none the worse for Wisp

Whenever I've gone anywhere near Dalkeith in the past I always tended to just go along the A7, over Sheriffhall roundabout then along the road, only using the shared-use footway if I wanted to dawdle. I didn't know about the old-railway cycle path crossing under the A7 until quite recently. I therefore had to poke at a map for a bit to find a roundabout-avoiding route to take the wingpiglet to the garden centre, reckoning Gilmerton to be the best bypass-crossing option. Unfortunately I decided to get there by going through Mountcastle and straight across Niddrie and along The Wisp, unfortunately then not taking the right-turn and ending up in Millerhill, after which it then seemed sensible to pop to Sheriffhall but walk around it when vehicles were restrained by red lights then take the nice old-railway-path to Eskbank, thence round the back to Dobbies. Edgar didn't particularly mind as he'd been asleep since Mountcastle Drive, unfortunately also missing the nice railway-path bit, much less dog-infested than the similar paths in the city. After a swing whilst waiting for Nicky to arrive by car, a cake, a scuttle round the sheds, seeing a guinea-pig for the first time and looking at the chickens and so on we went back via the much less hostile Gilmerton Road, cutting across to Craigmillar Castle Road, which I'd avoided on the way out on the grounds of hostility but which could learn much from The Wisp about passing far too quickly and far too closely. In an ideal world the surface of the Infirmaryside path would be less gravelly and the little slopes to the sides of the steps less only-accessed-by-twisting-sharply, which I'd want to practice with the seat and a toddler-equivalent weight before trying it with the real sleeping thing, though he woke up at some point anyway, fortunately choosing to keep hold of his hat after removing it.