Activities

Edinburgh boasts a wide variety of recreational activities. There are plenty of good walks, and cycling is made easier around the city and out into the surrounding countryside with Edinburgh's network of signposted cycle paths, though the hilly cobble-stoned city centre is a wee bit difficult for most two-wheelers.

Points of interest

Mussel Inn

Owned by shellfish farmers on the west coast, the Mussel Inn provides a direct outlet for fresh Scottish seafood. The busy restaurant is all bright beech wood, with pavement tables in summer. Your pot of mussels comes with a choice of sauces - try leek, bacon, white wine and cream. Queen scallops, soup, pasta, oysters and catch of the day are also on offer.

Address

Contact

Transport

Hadrian's Brasserie

This brasserie has an Art Deco feel, with pale green walls and dark-wood furniture, and white-aproned, black-waistcoated waiters. There are posh versions of Scottish favourites such as salt-and-pepper prawns (with chips and mayonnaise), confit of pork belly with apple sauce, and duck-filled spring rolls with hoisin sauce and pickled cucumber.

Address

Contact

Transport

Restaurant Martin Wishart

In 2001 this restaurant became Edinburgh's first to win a Michelin star. The eponymous chef brings a modern French approach to the finest Scottish produce, from fillet of halibut to roast saddle of lamb. The dining room is crisply elegant, the service professional and discreet, and the food beautifully presented. Book ahead as far as possible.

Address

Contact

Transport

Edinburgh Castle

The brooding, black crags of the Castle Rock, shouldering above Princes St Gardens, are the very reason for Edinburgh's existence. This rocky hill - the glacier-worn stump of an ancient volcano - was the most easily defended hilltop on the invasion route between England and central Scotland, a route followed by countless armies over the centuries.

The place has seen plenty of action: back in the 6th century it was used as a defence against the Picts, while in the 18th century Bonnie Prince Charlie's army tried but failed to breach its walls. These days hostilities are more likely to erupt between competing tour groups.

By the mid-18th century, the castle looked much as it does today. Partly thanks to Sir Walter Scott, in the 19th century it began to recover its importance as a Scottish symbol.

Visitors enter from the Esplanade, a parade ground where the changing of the guard occurs on the hour. Sites within the castle proper include Mills Mount Battery, where a gun salute takes place on weekdays; St Margaret's Chapel, the oldest building in Edinburgh; the Palace, built between the 15th and 16th centuries; and the Scottish United Services Museum, which houses displays on the history of Scottish regiments.

Address

Contact

Transport

Admission

Real Mary King's Close

The City Chambers were built over the sealed-off remains of Mary King's Close, and the lower levels of this medieval Old Town alley have survived almost unchanged in the foundations for 250 years. Now open to the public, this spooky, subterranean labyrinth gives a fascinating insight into the everyday life of 17th-century Edinburgh.

A drama student in period costume will take you on a guided tour through the vaults, whilst practising their old-world enunciation.

The scripted tour, with its ghostly tales and gruesome tableaux, can seem a little naff, milking the scary and scatological aspects of the close's history for all they're worth, but there are things of genuine interest to see. There's something about the crumbling 17th-century tenement room, with tufts of horsehair poking from the collapsing lath-and-plaster walls, the ghost of a pattern on the walls, and the ancient smell of stone and dust thick in your nostrils, that makes the hairs rise on the back of your neck.

Address

Contact

Transport

Admission

Museum of Scotland

Opened in 1998, this is one of the city's most distinctive new landmarks, and the imaginative interior design is an attraction in itself. The five floors of the museum trace the history of Scotland from its geological beginnings to the 1990s, with many stimulating exhibits - it could take several visits to do it justice.

Address

Contact

Transport

Admission

Outlook Tower & Camera Obscura

The 'camera obscura' itself is a curious 19th-century device - something like a periscope, using lenses and mirrors to throw a live image of the city onto a large horizontal screen. The accompanying commentary is entertaining and the whole exercise has a quirky charm. The Outlook Tower offers great views over the city.

