Kings’ Cross Train Station: While I watch the big board for our track assignments, Tara and Cheyenne wait with our luggage near the trains. They amuse themselves by mentally projecting pink light to pigeons, who respond by hurrying over to check out the girls. Amazing.

Tara and Cheyenne have both added a suitcase to carry their festival and London shopping purchases. They came prepared with collapsible bags that become full size when the need arises. Since we didn’t make advance reservations, we have to schlep the luggage to the back cars. Boarding the 9 AM train to Edinburgh is no easy task. 

Over the train loudspeaker system, the customer supervisor apologizes profusely for leaving Kings’ Cross seven minutes late. There was a locomotive problem, but they will try to make up the time.

I’m excited about returning to Scotland. We eat on the train, read the paper, watch the English countryside shoot past. Rectangular brick and stone houses are the only dwellings -- no architectural variation. Church steeples are plentiful. The land is rural with fallow fields, but new green growth covers most the landscape.

Beyond the city limits of Doncaster, a six-tower nuclear power station looms on the horizon. Five miles down the track, 12 nuclear towers appear -- six of them smoking. The people around here must glow in the dark. I think I’m repeating myself here, but it’s shocking to see.

After four hours, we cross the Royal Bridge into Scotland at Berwick-upon-Tweed. The rails now run along the edge of the North Sea. The further north we go, the more gray and overcast the sky.

(NOTE: I’ve written much about previous Scotland adventures in my book “With Your Spirit Guide’s Help” and a “1999 Road Diary” which can be read at this site by clicking on “Articles.” This trip will not include most of the things tourists do in Edinburgh, because we’ve already done them.)

32 Castle Terrace in Edinburgh.

A hole in the clouds, spotlights Edinburgh Castle in sunlight as we pull out of Waverly Train Station in a Black Cab. We’re heading to 32 Castle Terrace. I tell the driver, “I know it’s close, but I’ll tip you well.” After sitting in the long train-station cab line, a driver doesn’t want a one-mile fare. Our fare is 2.90 pounds, but I give him 7 pounds. He acts shocked.

Angela Tunstall, the apartment owner, is waiting for us. An attractive middle-aged woman, she shows us how things works, gives us a payment receipt and a set of keys. The third-floor walkup flat is newly decorated, and the living-room-window view of Edinburgh Castle is spectacular. The living room offers a dining table and four chairs, plus there are two lounge chairs, a sleeper sofa for Cheyenne, a fireplace heater, TV, and stereo. Our bedroom has a queen-size double bed. There is a full kitchen and washer-dryer.

The apartment building was erected about 1850 as a nurses home for the Royal Infirmary. On the roof of the four story building is a large statue of Queen Victoria as a slim young woman -- not the common image of the Queen.

(NOTE: We didn’t learn that the building was a nurses home until after we returned home and I e-mailed Angela. While living in the apartment, Tara did a psychometric reading and sensed intense physical pain taking place. She felt someone had lost an arm, and perceived the pain of another with an intense gash across their chest. So I wonder if there was also a time when the building was used to house wounded men.)

London was balmy by comparison to Edinburgh. We walk the streets dressed for winter. Memories lurk around every street corner. “Remember, Cheyenne, you played laser tag there.” Now it’s a tanning salon. “We had Hunter’s birthday there.” “We saw ‘Reduced Shakespeare’ there.”

Three years ago, the last time Cheyenne was here, we stayed all summer. She tried out for a part in a Scottish Opera production and performed in a musical at the biggest theater in Edinburgh.

After buying groceries and supplies, we journey down the Royal Mile -- a street of shops, restaurants, and churches that leads from the Castle to the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the official residence of her Majesty the Queen while in Scotland.

The Palace of Hollyroodhouse, residence of the Queen when residing in Edinburgh.

At La Rusticana, the restaurant owner looks at us with a cocked head and says, “I think I remember you.”

“It’s been a couple years, but we’ve been here often,” Tara replies. We drink a carafe of wine. The meal is exceptional and we splurge on dessert calories.

On the way home, Cheyenne spots a body piercing shop on Cockburn Street. “Oh, Mom, you said we could, now we can.” Tara mumbles something about maybe later in the week.

At the apartment we have more wine. Tonight is a celebration of having finished our heavy fall seminar and workshop commitments.

Click HERE for the continuation
of Dick’s London/Edinburgh
2002 Road Diary

• November 6 -- Travel To London
• November 7 -- Arrival In London
• November 8 -- Healing Arts Festival Day
• November 9 -- Oxford Street and The Festival
  November 10 -- Last Day of the Festival
• November 11 -- Off To Edinburgh
• November 12 -- Settling In
  November 13 -- Hanging Out
• November 14 -- Posing For Pictures
  November 15 -- Lost Penny
• November 16 -- Rosslyn Chapel
• November 17 -- Harry Potter Day
• November 18 -- Separate Shopping
• November 19 -- Last Day
  November 20 -- Train To London
  November 21 -- Return Home
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