Train Ride: London to Edinburgh

Yes, you can fly from London to Edinburgh, but by the time you take the tube to the airport, go through security, get to your gate, take off, and then go from the other airport to town, it’s about the same amount of time, really (4-5 hours).

So we went with the train option, up through the eastern side of England, through York and Durham and Newcastle, then crossing the border to make our arrival at Waverly Station, in the heart of Edinburgh, and walking distance to our hotel.

The countryside was beautiful and for the first hour or so, we had lots of sunshine. The train was supposed to have wifi, but it wasn’t working, which actually encouraged me to look out the window and let my mind wander. Very relaxing. The other part of the train that didn’t work out quite as planned was that we booked seats in a forward direction, but when we got on the train, they were backward-facing. After observing our fellow passengers, we decided one couple had the right idea: they booked four seats at a table, and then they had room to spread out and change directions if they wanted. Very clever!

I recognized the cathedral at Durham, which has so many different styles from different building periods that it’s unique in its own way. On my first trip to England, I toured the cathedral, admiring its thick Norman-era pillars (over a thousand years old!) and the flying buttresses and vaulted ceilings of the Gothic period. It felt like seeing an old friend out the train window this time.

One of the fun things about train rides is seeing the different stations. The one above is in York, and it looks just about like you’d expect an old English train station to look. The one below is in Newcastle, which is also an older architecture and I kind of wished we could have gotten out and had a look; we were stopped there for 20 minutes or so and I could have gotten at least a few photos, I’m sure…)

As we got going again and passed through Newcastle, I took this photo of the many bridges across the River Tyne. How many can you count? (And, yes, Lyn, this photo is for you!)

As we got closer to Edinburgh, the weather turned appropriately damp and dark, but I still managed to get a shot of this bridge near Belford. Something about bridge + reflection always works for me. This far north, we were still in England, not yet in Scotland.

Soon after, we arrived at Waverly Station, lugging our suitcases behind up as we went up two flights of stairs only to then walk downhill towards our hotel. What goes up… And up we did go, all the way from London to Scotland, the focus of this trip. My nephew, Bob, and I had planned to go in 2020, but, well, we all know how that year turned out. Four years later, we made here and we’re making the most of it.

The landscape changes, the people change, but the train keeps moving. Life is the train, not the station.

Paulo Coelho