Address

Contact

Transport

Admission

Scotch Whisky Heritage Centre

Housed in a former school, the Centre explains the making of whisky from barley to bottle, in a series of exhibits combining sight, sound and smell. The first, more interesting part is led by a guide, while the second part involves riding a 'barrel car' past several tableaux depicting the history of the 'water of life' - Johnnie Walker meets Walt Disney.

As a reward, you get a wee taste of the real thing, before being channelled into a shop full of whisky. There's also a restaurant, Amber, that serves traditional Scottish dishes with, where possible, a dash of whisky thrown in.

Address

Contact

Transport

Admission

Claremont Bar

The Claremont is a friendly, gay-owned bar that looks like a traditional Scottish pub at first glance. Then you notice the Star Trek paraphernalia (check out the model USS Enterprise behind the bar, and the wee red-eyed alien up the stairs), and the flyers for the cross-dressers' night Absolutely Dragulous, and you realise it's way more special than that!

Address

Contact

Transport

Edinburgh Festival Theatre

The curving glass-and-steel façade of the Festival Theatre houses the city's main venue for ballet, contemporary dance and opera; it also stages musicals, concerts, drama and children's shows. Performances by the critically acclaimed Scottish Ballet are a regular feature of the programme. The Dundee-based Scottish Dance Theatre also performs here.

Address

Contact

Transport

CC Blooms

The raddled old queen of the Edinburgh gay scene, CC's offers two floors of deafening dance and disco. It's a bit overpriced and overcrowded but worth a visit - if you can get past the bouncers and the crowds of drunks looking for a late drink. A traditional last stop of the night, with all that implies.

Address

Contact

Transport

Events

They don't call Edinburgh the Festival City for nothing. The peak party time of the year is August, when the sun warms into something worthy of the name, the city explodes with arts events and the streets fill with a cosmopolitan melange of visitors high on a heady mix of culture and single malt. If you're hardy enough to brave the Scottish winter, you'll be rewarded by the fullest-bore New Year celebrations you're ever likely to see.

The highlight of Scotland's calendar is the Edinburgh International Festival, held every August. Since its inception in 1947 to mark the end of WWII, it has grown into one of the world's largest and most important arts festivals. The Fringe Festival began unofficially at the same time and grew in tandem to become the largest such event in the world. Over 500 amateur and professional groups present every possible kind of avant-garde performance in venues all around the city. Also held in the same period is the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, which takes place on the Esplanade of Edinburgh Castle. The show is an extravaganza of daredevil displays, regimental posturing and swirling bagpipes and ends with a single piper playing a lament on the battlefields. Hogmanay, the Scottish celebration of the New Year, is another major fixture in Edinburgh's festival calendar with concerts, street parties and a massive bonfire on Calton Hill. There's also the frenzy of the other international fests: Edinburgh International Jazz and Blues Festival in July-August, Edinburgh International Book Festival and Edinburgh International Film Festival in August, and a whole lot more in between.

official holidays

Books

A reasonably up-to-date history of the country, extending to the early 1990s.

An interesting and readable introduction to Scotland's past.

One of the greatest Scottish travelogues, including visits to Skye, Coll and Mull.

Perhaps the best known of Scott's prodigious outpourings.

A page-turning read set in Edinburgh and Mull.

The humorous tale of what transpires when a cargo of whisky runs aground on a Hebridean island during WWII.

Maxwell's works contain evocative descriptions of life among Highland wildlife.

A shrewd portrayal of 1930s Edinburgh.

This novel takes the reader on a guided tour of Edinburgh's underworld, demonstrating the Scottish flair for making mordant humour out of despair.

An excellent introduction to Scotland's national tipple.

Originally serialised in The Scotsman, this witty collection tells of the lives of various characters living in an Edinburgh house by the billion-selling author.

Edinburgh's best-known crime writer follows in the footsteps of the hard-boiled detective, Rebus, around edinburgh and beyond.