On Sunday I made a trip to the Edinburgh Christmas Markets and I would highly recommend a visit to anyone who is looking for an day or evening away.
It’s been a hectic few months and I managed to talk my husband into taking a day off work so we could go away for a night. We decided on Edinburgh as we hadn’t visited for a very long time – we certainly weren’t disappointed.
We decided to get the train up as I hate the drive from Newcastle. As it was a Sunday, we managed to book some off-peak tickets at a great price and also made a booking to stay at the Ibis Hotel on the Royal Mile.
Our train arrived into Edinburgh just after 1pm and we decided to go straight to the hotel to drop off our bags. From here, we made our way down to Princes Street, where one of the city’s three festive markets was taking place. This was the European market, which offered a range of gifts, food and drink from an eclectic mix of retailers. There was also an ice rink and rides, in addition to a bar built on a fairground carousel. We bought two glasses of mulled wine and made our way around the stands.
It began to rain a little so we took this as a sign to head off for some lunch and come back a bit later. After eating, we visited the second market, which was located near St George’s Street. This market was a lot smaller, however there was still plenty going on. We then made a quick trip to Harvey Nichols, before heading back to the Princes Street market to finish looking around.
Although I didn’t eat at this market, I did buy some doughnuts which were served with melted Nutella – definitely a highlight of the trip – and some irish cream flavoured coffee, which I haven’t yet tried.
After we finished at the market we went for a drink in the Grassmarket before doing a ghost tour in the underground vaults. For those who haven’t visited the vaults, I’d definitely recommend a visit as they are very interesting – and a lot warmer than doing an outdoor ghost walk! Although we didn’t see any ghosts, we did have a good time and a few laughs along the way.
We didn’t want too much of a late night so we decided to go for a mexican meal at a restaurant in the Grassmarket called Mariachi. The food was fantastic and I’d highly recommend it. Once we had eaten it was around 10pm so we headed back to our hotel.
We were up bright and early the following day so made our way for lunch and a little more shopping before our train at 1pm. We had a fantastic 24 hours and Edinburgh’s Christmas markets certainly didn’t disappoint.
I have trips to Amsterdam and Prague booked over the coming weeks so will share my experiences from each of these too. I’m very excited!
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