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Published: August 7th 2011
Glass House
Prosciutto and fig saladWe got up early for us on the trip...7:30 AM - unimaginable!!!! 😉 We were both super draggy from being out the night before, but me being the crazy organizer that I am, I wanted to make sure that we got to the station and grabbed our tickets with plenty of time. So, we locked up and said goodbye to our flat and Edinburgh, and took a taxi to Waverly Station (which seemed super lazy because it's not that far away, we just didn't want to drag our bags over the mound). We had no problem collecting our tickets, so we stopped for a coffee before jumping on our train to Leuchars, which is where you have to take the train to in order to get to St. Andrews. An hour train ride and a short 11GBP taxi ride later and we were at our bed & breakfast called Burness House at 1 Murray Park. We stayed in room #1 and the bed was bigger than what we were used to this past week (even though it was also a double) and the room and bathroom were also very modern (yay, no more electric shower to turn on!). 45 GBP per
Glass House x 2
Cor's starter - deep fried goats cheese. I'm pretty sure that a piece of goat cheese that size back home would cost as much as Cor's lunch did person per night seems like quite a bit, but compared to some of the pricing of the local hotels (many 200 GBP per night +), our little B&B suited our purposes and was a good deal.
We were both starving so we popped into an Italian restaurant called the Glass House on North Street. For 5.95GBP you could have a two course lunch. I started with the carrot and cauliflower soup and then had a fig and prosciutto salad, while Corwin started with deep fried goat cheese and then had fetticine for his main. And while the food didn't knock our socks off, it was very good and definitely worth the very cheap price. With walking around, we also saw a couple of weddings. I've been to a wedding in Cuba and I always marvelled at how tourists take pictures of the people getting married. Apparently Scotland was no different with people across the street taking constant photos....um....maybe just let those people get married without having their pictures taken by wedding obsessed weirdos. People are strange.
Being tired from the night before, we decided to stop back and have a nap. We went to bed to
Nahm Jim...
...why do I always forget to take pictures until after we've started eating? Top: Thai Haggis & salad, Bottom: stuffed chicken wings lovely weather and woke up to the pouring rain. I knew it was in the forecast, but I was hoping that it would be wrong - especially since we were only here for 2 days and what we were here for was completely contingent on the weather: golf!
We had a reservation for dinner at Nahm Jim on Market Street which some people may recognize as being one of the Thai restaurants competing on Ramsay's Best Restaurant in 2010. We stuck to Thai on the menu as they also serve many Japanese dishes as well. We started with the stuffed chicken wings (some how they de-bone them and stuff them with noodles and spices) and the Thai haggis which was featured on Ramsay's Best Restaurant. I know that it sounds gross, but I like haggis now and again (except from the Scottish pavilion at Mosaic in Regina....it's served with an ice cream scoop and is definitely barf worthy). Cor wasn't so sure, but he let me order it anyway. The chicken was good but the haggis was amazing!! It was spicy (there were chilis in it!) and delicious and not grainy (as haggis can sometimes be) at all.
More Nahm Jim
Left: beef panang
Right: trying to ward off disease with a basic mixed vegetable If you go and even if you have your doubts - order this dish!!! We then ordered the beef panang, a chicken sizzling hot plate with some kind of lime cilantro sauce, and just a basic mixed vegetable because I feel like I'm developing a vitamin deficiency on this trip. The panang was very good (but cooled off quickly), but didn’t quite live up to the hype (still worth the trip though, Nahm Jim has had mixed reviews since being on Best Restaurant with some saying that the quality and service has decreased while the price has increased. I would go back though - our service was great), and the chicken on it's own was good but when you put the sauce on, it took it to a whole new level. This was definitely our priciest bill to date (about 60GBP), but we easily could have shared less....except that we are giant pigs and eat way too much when we find good restaurants.
We tried to walk around again after supper and made it to the Old Course, but it was very windy (my umbrella was turning inside out) and incredibly wet so we headed back for the
Another Nahm Jim
Chicken sizzling hot plate sans coriander sauce that was served on the side. night.
