So after Christmas, Casey and I planned an itinerary for her trip. That itinerary quickly went out the window once she got here because we had to work around the weather. Casey definitely got the Scottish weather that people talk about. Within an hour and a half, it rained, snowed, and completely cleared up, all while being incredibly windy.
As I said, the weather was wild, so we would go back to my flat in order to regroup at least once a day. We also were in no rush to start our days, because it was a vacation, so we didn't leave my flat until at least 11am every day. 
Sunday, February 16
Casey landed in Edinburgh around 11:30am and was in my flat by 1pm. I spent the morning finishing up some homework and grabbing some candy from the grocery store. I showed her around my flat and then we headed to Civerino's Slice for lunch. We spent the rest of the afternoon chatting and catching up. We ate dinner at The Pear Tree. It was a relaxed day, especially because Casey had spent so much time traveling so we ended the night by watching John Mulaney on Netflix.
After grabbing breakfast at Black Medicine Coffee Co, Casey and I walked into the Old College so that she could see a little piece of my school. I don't spend much time at the Old College, but it's where the pictures from the brochure come from. We went on a Mountebank Comedy Walking Tour of Edinburgh which we both enjoyed. Our tour guide, Daniel, was hysterical and not only good at making the tour generally funny, but also relating it to specific people on the tour. It was also educational and allowed Casey to get an overview of the part of the city that I spend the most time in. We also booked a tour at The Scotch Whisky Experience. That was cool because you get to ride in a Whisky Barrel train type thing to learn how whisky is made. Then there were videos and the staff member, Jethro, gave a voice-over of information. At the end of the tour, we were standing amongst the world's largest Scotch Whisky collection and got to taste a sample for ourselves. Neither Casey nor I am whisky drinkers, but because whisky is such an important aspect of Scottish culture it seemed necessary to learn about it. I really enjoyed both tours and thought they were good first-day activities because they force you to dive headfirst into Scottish history and culture. We met up with my cousin, Katie, for drinks at The Piper's Rest and then grabbed food at BRGR.
Tuesday, February 18
When we woke up, it was sunny out so we decided the first activity we should do was climb Calton Hill and look at the views of the city. We grabbed a quick breakfast at Pret and made our way up the hill. As we were there, it started pouring out and we dipped into The Guildford Arms to wait it out. The sun did come back out, which allowed us to make our way down Princes Street to the Ross Fountain for some photos. Afterward, we went back to the Royal Mile, stopping in The Albanach for a Pimms before walking through a few of the gift stores. For food, we went to Civerino's restaurant in Hunter's Square. That night we decided to a comedy show at Monkey Barrel Comedy because it was free for students. I had been to comedy shows there before and really liked them, but this one wasn't very good. It was called Alternative Comedy, which Casey and I learned we don't like. But hey, you never know what you will and won't like unless you try it out.
Wednesday, February 19
We started Wednesday at Em's Kitchen eating delicious pancakes. I got bacon and maple syrup while Casey opted for banana and Nutella. We each got a hot chocolate as well. It was all amazing. We then walked down to the Palace at Holyroodhouse just to see it before walking the full length of the Royal Mile to get to the Edinburgh Castle. We went into the castle and took a quick tour before exploring on our own. I love the short overview tours that the castle has. They remind me of the Beefeater tours at the Tower of London. You don't go inside anything, but the tour guide points to a building and gives you its history and what you'll find inside. We liked the Honours of Scotland because it includes the crown. We learned that during the American Revolution some revolutionary soldiers came to Edinburgh and were held prisoner at the Edinburgh Castle. However, because they weren't technically Americans yet, they were treated as pirates/rebels of the royal crown and given fewer rations that the other prisoners of war. What is believed to be one of the first drawings of the American Flag was carved into one of the doors that the castle has on display. That night we got dinner at McSorley's and booked a tour of St. Andrews.
We didn't initially plan on this but decided to go on a Rabbie's day tour of St. Andrews & The Fishing Villages of Fife. The first stop was at a small fishing village in Fife. The stop was short to allow everyone to stretch their legs and we got some hot chocolate. The big stop was St. Andrews. There were two different drop-off spots, one at the golf museum and one at the cathedral. This became a bit of a joke because during the drive our tour guide, Grant, asked who was interested in golf and no one raised their hand. St. Andrews is the home of golf, so it was funny for him to have no one on the tour very interested in it. Casey and I walked through the cathedral but didn't buy tickets to the museum. Then we walked the path by the water and took pictures with the castle in the background. We walked past the castle, afterward, but again, didn't pay to explore the ruins. The University is spread throughout the city, so we pretended like we knew the exact spot William and Kate met and then went into the gift shop. We got lunch at Molly Malones before walking to the golf museum gift shop. This was also where we had to meet the bus. We tried to find some golfing husbands in the last seventeen minutes of our trip there but were out of luck on that. The final stop of the tour was Falkland. Unfortunately the castle there doesn't open until March but we took a picture of it and then made our way back to Edinburgh. Because we had some extra time, we stopped to take a picture of the bridges as well.
Once back in Edinburgh, we met up with some of my friends for trivia at The Black Bull, which we do every Thursday. However, they changed their menu a little while ago and took off our favorite foods, so after trivia, we went to Civerino's slice for pizza and zeppole donuts.
Once again, we got Black Medicine Coffee for breakfast before starting our day. We decided to tour the Palace at Holyroodhouse. It's a nice tour, but it's a headset tour so it's very quiet. It was fun to be somewhere the queen and royal family actually spend time in when they're in Edinburgh. Then we did some final souvenir shopping for Casey. We were originally thinking of going to a rugby game at Murrayfield, but then it was so cold and rainy we said forget it. We tried to go to The Three Sisters, but it was packed so we ended up back at The Pear Tree. We thought the rugby game might be on the TV, but it wasn't so we people watched instead, which was very entertaining. On the way back to my flat we went to BRGR for chicken nuggets and milkshakes.
Our alarms went off at 5:15am and Casey was in a taxi on the way to the airport by 6am.
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