Recommendations
The best cafés, pubs, and local spots near our Edinburgh locations — hand-picked by Kiez Traveller. Know a place worth adding? Get in touch.
☕ Cafés
Eighty-One
A small café on the Portobello promenade that does proper coffee and breakfast without any pretension. Window seats facing the Forth, reliable Wi-Fi, the kind of place you can stay for two hours without feeling watched. Best on a cold weekday morning before the weekend crowd arrives. Pairs well with the outdoor pool next door.
The Original Rosslyn Inn
A reliable stopping point in the village after the glen walk — coffee and something to eat in a building that predates the chapel by several centuries. Not fancy, not for tourists, and completely functional as a post-walk recovery spot. The inn part is the point; the Dan Brown tourists miss it entirely because they turn back at the chapel car park.
The Dreel Tavern
A historic pub in Anstruther's centre — reliable hot food and coffee after the coastal walk between the three fishing villages. Old enough to have served fishermen before tourism existed; still used that way by locals. The fire is on from October. On a cold November morning after walking from Crail, this is precisely the right place to be.
🥙 Food
Anstruther Fish Bar
The most famous fish and chips in Scotland, and the claim is justified. Haddock in proper batter, chips made from actual potatoes, at a price that hasn't yet caught up with the reputation. A two-hour queue in summer — go in October or November when you walk in straight away. Eat it on the harbour wall looking out at the May Island. There is no better outdoor lunch in Scotland.
Leith Market
Saturday morning market on Leith Links — local producers, decent cheese, good bread, and the kind of stalls that sell things people actually want to eat rather than artisanal tat. Smaller and less crowded than Edinburgh's city markets. Arrive at 10am, buy your packed lunch provisions, and start the Leith walk from there. The Links themselves are worth 20 minutes.
The Scottish bakery
Gregg's-level prices, local ingredients, and the best sausage rolls outside of a Greggs. Every Scottish town has one. Dalkeith, Musselburgh, Penicuik, Dunfermline — find the local baker on the high street rather than the chain. A forfar bridie, a Scotch pie, a morning roll with square sausage. Under £3. The best pre-walk breakfast in any outer-area episode.
🍺 Pubs & bars
The Dalriada
A comfortable local pub on the Portobello front that hasn't been converted into a cocktail bar or a brunch venue. Real ale, locals at the bar, and the kind of atmosphere where you can finish a long promenade walk and sit down with a pint without anyone bothering you. Cash still welcome. The terrace is usable in May and June.
The Compass Bar
An old Leith dockworkers' pub that has somehow survived The Shore's gentrification by staying exactly what it always was — unreconstructed, cash in hand, and not interested in tourists. Pool table, sports on the TV, the cheapest pint in Leith. Walk in from the waterfront and you've walked back thirty years. This is the pub the Leith episode is pointing at.
The surviving working-class pub
In every East Lothian and Fife town in this guide there is at least one pub that has not been converted, gentrified, or turned into a gastropub. Tranent, Prestonpans, Dalkeith, Bo'ness — find it, go in, sit down. They're usually on or near the high street. Not recommended sarcastically. Recommended specifically because they're still there and you should use them before they're not.
🌿 Parks & green spaces
John Muir Country Park
Eight miles of coastline east of Dunbar, named for the man who invented national parks. Sand dunes, salt marsh, volcanic shoreline, and almost no one on it for most of the year. The park connects to the John Muir Way long-distance path. If you've done the Dunbar episode, this is the walk you do next — west from Dunbar along the dune coast. Scotland at its most quietly extraordinary.
Dalkeith Country Park
Free to enter, vast, old-growth woodland, a river gorge, and the former grounds of Dalkeith Palace. One of the best-kept secrets in the Edinburgh area. Most locals have never been. The adventure playground and the wooded gorge walk along the North Esk are genuinely good — better than anything in the city. Start the Dalkeith episode from here rather than the town centre.
The Union Canal towpath
Edinburgh's answer to the Regent's Canal — 31 miles from the city to Falkirk, flat, traffic-free, and mostly quiet. The section from Fountain Bridge west to Ratho is accessible and beautiful. The eastern section connects Linlithgow to Falkirk Wheel. Walk, run or cycle. It's one of the most underused green corridors in Scotland and the best way to connect several episodes in this guide on foot.