The advantage of visiting Scotland in June is that it doesn’t get dark until around eleven in the evening, and even then it doesn’t ever seem to get completely black. The extra daylight meant that each afternoon after the conference finished we were able to head out and explore the city of Edinburgh a little.
We were lucky enough to be staying just a short distance from the castle and so whenever we left the hotel we had a glimpse of the castle perched on the hill.
We were incredibly fortunate with the weather and the one afternoon the conference finished early coincided with a beautiful sunny day. After having spent most of the day sat in dark meeting rooms we took advantage of the extra time and went out to Arthur’s Seat.
The gorse was in full bloom and looked amazing against the blue sky. Despite all our battles with trying to clear gorse from our land in New Zealand, it was beautiful to see so much gorse in flower.
It didn’t take us long to reach the top of Arthur’s Seat and from the top we had great views out over Edinburgh; we could make out the Palace of Hollyrood at the bottom of the hill as well as a huge cruise ship anchored out in the Firth of Forth in the distance.