Welcome back to part 3 of the Scottish Adventure, this is the last part of the 3 day trip in Scotland.
It was the penultimate day out in Edinburgh and for once unlike the last two days which had questionable weather, today at least would be different.
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| Onboard Lothian Buses route 3, which was heading towards Clovenstone via Edinburgh City Centre. |
I boarded route 3 alighting at Bernard Terrace, a couple of stops short of the City Centre. Now of course I wanted to explore more around Edinburgh itself, so one of the areas I had in mind was Arthur's Seat. Arthur's Seat is one of the highest hills in Edinburgh - at 251m - as before it used to be an active volcano millions of years ago. Getting there involved going around a couple of side roads and a hilly grass path, which Citymapper helpfully navigated me through.
There was a slight incline when walking towards Arthur's Seat, which my knees started to feel the further and further I got. In the distance, I could see people making their way up Arthur's Seat, with some already arriving at the top. As much as I would have liked to have climbed it fully, 2 hours going and 2 hours coming down didn't seem worth it, since I didn't contain the right footwear and gear for climbing - unlike other people that did. At least the consolation was that the views managed to be quite good, no matter where you were standing in the area.
After capturing some photos, I decided to head back to continue the rest of the day. 20 minutes later, I arrived where I got off and boarded route 8 (see the first photo below, this was the exact bus model I got) into town - a Wrightbus Eclipse Gemini 2. Of course, the bus type and layout inside was familiar to me, as we have quite a few of them in London. Sitting upstairs, there was no next stop announcement board screen that I've been familiar to - instead a CCTV screen so I used Citymapper, to know the stop where I had to alight from. I then explored around visiting a museum (that I didn't stay for long in because.... museums) and Edinburgh Castle though unfortunately, to visit this castle it has to be booked, hence the tickets were sold out but still, I made it up to the entry point before they started to let people in.
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Bright Bus Tours 32790, (LX51FNT) seen in Lawnmarket (Edinburgh City Centre) on the City Tour.
Bus model seen in this photo: Alexander Dennis ALX400
Previously Stagecoach London 17515.
Above: A CAF Urbos 3 Tram is seen departing Princes Street tram stop on a service towards Edinburgh Airport.
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I wanted to try out the tram however, unlike buses contactless was not accepted and I felt a bit confused on paying since there were two fare zones. Of course, majority of the stations are in the City Zone with Edinburgh Airport being in the Airport Zone. After an attempt to buy tickets, I ultimately gave up and decided to do something else instead.
Two photos above: Onboard route 44 heading towards Balerno, displaying some of the bus stop information.
All of a sudden, I waited at the bus stop and got onboard route 44, which was heading towards Balerno - I decided to take a ride for myself to see where it was. Sitting upstairs, we passed through the congested Princes Street onto Haymarket station - another busy station in Edinburgh. We are now on the A70 at this point and various shops appeared left and right, as we were still near the area of the City Centre. The next bit consisted of housing, with the railway lines passing underneath entering Slateford, the Lidl shop shortly emerging afterwards. Now, for some reason it seems like supermarket shops in Edinburgh start at 8am and close at 10pm, even on Sundays. Bit interesting I guess. The housing consisted of flats looking largely similar to each other, though there was a fuel station which was in between. Slateford Station appeared and does not see many trains being served, as proved with no passengers at the platform, with indeed no trains either.
There seemed to be some building works taking place, probably new housing. I thought the colour for holding the scaffolding (yellow) done here was quirky, as usually it would be blue. The housing felt different and varied as it seems we entered the area of Kingsknowe, definitely felt suburban for sure. Housing seemed to be the theme for next few minutes into Juniper Green, the sign mentioning it to be a "historic mill village". The road did feel a bit tight here but, a view of the A720 and the hill was one of those look at moments in a bus/train ride - if you get what I am saying. The houses wasn't too much here compared to the other areas, with trees and greenery mainly to look at. Shops are also very limited, with Iceland being the first proper shop that appeared in a while. The view of the hill in the background definitely meant we were on the outskirts of Edinburgh, with a Sainsburys Petrol station making a random appearance.
