And this is me catching up. And of course I used this song. It's as awesome as David Tennant's face. That man is so beautiful.
The morning began with me panic-emailing my seminar leader because I severely underestimated the time it would take me to ride the bus to the airport. She let me know it would be okay to miss the seminar, and I ran to the bus station to find the next airport shuttle. Crisis averted. However, Christine somehow managed to book a different flight from me (foreshadowing going on here, hmm?), so it was a solo trip for me for a couple hours. It was kind of exhilarating, though. Alone in a different city, trying to find my way to the hostel, seizing life by the balls. Just kidding.
I had been to Edinburgh before, so I kind of knew where I was going. It's a nice feeling returning somewhere you thought you'd never see again. Christine had arrived and found the shuttle wifi, alarmingly messaging me that she didn't like Edinburgh. She took it all back as soon as she arrived closer to the city centre. We were super hungry, and nothing except an all-you-can-eat buffet was going to make our hunger go away. After putting our names down on a waitlist, we wandered around Prince Street and eventually found our way to St. Andrew's Square where there were lights posted throughout the entire lawn. It was so gorgeous it was like running through fireflies. We almost forgot we were hungry. By the time we walked back to the restaurant, we definitely remembered the empty spaces in our tums and put away four plates each. Then we called it an early night so that we could get up at dawn and hike up Arthur's seat to watch the sun rise.
By the time we woke up, Maria had gotten in as well and joined us as we set out for Holyrood Park. It should be noted that none of us slept well because some lady was snoring the entirety of the night. We still got up in time. Booyah. With screenshots of Google Maps in hand, we found our way to the bottom of the park's sloping hill. I crossed the road and almost got Christine killed because I didn't look both ways. Sorry! After her near-death experience, we continued on, impressed by the magical scenery that laid before us. After a while, our amazement turned to befuddlement. There were so many paths and no signs. We followed one up a steep slope that ended up becoming so steep that I had to use my hands to crawl up. That was probably not the right path, so we turned a corner and made our way up some stone steps and lo and behold, the sun peeked up over a ridge. It was seriously the most encouraging thing, seeing the sun. But we weren't even at the top yet. That was another very windy, very cold 20-minute trek up even steeper and slipperier terrain. Worth it. I didn't get to go to Arthur's Seat the last time I was there (too lazy and somehow I got convinced to go on a haunted city tour LOL). It was so beautiful. Were it not so cold, we probably would have stayed a while longer. We hiked down, and I gave the super condensed/abridged tour of Edinburgh from whatever I could remember from two years ago. Nearing the Elephant House, birthplace of Harry Potter, we happened to run into Danielle and Jessica. It's love, I swear. Then we all proceeded to go to the bathroom where all the crazy Harry Potter graffiti is. We all geeked out. It was a glorious moment. I made my contribution, had an emotional moment, and left. After walking what felt like a million miles to the Botanical Gardens, all of us were pooped and ready to eat and check in and whatever. We found an overpriced place that sold burgers because Weatherspoons was packed. It didn't stop Jessica, Danielle, and I from ordering two pints there after dinner anyway. More accurately, Danielle and I drank two pints and Jessica shook her head at us. We slept nicely.
Up and early for the endless bus rides. Our tour guide was an elderly gentleman in a kilt. This was really impressive seeing as how the weather was below forty degrees Fahrenheit the entire weekend. There aren't a whole ton of videos from this portion of the trip because to be honest, nothing puts me to sleep like a car ride. The tour guide's humor couldn't keep me awake, and so I slept like a baby until we got to the first castle. It was a group decision to blast through the castle walkthrough like champs because we were so tired of just being on the bus. Exploring the grounds sounded like a better idea. This hunch proved correct. We found a playground and shaggy red cows, or "shows" as Mattie lovingly refers to them as. As we were loading up the coaches again, a peacock came to see us off. Then we shuttled for hours to a battleground (I feel so bad forgetting the name, this is why I should have blogged this sooner) which was kind of cool. Our tour guide attributed the reason we all speak English instead of French to this battle. There is a ton of historical significance surrounding the battle, but all I can remember is being hungry and cold and unwilling to get back on the stupid coach. I tried to do the "EEEEEAAAGLE" thing that Turk and J.D. do on Scrubs, but I ended up breaking Mattie as I piled on to her. She fell to the ground, and thank glob we were walking through a more secluded, darker area of the museum at the time. You're welcome, CCTV monitors. Later that night in Inverness, I basically fell asleep during the storytelling. He was really interesting, but you know, my sleepy tendencies always win out. I ate ALL my haggis and mash that night, thank you very much. We tried going out, but half of us went WiFi hunting and the other half settled in at a pub with a lot of older people. It was like Inverness was full of people over the age of thirty.
The next day was a freakin' whirlwind. Let me sum up because this post is really long. After getting jipped at breakfast (we were in the first group to eat, so none of the hot food was ready) we went to Loch Ness which was really underwhelming. Visit it, but don't have expectations. Several stops later, we got to Glencoe where we only had ten minutes to take in this overwhelmingly massive scenery. It was so so gorgeous I wish we had had time to hike and really take it in. I would have traded the Loch Ness cruise for an hour at Glencoe. From Glencoe, we went to the airport where most of the Bristol bitches posted in the airport pub, dining on quality (hah) pub food and Stella Artois.
The moral of the story is: when they say youth hostel, they mean you're too old to stay here once you're 18 or older unless you're chaperoning. Steer clear.
