Leigh in Azerbaijan

Part of the Edinburgh free walking tour included some J.K. Rowling sites that are sacred for the young reader.

The Elephant House cafe was the venue where the struggling JK Rowling went to write the first Harry Potter book.  Going there meant that she didn’t have to heat her flat.

This shot of The Elephant House cafe (third floor) is from the rear. Tanya took a photo of me inside the cafe, but I was looking rather sombre, not wanting to look the idiot in this significant place, so that one’s not going public.

The cafe overlooks the Grey Friars Kirkyard (above) where Bobby, the Skye terrier, sat by his master’s grave for fourteen years.  (Previous post) Because Greyfriar’s Bobby is a cherished part of the Edinburgh story, his collar and dinner dish are preserved in the Museum of Edinburgh, the museum dedicated to city history.

This school, in the distance, was the inspiration for Hogwarts’ School of Magic.  It was George Heriot’s hospital for orphans, founded in 1628. George Heriot died childless and his bequest amounted to £23,625 10s 3 1/2d, being to provide a school for “puire fatherless bairnes, friemenes sones of that Toune of Edinburgh”. Today it is an exclusive private school.

It seemed that the whole of Edinburgh could be part of a Harry Potter film script with well-preserved ancient buildings almost everywhere.