One day, I booked us in for afternoon tea at The Dome, a very old building in Edinburgh. I didn’t eat breakfast since I knew there would be a lot of delicious things to eat. The building is lavishly gorgeous and inside too: the flowers, wallpaper, chandelier. The doorman directed us up the stairs to the Georgian Tea Room.
Afternoon tea is a tradition started by Anna, Duchess of Bedford, in the 1800’s. She “complained of getting that sinking feeling” around 4, and wanted a little something with her tea to hold her til their usual dinner hour of 8 or so. Her friend Queen Victoria took to this and so it went. The afternoon tea of today consists of much more than it did then.
We started with the sandwiches on the bottom tier of the 3 tiers. Cucumber mint, egg salad, duck with chutney, smoked salmon buns, and vol-au-vent pastry with some yummy mousse in it. The scones are what I really go to tea for, with the clotted cream and jam. They’re just so good. Not really sure why there has to be dessert after that, but we managed a little sweet tart or tiny piece of cake.
After eating all that with numerous cups of tea, we staggered on to a bus back to our flat in Bruntsfield (a great neighborhood ) to drop off the box of leftovers from tea. We changed our shoes and set off to walk The Waterway of Leiith, winding our way through the city to the green and stone pathway that follows the river through old villages and other parts of Edinburgh.
Each neighborhood we passed through had its own character, and none were quite the same as the others. We took a slight detour off the path a few times; at one point, we saw a women’s lawn bowling club starting their evening game. And in Inverleith Park, it seemed to be nap time for some of the swans and ducks. I can’t resist adding these photos of the birds. They were all so relaxed, not seeming to mind humans moving around them and their pond.
It’s a good thing we’d eaten so much for our 7 mile walk. Will saw a post on the side of the walkway that we stopped to inspect.
It was almost dark when we began to see signs of the port of Leith, formerly seen as a ‘dodgy’ part of Edinburgh. It’s now seen as 1 of the top 10 places to live in Scotland, says the Sunday Times there. We couldn’t really see much of that in the drizzle that started, but the walk was really a great way to explore.
Our days in Edinburgh went quickly in the warm summery weather we had much of the week. I found another place that intrigued me for afternoon tea at Prestonfield House. It’s still in the city, but a ways out from things. Once a private home and now a hotel, it’s very elegant in style. Will added a bloody mary to his afternoon tea there. Before we walked in, I looked up in a tree to discover their resident peacock.
Edinburgh really is a city of contrasts, and manages to showcase them all in large and small ways. The people we met were welcoming and generous with help for directions or suggestions of things to see.
But we’ll go back. Many more walks to discover, and lovely people to meet.
Birdgirl’s travels 