Edinburgh is one of Europe’s most beautiful cities, draped across a series of rocky hills overlooking the sea. It’s a town intimately entwined with its landscape, with buildings and monuments perched atop crags and overshadowed by cliffs. From the Old Town’s picturesque jumble of medieval tenements piled high along the Royal Mile, its turreted skyline strung between the black, bull-nosed Castle Rock and the russet palisade of Salisbury Crags, to the New Town’s neat grid of neoclassical respectability, the city offers a constantly changing perspective.

Edinburgh is also known as Auld Reekie, a down-to-earth place that flicks an impudent finger at the pretensions of the literati or maybe London. Auld Reekie is a city of loud, crowded pubs and decadent restaurants, late-night drinking and all-night parties, beer-fuelled poets and foul-mouthed comedians. They aren’t interested in what’s new at Harrods or how Princess Megan behaves around the Queen. We visited this gallant city during the holiday season and enjoyed the cold wintry rainy conditions even more than a sunny day in Florida.

The huge Christmas celebration called Edinburgh Christmas was located near Waverly Station and featured an aray of activites & booths serving hot cider,warm food and many festive items for sale to match anyone’s desire. Leaving there and walking up cockburn street

yes walking up that curved steeped street with temperatures near 30 degrees Fahrenheit was a task in itself but to the see a Starbucks siting at the top of the street like an oasis in the dessert made us smile from ear to ear.

The Starbucks looked like Edinburgh at night, how I imagined it would be with it’s frosted fogged windows and warm atmosphere once we got inside.

Edinburgh is a city I have longed overlooked but one my wife, who is the brains of the outfit has mentioned time and again as a destination we should pay more attention to. Well for once she was right! it’s a lovely city with many places to enjoy even if your just people watching like we were. We didn’t go inside the Castle or visit Holyrood Palace WE JUST ENJOY THE ATMOSPHERE! For some reason, I’m not so sure if I would venture to Edinburgh during the summer, something about being here during the winter months that makes this place magical.