The Sunday morning we had a quick breakfast of cereal and fruit at our B&B and then grabbed a taxi to the Golf Academy out at the St. Andrews links as we each had a one hour private lesson with one of the golf pros, Patrick Walker. While one of us had a lesson, they let the other into the spot next door to practice. First you hit a few balls and then they film your swing and go through that with you. You then continue to practice while he gives you tips through out, and then you are filmed again and you compare. Finally, he records points, tips and what to work on, and that is sent to your online account so that you can check it out later. I did terribly and I felt like I didn't really improve throughout the lesson because I had to change so many things (since I'm a super beginner), but I felt that the instruction was great and worth it....although, it was 65GBP per person/hour, so that may turn some people off. We looked at some shops, booked Corwin a tee time for Strathtyrum (even though he wanted to
Wee ooo....
apparently looking like a tool during my golf lesson play Eden, but there was a tournament on), walked part of the Old Course (which is open for walking on Sundays) and grabbed some lunch at the Jigger Inn which is a cottage right outside the Old Course Hotel. I had bangers and mash again because it's one of my favourites, but honestly, it was good but I didn't hold a candle to what I had at the Whiski in Edinburgh. Cor also had a giant homemade burger with cheese and bacon that was so thick he could barely eat it....for some reason they were surprised when he left half. Um....we're giant pigs, but not THAT big of giant of pigs.
We then went back so that Cor could tee off (I was going to walk the course with him, but then I decided that I was too big of a baby to walk in the rain). Because it was so rainy and there were so many cancellations (at this point though, it went down to a drizzle and later it was just spitting, so the weather ended up being fine for golf. Fortunately, the courses generally stay open during rain because there is sand underneath so the
The Old Course
with the Old Course Hotel in the background water drains away quickly), Cor was able to go right on and golf by himself. So since I was a baby, I went over to the practice range, borrowed (I think, I’m pretty sure that I didn’t get charged for it) a 7 iron and bought a bucket of 50 balls (for 6GBP - good deal I thought). This time, everything from my lesson came together, and I really only screwed up on 5 of my hits....this made me think that maybe I should have golfed too, but people are so hardcore here that it kind of freaked me out (I'm such a nervous golfer)! Then I stopped at the pro shop at the Old Course Hotel and bought a golf towel, a St. Andrews jacket (so that I can rub it in the faces of certain db's back home) and some logo balls for a friend.
Corwin and I met back up at the B&B after he played a great game (see, the lesson was worth it!). We weren’t really sure where to go for dinner, but we had passed by a few restaurants that looked onto the Old Course. We settled on going to the Rocca
FORE!
Oh wait, I'm not golfing. on the Links which is in the Russack Hotel. We thought maybe we could pop in for a couple of reasonably priced pasta dishes, but once we sat down, we discovered that there was a 17.95GBP minimum charge. Apparently views cost money. Once we saw that, we decided to just screw it and go all out (although not without me deciding that we should eat more reasonably once we get to Inverness - we’ll see how that goes). Corwin had the cornfed chicken, and I had the braised beef. Our meals were amazing (especially the little gnocchi that came with Corwin’s entree). We decided to finish with the peach souffle (and when I say we, I mean me since Cor will normally have one bite and then he’s done with sweets). Cor also had a coffee which came with some petit fours (which you didn’t have a choice, you automatically got them if you order coffee - he also tried to pawn those off on me, but then he ended up eating most of them). Again, another big bill - 56GBP, but the meal was very enjoyable and we had a great view of the Old Course and the beach.
The Old Course...
...and Corwin....on a bridge....that I guess is famous....seems like all of the big deals in golf (as well as the zillions of tourists) get their picture taken on this thing. We’ll have to stop doing this though, or I won’t only be obese, I will be too poor to buy myself a rag on a stick to wash with.
Tomorrow: Inverness!
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