Pole Dancers and Bagpippers

June 30th (afternoon)

Leaving the Scottish War Memorial we head down The Royal Mile to find lunch.  It is soon found in the form of a pub.  We eat upstairs next to an open window with views of the Geraniums in a box and High Street below.  All is picture perfect.  I sample the smoked Scottish salmon on toast which proved to be a good choice. 
Tab paid we decide to split up.  Sam takes the boys to Clarkes down on Princes Street to look at shoes and I go to find two antique bookseller I had contacted back in the States.  Being an antique print dealer I am determined to bring back some great finds.  By now, my feet hurt from so much walking in the new pair of "walking shoes" specially bought for the trip.  The spaces between the cobblestone on the Royal Mile are so deep and so wide that I've twisted my ankles several times. 


I turn left up Lothian Road from Princes Street making a mental note to use our Hilton points at the Grosvnor Hilton instead of the one near Haymarket next time as there is a direct view of Edinburgh Castle.  I find Bread Street on the left and head to my destination.  Another thing Rick Steves fails to mention is that you might need to pass through a "questionable" area to get where you need to go.  I notice a newstand owner giving me a funny look but I pay him no mind.  Soon I pass what I thought was a discoteque until I see the sillhouettes of well endowed women hanging from poles.  Thinking this was just an anomaly I keep walking.  Across the street I see another place that looks clearly not like a discotheque.  I press on debating with myself that maybe I ought to turn around when low and behold I find Edinburgh Books www.edinburghbooks.net and I slip inside much relieved. 

The bookshop was literally crammed top to bottom  with every kind of book imaginable.  I had no trouble finding the volumes that I wanted and I purchased about 6 books.  If you like antiquarian books, fine leather binding, poetry, fiction etc.  it's worth braving the surrounding to get here.  Don't ask to use the restroom, it's a frightening 1920s watercloset in the basement and I don't think it's been cleaned since the Second World War. 

My next stop was Armchair Books.  I slip out the door turn left and wonder what I would encounter on the way.  I quickly find Armchair Books www.armchairbooks.co.uk (sans the pole dancers) across the street and and head in that direction. 

The store was actually two storefronts with two front doors but no one had bothered to cut a hole between the two to make one complete store.  The fellow James that owned/worked there was very friendly and chatty and helped me find what I wanted.  We talked about the horrors of ebay and the Royal Mail situation.  Funny how they attribute the slow mail between UK/US to our homeland security proceedures while I had attributed it to cut backs and strikes at The Royal Mail.  He gave me a nice discount and had to keep running next door for bags and receipt paper etc. which only added to the disorganized charm of the place. 

Finally, I am ready to make my way back down Bread Street.  Initially, I had thought about finding a different way back to the hotel but given the twisting and turning of Olde Town streets I decide against it.  Besides this is the most direct route.  As I head toward Lothian Road I note that business here has begun to pick up.  A woman in a dark trech coat and I swear 4 inch lucite heels stands talking with a gentleman outside one of the pole dancing places.  I jay walk across the street making a beeline for Lothian Road. Somewhere on Lothian Road I bought the travel journal that most of my notes for my blog were ultimately written in.  My arms are starting to tire from my heavy load of books.

 About the time I reach Princes Street I realize I have left my map on the step ladder at Armchair Books.  There are 4 or 5 streets that come together in a jangled mess at the intersection.  I take a stab at one and head in a direction that seems right.  There is an OxFam store and it seems familiar.  Soon I see Odd Bins and I rejoice.  Wine!  We went to Odd Bins often in London 12 years ago.  But then my heart sinks, I don't remember passing Odd Bins this morning on the way in.  (I assure you I would have noticed.)  Nevertheless,  I stop in and buy a screwtop Shiraz and ask for the directions back to my hotel.  (My corkscrew was confiscated from my backpack at the Columbus airport back in Ohio.)  My feet at this point are screaming and I'm hot from carrying two bags of antique books and now a bottle of wine.  The shop keeper says to keep bearing left and that this will eventually put me out onto Haymarket.  Right?  (Wrong)  He failed to mention that you have to go around and enormous church to get to Haymarket. 

By now it is late in the afternoon or early evening as it stays daylight until 11:00 here in the summer.  I am basically wandering around New Towne ladden with books and a bottle of wine searching for my hotel.  Every now and then I come across random bagpippers on the large front landings that are characteristic of New Towne dwellings, playing their heart out.  (Retrospectively, I have decided that there is no halfway playing the bagpipes here, you either are or you aren't.)   Maybe they all practice on the landing so as not to scare the cat or wake the baby, I don't know, but it was a nice serenade after my afternoon adventure.

Ultimately, I never found Haymarket but I did find Grovener Crescent and I knew our hotel was on the street at the top of the crescent.  So with the bagpippers pipping me home, I found The Hilton no worse for the wear.  The screwtop Shiraz turned out to be pretty good and Sam and the boys had had their own adventure locating Murray Stadium and a skate park.  We were all so tired we had dinner at the hotel.  Fish and chips all around while I sampled more salmon.