More housing and vegetation alongside the unusual brickwork eventually lead into the village of Currie, again, limited eateries consisting of a few small independent shops, a cafe and an Inn. The empty park and football pitch briefly made an appearance before passing houses, feeling a bit residential. The scenery pretty much felt the same entering Balerno, as we turned off the A70 taking a left onto Bridge Road, with a high school on the left hand side to greet us in. Navigating the roundabout, it felt rather residential at first, until it became rural and felt like being in the middle of nowhere. The terminus was in a turn around point, nothing else but a road and houses to stare at. I then asked the driver (as the bus was terminating here) whether I could stay on, he replied "yes" eventhough other people boarded nearby the terminus. On the way back we went via a different way, through the high street of Balerno which... didn't appear to offer much from the looks of it. Still, that's not really a surprise considering that we were outside of Edinburgh! The route was going to Wallyford and well it looked pretty lengthy, so I would have loved to complete it fully, nonetheless I decided to play safe and alight at Edinburgh City Centre, getting route 31 back towards Cameroon Toll. Overall, the route definitely had some picturesque moments at times when riding it towards Balerno and back - the sunshine definitely made the viewing experience more admirable to look at. A pretty good day!
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| View of the hills. |
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| Passing over the A720, the border of Edinburgh. |
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| Picturesque view. |
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| Slateford station, served by ScotRail services. |
Leaving Edinburgh - Sunday 28th August 2022.
It had been a great few days in Scotland, though the time was coming to an end. Exiting the hotel, I decided to buy some food for the journey back at Cameroon Toll Shopping Centre, offering a decent amount of shops. I got it, then made my way towards the bus stop to wait for a bus to take me towards the station. I did initially walk (at first) to see if I could reach the station on foot but, after 10 minutes, I figured this would not be appropriate, especially I since I was carrying luggage around with me. So I walked over to the bus stop and waited, eventually route 37 came and dropped me off at Princes Street leading me to walk towards the station. I then admired the rubbish being left on the pavement one last time, before I arrived at Edinburgh Waverley station. To be honest, there was an ongoing bin strike when I travelled during this trip, so it pretty much was their fault - tourists might just get the wrong impression of the City when visiting!
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| Onboard route 37, downstairs in Edinburgh City Centre. |
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Lothian Buses 697, (SJ71HLU) seen in Princes Street (Edinburgh City Centre) on route 37 towards Sliverknowes.
Bus model seen in this photo: Alexander Dennis Enviro 400 MMC
By the time I arrived in the station, it was around 12:50pm and our train was not departing Edinburgh until 2:00pm, so I had about an hour to kill which is what you want - better to have time to spare and wait than be running around, arrive late onto the platform, missing the train you supposed to have gotten! I sat in the waiting room where other fellow travellers were also waiting for their trains to arrive. In the meantime, I took a moment to look at the glass up above which was very presentable indeed along with the brickwork and lighting.
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| Onboard the 2:00pm LNER service to London King's Cross at Edinburgh Waverley. |
The platform was announced for 2:00pm service, so I walked over and found my seat. The service was a bit busy heading back, even the reservation system for seating wasn't operational on this journey which lead to some passengers having to move around, meaning some people stood in the unreserved section and near the doors. We called at: Alnmouth, Newcastle, Durham, Darlington, York, Doncaster, Newark North Gate, Peterborough and London Kings Cross. The departure from Edinburgh was on time, slightly late arriving into Alnmouth (9 minutes), though time managed to be made up. The scenery was pretty impressive around Alnmouth and Newcastle, notably at Stevenage station (a couple of stops after Peterborough) we went via the Hertford Loop Line instead of staying on the East Coast Main Line, passing through stations served by Great Northern. Presumably that section between Alexandra Palace and Stevenage was closed off for engineering works that day. The areas began to became more built up entering London, with the Emirates Stadium at Finsbury Park coming into view, finally arriving into London Kings Cross about 2 minutes late at 6:51pm in the evening.
As I was sitting on the other side of the train on the way back (again), I decided to quickly get a photo of the North Sea while the train was still empty during that point.
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| The North Sea. |
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| Interior of the LNER Class 801s, standard class. |
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| Arrived at London Kings Cross after a 4 hour journey from Edinburgh. |
I don't often do train trips to other areas, however, I really enjoyed spending the past few days venturing into Scotland and taking in some of the scenery along the East Coast Main Line, which has some picturesque moments for sure. Needless to say, I managed to tick off two lines (well technically one but, yeah) and have a ride on one of the Class 801 IETs, which I have to say are alright and the motors are good despite being pretty quiet, although I imagine it wouldn't bother the regular passenger who commutes regularly on the route. I personally don't have any complaints about the IETs at the moment - just that they seem to be the regular choice for rail operators in the UK that operate fast intercity services (i.e. Great Western Railway, Hull Trains, TransPennine Express, Lumo). An enjoyable few days out in Scotland and it will most likely be a while until I visit it again, since the prices were pretty expensive.
Thanks for reading and happy riding!
Previous parts can be found here:
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