The morning began with me panic-emailing my seminar leader because I severely underestimated the time it would take me to ride the bus to the airport. She let me know it would be okay to miss the seminar, and I ran to the bus station to find the next airport shuttle. Crisis averted. However, Christine somehow managed to book a different flight from me (foreshadowing going on here, hmm?), so it was a solo trip for me for a couple hours. It was kind of exhilarating, though. Alone in a different city, trying to find my way to the hostel, seizing life by the balls. Just kidding.
I had been to Edinburgh before, so I kind of knew where I was going. It's a nice feeling returning somewhere you thought you'd never see again. Christine had arrived and found the shuttle wifi, alarmingly messaging me that she didn't like Edinburgh. She took it all back as soon as she arrived closer to the city centre. We were super hungry, and nothing except an all-you-can-eat buffet was going to make our hunger go away. After putting our names down on a waitlist, we wandered around Prince Street and eventually found our way to St. Andrew's Square where there were lights posted throughout the entire lawn. It was so gorgeous it was like running through fireflies. We almost forgot we were hungry. By the time we walked back to the restaurant, we definitely remembered the empty spaces in our tums and put away four plates each. Then we called it an early night so that we could get up at dawn and hike up Arthur's seat to watch the sun rise.
By the time we woke up, Maria had gotten in as well and joined us as we set out for Holyrood Park. It should be noted that none of us slept well because some lady was snoring the entirety of the night. We still got up in time. Booyah. With screenshots of Google Maps in hand, we found our way to the bottom of the park's sloping hill. I crossed the road and almost got Christine killed because I didn't look both ways. Sorry! After her near-death experience, we continued on, impressed by the magical scenery that laid before us. After a while, our amazement turned to befuddlement. There were so many paths and no signs. We followed one up a steep slope that ended up becoming so steep that I had to use my hands to crawl up. That was probably not the right path, so we turned a corner and made our way up some stone steps and lo and behold, the sun peeked up over a ridge. It was seriously the most encouraging thing, seeing the sun. But we weren't even at the top yet. That was another very windy, very cold 20-minute trek up even steeper and slipperier terrain. Worth it. I didn't get to go to Arthur's Seat the last time I was there (too lazy and somehow I got convinced to go on a haunted city tour LOL). It was so beautiful. Were it not so cold, we probably would have stayed a while longer. We hiked down, and I gave the super condensed/abridged tour of Edinburgh from whatever I could remember from two years ago. Nearing the Elephant House, birthplace of Harry Potter, we happened to run into Danielle and Jessica. It's love, I swear. Then we all proceeded to go to the bathroom where all the crazy Harry Potter graffiti is. We all geeked out. It was a glorious moment. I made my contribution, had an emotional moment, and left. After walking what felt like a million miles to the Botanical Gardens, all of us were pooped and ready to eat and check in and whatever. We found an overpriced place that sold burgers because Weatherspoons was packed. It didn't stop Jessica, Danielle, and I from ordering two pints there after dinner anyway. More accurately, Danielle and I drank two pints and Jessica shook her head at us. We slept nicely.
Up and early for the endless bus rides. Our tour guide was an elderly gentleman in a kilt. This was really impressive seeing as how the weather was below forty degrees Fahrenheit the entire weekend. There aren't a whole ton of videos from this portion of the trip because to be honest, nothing puts me to sleep like a car ride. The tour guide's humor couldn't keep me awake, and so I slept like a baby until we got to the first castle. It was a group decision to blast through the castle walkthrough like champs because we were so tired of just being on the bus. Exploring the grounds sounded like a better idea. This hunch proved correct. We found a playground and shaggy red cows, or "shows" as Mattie lovingly refers to them as. As we were loading up the coaches again, a peacock came to see us off. Then we shuttled for hours to a battleground (I feel so bad forgetting the name, this is why I should have blogged this sooner) which was kind of cool. Our tour guide attributed the reason we all speak English instead of French to this battle. There is a ton of historical significance surrounding the battle, but all I can remember is being hungry and cold and unwilling to get back on the stupid coach. I tried to do the "EEEEEAAAGLE" thing that Turk and J.D. do on Scrubs, but I ended up breaking Mattie as I piled on to her. She fell to the ground, and thank glob we were walking through a more secluded, darker area of the museum at the time. You're welcome, CCTV monitors. Later that night in Inverness, I basically fell asleep during the storytelling. He was really interesting, but you know, my sleepy tendencies always win out. I ate ALL my haggis and mash that night, thank you very much. We tried going out, but half of us went WiFi hunting and the other half settled in at a pub with a lot of older people. It was like Inverness was full of people over the age of thirty.
The next day was a freakin' whirlwind. Let me sum up because this post is really long. After getting jipped at breakfast (we were in the first group to eat, so none of the hot food was ready) we went to Loch Ness which was really underwhelming. Visit it, but don't have expectations. Several stops later, we got to Glencoe where we only had ten minutes to take in this overwhelmingly massive scenery. It was so so gorgeous I wish we had had time to hike and really take it in. I would have traded the Loch Ness cruise for an hour at Glencoe. From Glencoe, we went to the airport where most of the Bristol bitches posted in the airport pub, dining on quality (hah) pub food and Stella Artois.
The moral of the story is: when they say youth hostel, they mean you're too old to stay here once you're 18 or older unless you're chaperoning. Steer clear.
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