Castle tickets. Entry is timed. Book online at £23.50 (£26 at the gate) for the 9:30 a.m. slot. Summer hours are 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m., winter 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., last entry an hour before. Slots sell out weeks ahead in summer. Book only on edinburghcastle.scot, because lookalike sites sell fakes. The One O’Clock Gun fires from Mills Mount Battery at 1 p.m. every day except Sunday, Good Friday and Christmas Day, and Princes Street Gardens hears it for free.
The hills. Arthur’s Seat is 45 minutes up the paved path from the Holyrood parking lot, bare rock at the top and slippery when wet; shoes with grip, and go before 9 a.m. for the summit to yourself. Calton Hill is ten minutes of steps from Waterloo Place, free and always open, with the Castle and Princes Street in one frame.
August. The Fringe, the International Festival and the Tattoo fill the month; in 2027 the Fringe runs August 6 to 30 and the Tattoo August 6 to 28. Rooms cost two or three times the May price and sell out months ahead, the Royal Mile is a slow crowd from noon, Castle slots and Mary King’s Close tours go weeks out, and the Esplanade becomes the Tattoo’s grandstand, so the Castle’s entrance and hours change.
Buses and trams. Tap a contactless card or phone on a Lothian bus: £2.40 one way, capped at £5.70 a day and £26.50 a week on one card. City-zone trams share the cap but need a tap off as well as on; forget and you pay the airport fare, which the cap ignores. The airport tram is £7.90 and the Airlink 100 bus £6, both outside the cap.
Free museums. The National Museum of Scotland on Chambers Street and the Scottish National Gallery on the Mound are free, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, as are the other National Galleries sites; only the big exhibitions charge.
Weather. Layers: a waterproof shell, a sweater and something to take off. It turns within the hour, and rain comes sideways on the hills.
Banknotes. ATMs give Scottish banknotes from the Bank of Scotland, the Royal Bank of Scotland and the Clydesdale Bank. No banknote is legal tender in Scotland, Bank of England ones included, but shops here take all of them. Shops in England usually take Scottish notes and exchange desks abroad do not, so spend them before you fly. Cards work everywhere, including on the bus.
On the day. Castle at 9:30 a.m., then down the Mile; be near the battery by 1 p.m. if you want the gun; keep the hills for the clearest morning. Waystop’s hours check will flag the Castle if the slot lands after last entry.