Weekending: Edinburgh (March 2015)

Edinburgh is one of my favourites. I've been there with friends and with boyfriends, for romantic trips away and to the festival. I have been there enough times to have my favourites that I always visit as well as always having a list of new places to try. On our most recent trip we (me, my boyfriend, my friend, her husband) were there mainly to visit a friend, but my boyf and I decided to make a long weekend of it to get the most out of the city.

Travel

We got the train there and back - going up at around 11am on the Friday and returning about 2.30pm on the Monday. My friends who joined us got the sleeper train up overnight arriving Saturday morning and then flew back Sunday evening. Like most UK cities, Edinburgh is easy to reach via a number of travel options, and if you book well enough in advance then it's more than affordable.

Accommodation

Once again, we stayed in the Nira Caledonia hotel - one of my favourite hotels in the world. This was my third stay there, and we definitely had the best room I've stayed in there so far as our bathroom had a bath with jets rather than just a shower that I've had in previous stays. The bed was as big and comfortable as I remembered, and I gave the huge bath a go (and used the jets, though be advised to not try and figure out how to turn them on until the bath is full) which was delightful. The hotel gifted us a bottle of wine as well which was a lovely touch. We ate there for breakfast all three mornings during our stay, and also ordered some room service on Sunday night, and each meal was exactly what we were after. I cannot recommend the Nira Caledonia highly enough - with the lovely staff and relaxing rooms I can't imagine staying anywhere else in Edinburgh.

Food

Friday night - burgers at Red Squirrel - one beef and one chicken. They were awesome. We also shared a beetroot salad which was deffo in my top ten salads.

Saturday morning - breakfast at hotel (I believe I had poached eggs on toast, followed by some fruit and yoghurt)

Saturday evening - Hanams. We left it until that afternoon to decide where to eat, and after some googling I came across Hanams, which serves Kurdish and Middle Eastern cuisine. It's also BYOB with no corkage fee, which definitely made it a cheaper meal. Definitely one I would return to if I was in the mood for that type of food.

Sunday morning - breakfast at hotel (think this was my scrambled eggs and smoked salmon day)

Sunday lunch - Set-menu at Wedgwood. This was delicious, and such good value! I'd eaten there before on my birthday last year, and the food was just as inventive and interesting as I remembered. I believe I had goats cheese with curried lentils to start, then sooomething for my main (i'm annoyed I can't remember this) and then sticky toffee pudding. The food here is delicious, and the set lunch menu costs £12.95 / £16.95 for 2 / 3 courses. You can't really go wrong!

Sunday evening - room service. I had a smoked salmon and cream cheese sandwich, with some chips. Obviously.

Monday morning - final breakfast at the hotel.

Monday lunch - train picnic!

Sights

As we had all visited the city before, we didn't feel the need to do any of the touristy sight-seeingy bits this time around. Instead, we did a few geocaches along the Leith River Walk, and visited the Camera Obscura museum, which, although pricey, I would definitely recommend.

Shopping
The main shopping street in Edinburgh is Princes Street, which is full of all the standard high street shops. A couple to look out for though are Zara, which has a huge section upstairs of their child and baby clothes; Russell and Bromley, which has a great selection particularly from their mens range; and HMV, which has a really awesome vinyl section (I picked up Purple Rain and Blue whilst I was there).

Writing this all up now it doesn't seem like we did much aside from eat. But that's the great thing when you visit a city you know so well - you can just relax and wander and have a lovely time without feeling like you have to be go-go-go all the time. For me, that's what Edinburgh is all about.

Planning a Low-Key Valentines Day

My boyfriend and I aren't particularly ones for big romantic gestures, but since he moved in a couple of weeks ago we've been conscious of not falling into that trap of never having date nights, not spending time chatting over dinner, and becoming more like housemates than anything else. So this year we're trying to find a good mid-point, and are going to stay in but do something special.

DINNER

Usually when we have people round I do the cooking, but it seems a shame to have only one of us do it (even if it does mean I may have to help with the washing up afterwards). However, I am a bit of a control freak when it comes to food, so we have decided that I will cook the main and he can cook a starter and dessert.

I was reading with interest last week on both Buzzfeed and the NY Times about the 36 questions supposedly designed to make you fall in love with someone. VD seems like the sort of occasion when you should talk about important things rather than moaning about your work colleagues, so I've google-drived them here and figure I can cut them out and then we can take turns to pull them out and question the other.

PRESENT

We've already said that we don't need to get presents for each other, however I have loved the idea of a Date Night Jar for a while and seeing as we're trying to not fall into that easy trap of not really planning anything together anymore, this VD seems like the perfect occasion to introduce this. I've already ordered my giant lollipop sticks and jam jar, and am excited to start writing ideas on the sticks when they arrive. The idea is that you put a date night idea on each stick, and then when you're at a loose end for ideas you pull one from the jar and do whatever it tells you. You could do this for any occasion really, I think the Recipe Jar idea would be quite a good one. Anyway, for our one I've decided to split the sticks into two categories - daytime dates and evening dates - and will colour the tops so it's easy to pull out the correct one. Some of these ideas are a bit lame and I might change them, but at the moment I think I'm going to go with...

Daytime Dates

* Lunch set-menu deal at a Michelin Restaurant

* Boxset Day

* Bowling

* Geocaching and Pub Day

* Geocaching and Tea Room Day

* Make pizza from scratch

* Double Cinema Day

* Steam Train Ride

* Crazy Golf [this one will probably require a trip to the seaside]

* Hush Heath Winery Tour

Evening Dates

* Film and Takeaway

* Dinner and a Movie

* Bowling

* Drinks at Topolski [we had our first date here]

* Wine and Cheese Night

* Prince Charles Cinema Date

* One Aldwych Film + Fizz Night

* Mamma Mia Dinner [fave local restaurant]

* Mishkins Dinner [fave London restaurant]

* Everyman Cinema Date

I'll let you know how this is all received...!

Weekending - Edinburgh

Edinburgh is one of my favourite cities. I have spent numerous weekends there - visiting friends, attending the festival, going to a wedding - and every time I visit I always think "next time I'm here, I definitely need to..." I visited for a 3-night stay recently, and here are my highlights...

* We stayed in the Nira Caledonia, which is one of my favourite hotels. The breakfast can be included in your stay and is totally worth the price.

* We had dinners at La Favorita and Wedgwood - the former being a more casual affair serving pizza and pasta, and the latter being perfect for a special occasion (i.e. my birthday!)

* We had lunch at The Grain Store, which has a £12.50 / £15 set-menu at lunchtimes. Absolute steal, especially for Southerners like me!

* We spent Saturday evening at Bond no. 9, which serves delicious and interesting cocktails as well as some cute options for bar snacks (we had haggis bon-bons, of course)

* A couple of times during the weekend we found ourselves in the middle of Princes Street, needing a wine-break away from noisy crowds. On both occasions we made our way to The Balmoral Bar at the Balmoral Hotel - a touch on the pricey side but the drinks are high-quality so you could definitely do worse on Princes Street.

* Even though the weather was a 'touch' on the rainy side, we sucked it up and trekked to the top of Arthur's Seat. Was a lovely way to while away a couple of Birthday hours!

* I've flown up to Edinburgh a few times, but this time it worked out cheaper and easier to get the train. We went up at a popular train time so upgraded to first class (only £20 extra I believe) but stuck with standard class on the way back and kept ourselves happy by bringing a train picnic with us (you can always improve a train journey with cheese and red wine, that is just a fact of life.)

Edinburgh is such a lovely city there is always something to occupy yourself with. Our trip was mainly eating, drinking, walking and exploring, and suited us down to the ground.