The east coast just below Edinburgh is a very interesting area but just that bit too far for day trips so we decided to have two nights at Eyemouth to have more time to explore. It was a very nice day for travelling so we set off quite early and had our first stop for coffee at the sleepy border town of Selkirk , which has a lot of history including a famous courtroom. After a short break we pressed onto Coldstream, another small but attractive town with a good craft gallery then onto Berwick on Tweed – back in England for lunch and a potter around the shops. Just by sheer good luck we found an excellent veggie cafe, Kazmiranda, upstairs from a music shop. Very quirky but good food at reasonable prices. My other half had a spicy dish which he enjoyed but I just had something simple and saved myself for the excellent puds. Nothing was too much trouble here for the staff who amended dishes to suit our taste preferences with a lot of goodwill, highly recommended.
We then went on another 10 miles or so back into Scotland to our home for two nights the Anchorage in Eyemouth. This was a b & b which looked pretty unprepossessing from the outside but we need not have worried, it was lovely inside and the hostess, Janice, could not have been more welcoming. She had gone to trouble to ensure we had a choice of three kinds of veggie sausage for our breakfast and was happy to provide earl grey, coffee bags etc for our room as well as the standard tea. Sadly she could not do anything about the incredibly noisy seagulls who called all night long and kept us awake despite the double glazing. We had our evening meal at the New Inn just down the road in Coldingham . We had a vegetable gratin dish as there were only two veggie dishes on the menu, this got a star for being homemade but we felt it was very overpriced – £8.50 for a few vegetables in a tomato sauce topped with sliced potato and cheese.
The next day we did a little drive around the coastal and inland areas in the district, starting with Haddington which is a very attractive town with good shops and nice historical buildings ( and a museum). After this we had a brief stop at the seaside town of Gullane then went onto North Berwick, one of our favourite little towns in the area. There is a seabird centre here due to the nearby Bass Rock sanctuary but no noise! It also has lots of cafes and interesting independent shops and we discovered a lovely arts and crafts garden. We found all the public gardens and planting in the area was lovely – subtle colours of pinks and greys and not a horrid corporate begonia in sight – North Berwick area must have a good budget for its garden areas. Nothing exciting to report on the food front though North Berwick does have a wonderful ice cream shop!
Friday after another of Janice’s excellent breakfasts it was back home via Edinburgh , it only took us an hour to get there which was good as it gave us plenty of time for the National Museum of Scotland which has a wonderful and well put together exhibition “The Celts” on at the moment. Many of the pieces I have only see in books before but the real thing is so much more impressive. The cafe at the museum is also very good with interesting vegetarian choices but we were a little too early for lunch. Eventually after more wandering around we decided to eat at Villa Rustica on Hanover St – I had originally fancied Henderson’s, the historic vegetarian restaurant but sadly the choices were nearly all spicy and don’t get on with spicy food. The restaurant we went to was very reasonable £7.95 for three courses all of which had a reasonable veggie choice so it was not just pizza. The weather continued to be good ( lucky us!) so we drove down to the Morningside area for a potter around the interesting shops there and then went food shopping on our way back home – arriving very tired from lack of sleep but content with an interesting few days.
