliked children. Although he claimed that the museum was a serious social archive for adults, and dedicated it to King Herod, it has always attracted swarms of kids, who delight in the dolls' houses, teddy bears, train sets, marionettes and other paraphernalia.

Almost directly opposite is what's thought to be the city's oldest surviving dwelling, the early sixteenth-century Moubray House (no public access). The uses of the four-storey house have included tavern, bookshop and even, towards the end of the nineteenth century, temperance hotel. Next door lies the picturesque John Knox's House (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm; July & Aug also Sun noon-5pm; Ł2.25), built some thirty years later. With its outside stairway, biblical motto, and sundial adorned with a statue of Moses, it gives a good impression of how the Royal Mile must have once looked. Whether or not it was ever really the home of Knox is debatable: he may have moved here for safety at the height of the religious troubles. The rather bare interiors, which give a good idea of the labyrinthine layout of Old Town houses, display explanatory material on Knox's life and career. The house is linked to the neighbouring Netherbow Arts Centre , a busy venue during the Festival which displays paintings and photography throughout the year and has a popular lunchtime café selling wholesome soups and light meals.

Royal Mile - Parliament Square

The rest of Parliament Square is dominated by the continuous Neoclassical facades of the Law Courts , originally planned by Robert Adam (1728-92), one of four brothers in a family of architects (their father William Adam designed Hopetoun House) whose work helped imbue the New Town with much of its grace and elegance. Because of a shortage of funds, the present exteriors were built to designs by Robert Reid (1776-1856), the designer of the northern part of New Town, who faithfully quoted from Adam's architectural vocabulary without matching his flair.

Around the corner, facing the southern side of St Giles, is Parliament House , built in the 1630s for the Scottish Parliament, a role it maintained until the Union, when it passed into the hands of the legal fraternity. To enter the impressive main hall go through the entrance lobby (Mon-Fri 9am-5pm); the most notable feature is the extravagant hammer-beam roof and the delicately carved stone corbels from which it springs - in addition to some vicious grotesques with accurate depictions of several castles, including Edinburgh. In the far corner a small exhibition explains the history of the building and courts, but it's more fun simply to watch the everyday business, with solicitors and bewigged advocates in hushed conferrals. Most of the court rooms have public galleries, which you can sit in if you're interested - ask one of the attendants in the lobby to point you in the right direction.

Royal Mile - Upper High Street

The first main building on the northern side of the High Street after the intersection of George IV Bridge and Bank Street is the High Court of Justiciary, Scotland's highest criminal court, outside which is a statue of David Hume, the philosopher and one of Edinburgh's greatest sons, who looks decidedly wan and chilly dressed in nothing but a Roman toga. A little further on, opposite the Mercat Cross, the U-shaped City Chambers were designed by John Adam, brother of Robert, as the Royal Exchange. Local traders never warmed to the exchange, however, so the town council established its headquarters there instead. Beneath the City Chambers lies Mary King's Close , one of Edinburgh's most unusual attractions. Built in the early sixteenth century, it was closed off for many years after the devastation of the 1645 plague, before being entirely covered up by the chambers in 1753. Brief tours of this rather spooky "lost city" are run regularly through the day by Mercat Tours (tel 0131/557 6464).

Across the road you'll find the Tron Kirk , a popular focal point for hardy Hogmanay revellers to count down the seconds to the new year. The church was built in the 1630s and remained in use until 1952. It was then closed for forty years, during which time excavations revealed sections of an old close, Marlin's Wynd, which ran from High Street down to the Cowgate. Today the building houses the Old Town Information Centre (June-Sept daily 10am-7pm; Easter-May Mon & Thurs-Sun 10am-1pm & 2-5pm), where you can peruse information boards on the buildings of the Old Town and look down from raised walkways on the Marlin's Wynd excavations.

New Town | Old Town | Out from the centre

- - - Out from the centre - - -

There's a great deal to be discovered by exploring just beyond the compact centre of Edinburgh, in particular along the Firth of Forth coastline to the north and the rise of the Pentland Hills to the south. Just over a mile northeast of the city centre is Leith , the historic port of Edinburgh, a fascinating mix of cobbled streets and new developments. Nearby you can find a flavour of the city's maritime and fishing heritage at the atmospheric harbour of Newhaven.

In the southern suburbs of the city, the imposing fifteenth-century Craigmillar Castle is incongruously set amid a rather grim housing estate, but there is also a rural aspect to the area, with various hills, parks and, on the southern edge of the city, the range of the Pentland Hills which offer some wild walking country and terrific views.

Craigmillar Castle

In a green belt five miles southeast of Edinburgh's centre lies Craigmillar Castle (April-Sept daily 9.30am-6.30pm; Oct-March Mon-Wed & Sat 9.30am-4.30pm, Thurs 9.30am-noon, Fri & Sun 2-4.30pm; HS; Ł2), where the murder of Lord Darnley, second husband of Mary, Queen of Scots was plotted. It's one of the best preserved medieval fortresses in Scotland, and before Queen Victoria set her heart on Balmoral, it was being considered as her royal castle north of the border, a possibility which seems odd now given its proximity to the ugly council housing scheme of Craigmillar, one of Edinburgh's most deprived districts. Take bus #30, #33 or #82, or any bus heading for Hawick or Jedburgh, from the city centre to the district called Little France, from where the castle is a ten-minute walk along Craigmillar Castle Road.

Leith

For several hundred years, LEITH was separate from Edinburgh. As Scotland's major east coast port, it played a key role in the nation's history, even serving as the seat of government for a time, and in 1833 finally became a burgh in its own right. In 1920, however, it was incorporated into the capital and, in the decades that followed, went into seemingly terminal decline: the population dropped dramatically, and much of its centre was ripped out, to be replaced by grim housing schemes.

The 1980s, however, saw an unexpected turnaround, and today the port boasts arguably the best concentration of good restaurants (particularly seafood) in Edinburgh. The surviving historic buildings were spruced up and large blocks of yuppie flats appeared among the crumbling tenements and council housing. Meanwhile the dock areas are being transformed by Europe's largest ongoing waterfront development, most notably the vast building housing civil servants from the Scottish Executive and the new Ocean Terminal, a shopping and entertainment complex beside which the former royal yacht Britannia is settling into retirement.

Leith - Around The Port

While you're most likely to come to Leith for the bars and restaurants, the area itself warrants exploration; though the shipbuilding yards have gone, it remains an active port with a rough-edged character. Most of the showpiece Neoclassical buildings lie on or near The Shore , the tenement-lined road along the final stretch of the Water of Leith, just before it disgorges into the Firth of Forth. Leith Links is an area of predominantly flat parkland just east of the police station. Documentary evidence suggests that The Links was a golf course in the fifteenth century, giving rise to Leith's claim to be regarded as the birthplace of the sport: in 1744 its first written rules were drawn up here, ten years before they were formalized in St Andrews.

Leith - Britannia

A little to the west of The Shore, moored alongside Ocean Terminal (a huge shopping and entertainment centre designed by Terence Conran), is one of the world's most famous ships, Britannia (daily: April-Sept 9.30am-4.30pm; Oct-March 10am-3.30pm; booking advised tel 0131/555 5566; Ł7.75). Launched in 1953 at John Brown's shipyard on Clydeside, Britannia was used by the royal family for 44 years for state visits, diplomatic functions and royal holidays. Leith acquired her following decommission in 1997, against the wishes of many of the royal family, who felt that scuttling would have been a more dignified end.

Visits to Britannia begin in the visitor centre , within Ocean Terminal. You get a free audioguide and are allowed to roam around the yacht, taking in the bridge , the admiral's quarters , the officers' mess and a large part of the state apartments , including the state dining and drawing rooms and the (separate) cabins used by the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh. The ship has been largely kept as she was when she was in service, with a well-preserved 1950s dowdiness which the audioguide loyally attributes to the Queen's good taste and astute frugality in the lean postwar years. Certainly the atmosphere is a far cry from the opulent splendour which many expect.

To get to Ocean Terminal, jump on one of the tour buses which leave from Waverley Bridge in the city centre; otherwise, buses #10 and #16 from Princes Street, and bus #22 from St Andrew Square, run down Leith Walk to the junction of Commercial Street and North Junction Street, from where it's a five-minute walk down to the visitor centre.

Newhaven

To the west of Leith lies the village of NEWHAVEN , built by James IV at the start of the sixteenth century as an alternative shipbuilding centre to Leith: his massive warship, the Great Michael , was built here. It has also been a ferry station and an important fishing centre, landing some six million oysters a year at the height of its success in the 1860s. Today, the harbour still has a pleasantly salty feel. Among various modern developments, the old fish market remains, housing Harry Ramsden's fish-and-chip café, a couple of fish merchants and the small Newhaven Heritage Museum (daily noon-5pm; free), a fascinating collection of costumes and other memorabilia staffed by enthusiastic members of local fishing families.

Southern Hills

The hills of Edinburgh's southern suburbs offer good, not overly demanding, walking opportunities, with plenty of sweeping panoramic views. The Royal Observatory (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun noon-5pm; Ł3.50) stands at the top of Blackford Hill, just a short walk south of Morningside, or accessible by buses #24 and #41 direct from the centre. The visitor centre here seeks to explain the mysteries of the solar system by means of various hands-on exhibits and CD-ROMs, and you also get to see the observatory's two main telescopes.

Further south are the Pentland Hills , a chain some eighteen miles long and five wide. Numerous walks, from gentle strolls along well-marked paths to a ten-mile traverse of the hills and moors, are outlined on a pamphlet available from the Regional Park Information Centre at FLOTTERSTONE , ten miles south of the city centre on the A702, an old staging post on the route south.

The above information are taken from Rough Guides

New Town | Old Town | Out from the centre

Edinburgh Information
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