No. 28 Charlotte Square

Historical buildings, expensive museum shops, and traditional tearooms are somehow, I feel, essential components of British culture. After all, if they didn’t exist, where would we go when obliged to take elderly aunts out on day trips? And what more effective way is there of inflicting mind-​numbing (and therefore character building) boredom on small children?
So, if you are after a gentle and genteel sort of outing, the National Trust for Scotland headquarters is a highly appropriate destination. Housed in a very elegant building on Charlotte Square, it is a sort of companion piece to the Georgian House across the road. There is a Scottish gallery upstairs, which is unlikely to detain you too long, and, on the ground floor, a shop full of things like William Morris tea towels and books about regency table manners that are useful only as polite gifts to distant relatives.
And, after all that exertion, you will be relieved to know that there is also a tearoom, the ideal place to refresh yourself with a pot of Earl Grey and a superior scone while admiring your purchases.