I arrived on the at the small town 33 minutes east of Edinburgh on a cloudy, windy and increasingly chilly day. But as a person expecting the weather to only become increasingly more pressent I only brought my old light sail team jacket whihc was perhaps as insulative as a thin sweatshirt and a paper thin rain jacket. But I was greatful I had remembered my rain jacket, due to the speratic rain showers that accompanied to bone chilling wind.
Taking in the beauty of the town while walking through I soon realized that I was at the end of the city and on the trail to the fortest sitting on a bluff high above the water three miles outside the collection of buildings inside the town. Windy, watery and cold past the point of comfortability I was determinded to viste the castle that I had spend the day before investagating online. Pushing through the wind and rain the three miles as small cars showed off their 50 - 80 horsepower engines zooming by every now and again to the main road I was walking on, I finally made it to the castle in good time.
I have had a membership to the Scottish castle historical soceity that would have allowed me to viste Tantillon castle incorporated in my membership fee, But that membership had expired a month before. While talking to the helpful historical soceity woman at the front gate of the castle while my hands regained their usefullness so that I might pay for a continue to my membership, I soon realized that my bank cards would not work. One of the cards didnt have enough money on it, the other was only an ATM card and the other had never worked before but I keep it with me in the hopes that it will work in the future. After many failed attemps to pay with these cards and not enough cash in my wallet to pay for a membership in one go, I was forced to pay just for the day to viste the castle I had traveled so far to see. But not to treat the fee to viste this castle due to its location out side the normally visted areas of Scotland was realitive low. I was soon walking the grounds of history, of rebellion and patriotism, of bravery and restistence. The castle now in ruins of the what greatness it once was, was still an amazing work of enginering and masondary. The castle made for war fare of sords and arrows near the end of its use with stood bombardment by the increase of technology that was 1770's artillary, but met its end to the endless enemy of time. Once inside the walls the veiw over the bluff was the ocean and an island home of a long empty monstary, light house and protected bird habitat.
Due to the cold, wind and rain and a train to level in only a couple of hours, my time at the castle was shorter then I would have enjoyed on a nice day. So sadly sooner rather then later I was back on the street walking the three miles back to the small town center with quant shops and tourest couples marveling at butchers shops as if they had never seen them before. Back on the train back to Edinburgh I made it just in time to be joined buy student from a university just outside of the main city of Edinburgh back to the city center. So back in the city I weaved through the now very large crowd of students and professionals with the same destination in mind as me 'home and food' I made my way back to the building I had started my day in.
