This past week was travel week for our group. There were students who went to paris, rome, spain, and ireland. I went to scotland! Because it seemed close enough that we wouldn't waste all our money/time traveling and I'd never been there before but always wanted to. In my family, we were raised with a healthy love of Gene Kelly so, having seen Brigadoon I knew exactly what to expect from this trip. heh heh...kind of. It was green everywhere, it rained on and off the whole time, even when it was sunny there would be rain, which meant TONS of rainbows, there was a lot of wind, the whole country kind of smelled like haggis (look it up), and it was basically an entire country occupied by old people. I kid you not. Outside the capital of Edinburgh, there was no one under the age of 50. Actually we only interacted with one guy who was our age and he was french and there for an internship. haha go figure! It was actually kind of great though. We would be riding in a bus and an elderly couple that looked like the farmers from "Babe" would be standing on the side of the road waving at us as we drove past. So cute! I want to retire to scotland and own a sheep farm some day. This is a picture of an authentic Scottish man we saw wandering around in Drumnadrochit.
I had an AMAZING trip. I'm not sure I've ever walked so much in a single week in my entire life! Piece of advise if you ever think about traveling to Scotland. Bring good shoes! Not a pair of rain-boots or flats, but good solid running shoes. You won't regret it. (Mom! I checked the mail before I left but the package hadn't come yet so I had to make do. Hopefully it's not lost in the mail)
Ok, in order to organize myself a little better I think I'll break this up into a few main points starting with Edinburgh...
This is the capital of Scotland! We flew in on Tuesday after class. It has a really old interesting history of war, castles, the plague, and being one of the main places to influence JK Rowling's portrayal of Hogwarts/Hogsmead. Priorities right? Anyways this city has been around since the bronze-age. Sooooo old. One of the interesting things we did there was visit the "city of the dead". There were a ton of different haunted tours that explored this underground system of vaults and tunnels. Apparently, back in the time of the black plague, about 80% of the population was wiped out in these narrow streets so they're supposed to be haunted! I managed to convince our group that 7 pounds was a small price to pay for a haunted tour underneath the city :-) Edinburgh was kind of built layer upon layer so there are weird passageways and staircases everywhere and doors that lead down to what you think is the gutter but instead it's just a city underneath the city! So cool. One of the main things I would love to have my family do with me because they would have really appreciated it. We're all sort of morbid and weird but I thought it was awesome.
Also, this is Edinburgh castle, built on a big hill, kind of looked like a fortress/hogwarts. It was awesome but expensive to get in (side note: I keep on visiting places I went to a couple years ago when I was traveling with my parents and remembering that they were free. FALSE. The only reason I thought they were free is because I was traveling with my parents and living a very charmed life.) I love visiting these historic sights but then I just end up feeling dumb because of how little I know! I want to go home and study study study just because history is so interesting and I feel so ignorant. That's another thing I love about traveling with my dad. Papa Kelley definitely knows his history and I miss his little comments and educational lessons. We'll go back some day dad! You would love Edinburgh.
Last thing from edinburgh (keep in mind we did all these things in less than 24 hours... talk about cramming it in!) We went to bed after the ghost tour at like midnight then woke up at 3:30 am to go on a sunrise hike. In Scotland the sun sets after 10 pm then rises around 4 so we didn't have a lot of time! But I'll sleep when I'm dead and this hike was so worth it. This is Arthur's Chair...
SO THAT WAS EDINBURGH! And only the first day of my trip. After this we got on a train for 8 hours and went up to Northern Scotland: Thurso, the Orkney Islands, Inverness, and Loch Ness. So much to say! But it's also time for desert here meaning it's time for me to go. I'll blog about everything else later!
YES,MORE PLEASE!!!
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