The Bridge Inn at Ratho is the place to stay if you like old, characterful pubs away—but not too far away—from city bustle. The four rooms are complete with Au Lait Scottish soap products and slipper baths. The restaurant offers full Scottish as well as Canadian breakfasts, as well as canal Sunday lunch and dinner cruises. Three-and–a-half-miles away from the airport, the Bridge’s rooms are named Bonnington (after a local estate), Baird (after the builder of the Union canal onto which the pub backs), Burke (after the famous body snatcher) and Bryce (named after the last man to be hanged publicly in Scotland).
The kitchen garden, located 200 yards away from the canal towpath, provides fresh produce like golden and stripy beetroot for the speciality beetroot hummus and other vegetables to complement the local saddleback pork, fish and game. There is a canal side variant of Ploughman’s (a traditional British pub snack of bread, cheese and salad) called Bargeman’s on the snack menu. Meal cruises take you to the Almondell Aqueduct, with a three course dinner (priced at £34.95) that includes chicken, haggis with Isle of Skye whisky sauce and rosemary posset with apple and pear compote. Graham and Rachel Bucknall also run the excellent shorefront Ship Inn at Elie, 50 minutes away in Fife. It is also the only pub and hotel in the world which has its own beachside cricket fixtures all summer—including one against the MCC!