Bars

Best literary boozer:

The Oxford Bar

Long before Edinburgh was designated the world’s first UNESCO City of Literature in 2004, Scotland’s literary greats were drawing their liquid inspiration in its pubs. The shining souls of the Scottish literary revival put the world to rights in the basement of Milne’s Bar on Hanover Street. For the modern day reader, the only place to drink is the Oxford Bar on Young Street. A crammed pub on one of the New Town’s service streets, ‘The Ox’ has been made famous as the favourite watering hole of Ian Rankin’s Edinburgh cop, Inspector

Rebus. The bar staff are as legendarily curmudgeonly as Rankin makes out – he should know as he is not averse to dropping in for a pint or two of the locally brewed Caledonian 80/-.

Where: The Oxford Bar, 8 Young Street, Edinburgh EH2 4JB. Tel: +44 (0)131 539 7119

Website: http://www.oxfordbar.com

Best decadent venue for afternoon tea:

The Bollinger Bar, Balmoral Hotel

For a brief glimpse of the kind of cultured sophistication that the upper classes of the British Empire once liked to call their own, take afternoon tea in the Bollinger Bar of the Balmoral Hotel. Here, in comfy sofas or at one of the tea tables, is the place to partake of fine-cut sandwiches, mouth-watering cakes, and rare teas and coffees. On some afternoons, the sounds of a gently plucked harp waft down from the gallery and across the marbled floors. Which is decadent enough in itself to promote the thought that such a truly scrumptious tea should be washed down with a glass of fizz – or even a Champagne cocktail. It’s the sort of place at which you would only dress down if you could afford to treat the whole bar to champers, but is not overdressed that you couldn't drop by an afternoon's shopping trip, between Jenners and Harvey Nics.
Where: The Balmoral, 1 Princes Street, Edinburgh EH2 2EQ. Tel: +44 (0)131 556 2414
Website: www.thebalmoralhotel.com/dining/bollinger-bar-at-palm-court/afternoon-tea

Music

Dining

Best porridge:

Clarinda’s

According to the most flowery accounts of Highland adventurers, porridge – legendary food of the Scots – should be eaten while striding around the room and with only a pinch of salt for accompaniment. In Edinburgh, the best bowl is to be found in Clarinda’s, a surprisingly kitsch wee tearoom on the Canongate. There’ll be no striding around here, thank you very much, or the strict waitress will not be amused and refuse access to the groaning home-made cake trolly.

Where: Clarinda's Tea Room, 69 Canongate, EH8 8BS. Tel: +44 (0)131 557 1888

History

Best gruesome exhibit:

Surgeons’ Hall Museum

When infamous 19th century serial murderer William Burke was eventually hung – thanks to his partner-in-crime William Hare giving evidence against him – his body was ordered to be dissected. It was something of an irony, as their victims were sold to the medical school for the very same treatment. Burke’s skin, however, ended up being cured, turned into leather and used... to bind souvenir pocket books and wallets. One is on view in the tiny police museum at 188 High Street, but a rather better overview of the villainous pair is to be found at the Surgeons’ Hall Museum. Which itself, in another irony, owes much to the involvement of one Robert Knox, to whom the pair sold their recently murdered cadavers.

Where: Surgeons’ Hall Museum, Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, 18 Nicolson Street, Edinburgh EH8 9DW. Tel: +44 (0)131 527 1649

Website: http://www.museum.rcsed.ac.uk

Best kids' stuff for grownups:

The Museum of Childhood

If you’re wandering down the High Street and happen upon enthusiastic adults dragging their children into the Museum of Childhood, don't be bemused. This isn't so much a museum for the child, it’s a museum for the child inside – packed with displays that will make grown-ups well up with nostalgia for their misspent youth. There’s the odd sop to the wee ones, with little bits of interaction and an old rocking horse to remind you of times when the nursery was a rather less health-and-safety-conscious environment. But mostly it’s packed with the sort of displays that will have great-grandparents sighing over the memories of long evenings spent whipping their 'peeries' (a kind of spinning top) down traffic-free side streets. The best thing, though, is that it isn't just toys from the times before you were born that are there, but such evocative items as Meccano, naff Seventies action figures, and functional Fisher Price items from the Eighties.
Where: Museum of Childhood, 42 High Street, Royal Mile, Edinburgh EH1 1TG. Tel: +44 (0)131 529 4142
Website: www.edinburghmuseums.org.uk/Venues/Museum-of-Childhood.aspx

Siteseeing

Best View: