THE NEW TOWN

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The streets of the New Town are delightful to wander around. Elegant, imposing and harmonious, this rectangular grid of broad straight streets is the largest expanse of 18th- and early 19th century architecture in Europe, comparable in Britain only with Bath, Cheltenham and York. This speculative property development for wealthy citizens was primarily intended as residential, but today many of the streets of the New Town are dominated by shops, banks and grand business headquarters. It is still very much the preserve of the well-heeled, although more and more trendy shops, restaurants and bars are opening up. An area of the city that used to be renowned for its snobbery and select social cliques is gradually becoming more accessible.

Growth of a Vision

Different from the slow organic growth of the Old Town in every respect, the New Town was first formally proposed in the 1750s, after one of the stacked-up 'lands' on the High Street collapsed with considerable loss of life. A competition for its design was held, which was won by the 23-year-old architect James Craig.

The development of the proposal proceeded in three main stages, still clearly discernible today. First came the rectangular plan: George Street was constructed along the top of the natural ridge, with the 'Lang Gait' (now called Princes Street) running parallel below it to the south, and Queen Street parallel to the north. These three perfectly straight streets end in St Andrew Square in the east, and Charlotte Square in the west, and were named in honour of George III and his family. Almost at once Edinburgh saw a 'great flitting' of the gentry from their crumbling piles on the hill into these stately new homes, leaving the Old Town to sink into squalor.

By the 1820s the second New Town had gone up on similar lines, further down the hill to the north, with Drummond Place and Royal Circus linked by Great King Street. This development was less austere and altogether more showy, and has remained architecturally more intact and closer to its residential intentions. Finally the Earl of Moray caved in to the temptation to develop for profit the land he owned to the west, which he did in some style in the streets surrounding the monumental Moray Place. Like the Old Town, Craig's classical ranks have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1995.

This walk takes about three hours, at a leisurely pace. The main highlights are Calton Hill, George Street, the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and Charlotte Square, and equally the splendour of the surroundings and the many fine views. There are two opportunities for a particularly impressive view of the whole city and its setting: the first is from the Scott Monument, at the start of the walk, the other is from the top of Calton Hill a little way into the walk.

From the Scott Monument, look east to see the North Bridge (which made the New Town possible in the first place) soaring over the expanse of Waverley Station's roof.

The Scott Monument

Open daily April-Sept 9-6, Oct-Mar 9-3; adm; recently reopened after expensive and inevitably controversial restoration.

Love it or loathe it, the Scott Monument is probably the second most famous of Edinburgh's landmarks. Dickens wrote to a friend: 'I am sorry to report the Scott Monument a failure. It is like the spire of a Gothic church taken off and stuck in the ground.' But its Gothic excess contrasts well with the clean classicism of the New Town, and is entirely appropriate to the romantic imagination of her most famous son. Not many people read Sir Walter Scott's historical novels these days-their rollicking wordiness is a bit much-but few other individuals have brought their native country to the world's attention so effectively.

In John Steell's statue, Scott sits wrapped in his shepherd's plaid, a book on his knee, his faithful deerhound Maida casting up an enquiring glance at her master more than twice life size. The pose is unheroic but also suggestive of what some resent about the author: his love of the rustic squirearchy and promotion of a kind of 'tartan idyll'. Decorating the monument are 64 statuettes of characters from the novels and Scottish history. The most clearly visible are the four on the first gallery: Bonnie Prince Charlie, the Lady of the Lake, Meg Merriless and the Last Minstrel.

As an engineering feat alone, the monument was quite an achievement. Its architect was an unknown called George Meikle Kemp whose ambitious design, modelled on the author's beloved Melrose Abbey, was assured of stability by sinking a shaft 52ft down to the solid rock to support a structure just under four times that height. Kemp never saw his great project finished, unfortunately drowning in the Union Canal one dark night in 1844, just before its completion.

Along with some coins, newspapers, maps and medals in a glass jar, buried in the foundations is a bronze plaque declaring that Scott's writings 'were then allowed to have given more delight and suggested better feeling to a larger class of readers, in every rank of society, than those of any other author, with the exception of Shakespeare alone'.

There are 287 steps up to the highest gallery, for magnificent panoramic views over the city and out to sea (if you're hesitating over the climb, remember that you will get an equally spectacular view from the top of Calton Hill).

Walk east along Princes Street, past Jenners, the longest established department store in the world, on your left, and the Waverley Steps, notoriously the windiest place in the city in a southwesterly, on your right. Ahead on the right you will see the bloated clock tower of the Balmoral Hotel.

Once the North British Railway Hotel, it was built in 1902, a lumbering but undeniably impressive blot on the landscape, and now one of the smartest and most luxurious hotels in the city. Waverley Station, at its feet, has the unusual distinction of being the only station in Britain to be named after a novel; attempts by British Rail to rename it some ten years ago were successfully opposed.

Turn your back on the Balmoral and you will see the Register House ( open Mon-Fri 9-4.45), the grand domed building over the road spanning the approach from North Bridge.

This distinguished building is arguably the finest example in Britain of Robert Adam's neoclassical architecture. It was started to his design in 1774, but not completed until nearly 30 years later. Its significance at the time was threefold: it was the first public building in the New Town, designed to encourage further private investment there and provide an impressive welcome as you came off North Bridge; it was the first building in Edinburgh to be graced with a dome (partly hidden behind the pediment); and it was the first purpose-built repository for records in the western world. Since then it has been altered remarkably little, and is still the headquarters of the National Archives of Scotland. Visitors are welcome to explore the temporary exhibitions of historical material in the foyer and, if they ask nicely, to have a quick look at the splendid domed interior. If you want to use the reading rooms, you'll need to apply for a ticket ( contact the National Archives of Scotland, HM General Register House, EHI 3YY, /0131/ 535 1314).

Carry on in the direction indicated by the Duke of Wellington astride his charger.

One of the city's more dramatic public monuments, the Wellington Statue was unveiled on the 37th anniversary of Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo (18 June 1852), during a terrible thunderstorm. The Duke admired Steell's portrayal of his riding style enough to have two copies made for his houses in England. Remarkably enough, the entire weight of the sculpture balances on the horse's hind legs and tail, all the more remarkable, as one contemporary observed, in that the horse has no hocks. Several moves to have the statue taken down because of its inappropriate political associations have so far been unsuccessful.

Continue straight on uphill, up Waterloo Place to the Regent Bridge.

With its triumphal arch depicting scenes from Waterloo, the Regent Bridge was engineered by Robert Stevenson, the grandfather of Robert Louis, to connect the New Town with the new Calton Jail. Enormously expensive, it ploughed right through part of the Old Calton Burial Ground.

Go through a door in the wall further up on the right to look around the Old Calton Burial Ground at the foot of Calton Hill.