Today was another free day, for the most part. We had the morning and afternoon for our own plans, so of course, I wanted to sleep in a little to catch up on some rest. By sleeping in, though, I mean getting up at 8 am instead of 6 am.
A group of us walked to the Elephant House, which is a famous cafe known for J.K Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, visiting the cafe and writing her books there. I had pancakes there and they were very good, but a lot thinner than ones we would have in the United States.
After getting breakfast, we explored more of Edinburgh and the area surrounding our hotel. We walked up and down the Royal Mile and picked up some final souvenirs.
We also walked across the bridge to the New Town area, got coffee, and walked through Primark (The British version of Forever21). While over in that area, we stopped to sit in a park with a great view of the Edinburgh Castle.
We stopped for a light lunch at a pub fairly close to our hotel. After spending the day exploring, we headed back to the French Embassy where we had a group meeting to reflect on our time on the trip and what media visits we enjoyed the most.
After our meeting, we walked to Howie’s, where we had our last group dinner together. Everything I had there tasted great, especially the banoffee dessert.
After our last group dinner, we met up with our tour guide, Jane, on the Royal Mile to start our haunted walking tour of Edinburgh. Our guide was really funny but was also really good at telling the scary stories.
The creepiest part of the tour was when we went into the underground rooms and she told us various ghost stories, each one relating to a different room. At one point she blew out the candle she was holding so the room went completely black.
After that spooky experience, we walked back to the hotel and began packing.
We’ll be taking two flights tomorrow on our journey home, one from Edinburgh to London, then a connecting flight from London to Pittsburgh.