THOUSANDS gathered to greet Prince Harry and Meghan Markle on Tuesday during the couple's first official joint visit to Scotland.
The pair visited Edinburgh as part of public engagements in the run-up to their wedding on May 19.
And on the eve of Valentine's Day, they met members of the public during a walkabout in Edinburgh in order to learn more about work in the community.
The trip to Scotland marks the fourth public appearance Meghan, 36, and Harry, 33, have made together.
It follows their successful visits to Nottingham, Brixton in south London and Cardiff in the months that followed their engagement announcement in November.
Today, they made their first stop at the esplanade in front of Edinburgh Castle where they were officially welcomed by the Royal Marines Scotland Band.
It comes after Harry was appointed as Captain General Royal Marines in December 2017.
Inside the Castle at the historic Edinburgh Garrison, which looks out across the dazzling city, the pair stood still to observe the firing of the One O'clock Gun.
Harry and Meghan then visited Social Bite, a café and social business that tackles homelessness -- a cause close to Harry's heart.
The organisation runs social enterprise cafés throughout Scotland and distributes 100,000 items of food and hot drinks to the homeless each year.
They also employ staff who have experienced homelessness themselves and are working on a housing project for the homeless.
Harry and Meghan got to learn more about the social enterprise and toured the kitchen.
It was another high-profile visit for the Social Bite as Holywood star George Clooney stopped by for a sandwich at their premises on Rose Street in 2015.
The couple rounded off their visit by attending a reception at the Palace of Holyroodhouse to celebrate youth achievements.
The Year of Young People is an initiative aiming to inspire Scotland through its youngsters by celebrating their achievements and strengthening their voice on social issues.
Youth representatives from various charities and organisations that work with and for young people across the country were present.
And the reception provided an opportunity for them to discuss their aspirations for the year and the activities that they have been involved in so far.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel