We visited Craigmillar Castle for the first time last month, it’s only a few miles away from the centre of Edinburgh, but it’s hard to believe it. It seems incredibly rural, if you avoid looking at the ghastly modern housing estate that has been plonked down on its doorstep.

It’s apparently one of the most complete mediaeval castles in Scotland. It was built in the early 15th century.
It’s fairly open to the elements but still has this lovely vaulted roof as you can see in the photo above.

And of course stone spiral staircases, this one has a lovely shaped wee window in the wall. The stairs lead to the roof of course.

Hold on to your hat when you’re up here – and anything else you can grab, it’s a long way down.

That’s Edinburgh you can see in the distance, you can make out some spires and even Edinburgh Castle if you click to enlarge the photo below. It’s just to the left of the middle of the skyline. Craigmillar is just over three miles to the south east of Edinburgh. It must have been a lovely place to go to when the smells of medieval Edinburgh got too much to bear.

When Rizzio (Mary Queen of Scots musician) was murdered in Holyrood Palace she fled to Craigmillar, and it was there that the plot to murder her husband Lord Darnley was hatched to avenge Rizzio’s murder.

You can see more images of Craigmillar Castle here.