In the steps of Mr Thornton

So, before everything turned to crap this year I actually had a nice little holiday with my friend Michele

The trip was built around going to see Richard Armitage live in theatre. He was playing Dr Astrov in Chekov’s ‘Uncle Vanya’ at the Harold Pinter Theatre in London.

Our break consisted of 2 nights seeing Vanya and meeting some other lovely fandom friends for the first time. Then travel up to Edinburgh for a few nights/days in the fabulous Scottish capital. It’s somewhere I’d been planning to visit for a while, but just hadn’t quite managed to achieve.

The trip to Edinburgh was lush, we’d looked at various forms of transport-airplane, night train, but we decided on the day time train . Early booking meant we got a very good deal on the ticket price. It was 4 and half hours smooth journey with coastal views on the route that was made famous by the locomotive The Flying Scotsman.

The hotel we booked was perfect, 5 minutes walk from the train station and right next to one of the main reasons for writing this blog post: Calton Hill -an important location in the BBC mini series North and South!

As we arrived around 2.30 in thie afternoon, we decided that because the weather was so lovely it would make sense to drop our stuff off, have a cup of tea and then made our way up Calton Hill. We couldn’t wait to see the spot where Mr Thornton and Margaret Hale would take their daily walks and also enjoy the spectacular views over Edinburgh.. Thankfully it seems they added in the gravestones!

not the same view as the above picture

Over the next few days, as we explored Edinburgh, we visited a few other iconic locations from North and South. Next was the set of steps at Guthrie Street where Margaret, when she’s first exploring Milton, gets harassed by workers leaving the factory at the end of their working day-but is aided by the lovely Nicholas Higgins.

my re-enactment of Margaret holding onto the wall as the hoi-poloi push past
her!

Another spot is another very steep set of steps at Warriston Close where Mr Thornton (sigh) is stopped by the Policeman to talk about Margaret denying being seen at the train station late at night . Sadly the building at the top of the steps was covered due to building works.

And finally one of the most important locations is where the Hales live in Milton! St Stephens place with the Stockbridge Market arch.

We missed out a couple of locations such as Barries Close and St Stephens Church.

We did go around where the London scenes were filmed, just didn’t realise it at the time!

Anyway, Edinburgh is an absolutely gorgeous city and I would highly recommend anyone to go and i certainly intend to go back very soon. It’s a vibrant city and has just so much to see. It felt friendly and pretty safe. It’s a wonder for those who love architecture, i was in heaven seeing all the turrets! We went end of February-the weather was cold and a bit damp but it didn’t really negatively impact our visit.

I shall leave you with this sign we found near Guthrie Street