Farewells, Flights and Falkirk Wheel

Day Thirty-seven – Edinburgh

So that's it then. Holiday over! It's been an absolute blast, even with the manky Pommie weather although I must admit we're all ready for home, our own beds and some proper sunshine.

We did most of our packing last night so there was not a great deal to do this morning. I did my best to clean out the car and we tidied the (wonderful) flat before we left. Once breakfast was out of the way we were off.

There was no set plan for today other than "must be at airport at 3:00pm to return car" so we went for a drive. We were reluctant to go sightseeing "properly" so a wandering drive ending up back at the airport seemed like the best idea.

Jenni had a bit of trouble with directions and before we knew it we were committed to a trip across the Firth of Forth road bridge. No matter, we had plenty of time to kill and the opposite shore looked just as interesting. Once we reached the other side we turned west an headed, very roughly, towards Glasgow.

After an hour or so of driving through some very pleasant country we decided we'd better head back towards Edinburgh. Just after doing so we passed a sign for the Falkirk Wheel, a name which rang a VERY vague bell but I couldn't remember why. Once we were within sight of the Wheel though it all came back. I'd seen and read a fair bit about it some time ago and was quite interested in it.

The Falkirk Wheel is best described as a "canal lift", operating two caissons through 360 degrees of a loop, the top and bottom of which are both linked to canals. Each caisson can hold up to 4 boats or barges and hold so much water that an extra 1cm depth adds 1.8 tonnes of weight. The engineering involved is quite something and though I'm not sure exactly how high it is from top to bottom it must be 50 metres or close to. We wandered around the visitor centre for a while and ate lunch, all the while watching the Wheel do it's thing, lifting boat loads of tourists from bottom to top canal and back again.

With lunch finished it was really time to start heading home. On the way back to the airport we filled up the car (LOL I forgot to take a photo of it!) and drove her to the airport drop-off point. We've spent the last couple of hours sitting about, checking in and now we're sitting in the departure lounge waiting for our short hop to Heathrow and then on to Singapore.

Update: After a very bumpy but otherwise uneventful flight we've made it to Singapore. Everyone but me is crashed and I think the jetlag is going to be worse this time because we're flying the other way...

Cheers,

Millsy