Blogs from Scotland, United Kingdom, Europe - page 382

Geo: 55.9563, -3.48593Today, we slept in to the late hour of 8:00 a.m., getting in some much-needed sleep. We departed from the hotel and ended up at the Logie Beard Bar in the Bank Hotel for a full Scottish breakfast (buy one, get one free!). It consisted of: haggis, black pudding, beans, whole wheat toast, runny egg, sausage, "real" bacon, mushrooms, 1/2 a tomato, some weird pie-shaped piece of fried dough that we never quite understood, and "white coffee." It was goooood. Haggis consists of spices, oatmeal, and "animal bits" stuffed into the intestine of a cow. I think our haggis had already been removed from its intestine. It wasn't half bad, rather like pate.From breakfast, it was up the hill to Edinburgh Castle for a few hours learning about the history of the Scots trying ... read more

Ok. I'm sorry that I havn't written since I got back from Rome, but honestly, other than Canada Day, I really havnt been doing anything interesting other than wandering around the city looking at the shops and hanging out with Jackie, Brad and friends at night. I figured that you could all do without a daily account of the 18 different kilt shops that i visited each day with corresponding pictures that one could honestly not tell apart. Anyway, the last couple of days were actually spent doing things that are relatively interesting and are complete with equally interesting pictures. but first, i will talk about Canada Day, which was awesome. I was a little mad that I didnt get to watch the yearly fireworks show at home, but then i heard taht they really ... read more

On this day, we arose with excitement for Scotland. We enjoyed one last breakfast and fabulous shower at the Marriott, checked out, and worked our way onto the tube back to my flat in Bloomsbury. We discovered that 30th birthday balloons are very helpful when lugging luggage onto the tube up and down stairs! (many kind people assisted our plight, and we welcomed it, despite us being very independent women). Very quick turnaround, and we took just one suitcase this time, to the King's Cross train station. We got our train tickets stamped, found our platform, and then took pictures, of course! I heard someone say that these are the platforms they use when filming the Harry Potter 9 3/4 spots, so we wanted to make sure we had it preserved. These train stations are ... read more

On Tuesday the 10th, I got up late (AGAIN). This time it wasn’t my fault! The girl in the bunk above snores but it was REALLY LOUD because she was drunk. Neither Kara or I could sleep. Usually if I knocked on the bottom of the bunk she would turn over and stop snoring for long enough for us to fall asleep, but no such luck this time. We decided to go downstairs and maybe walk around outside. There were way too many drunk people so we decided to watch the end of the movie playing in the movie room. Unfortunately, the movie was Freddie Got Fingered, a really, really bad movie. We finally went back to bed and eventually fell asleep. After a very quick breakfast I headed into town and went to the bus ... read more

Kara and I actually got up in time to eat breakfast! Yey! We wanted to make it to the Palace of Holyroodhouse as early as possible because it has been very busy. The Palace is the Queen's official residence in Scotland. She was in residence about a week before I got to Edinburgh. The palace is closed to visitors during her stay so a lot of people were trying to get in after she left. The palace was beautiful, as every palace should be! We were not allowed to take photos inside so you will have to wait to see my guidebook or you can go to . The palace was founded in 1128 by David I of Scotland. Legend is that he was hunting when he saw a vision of a stag with a cross ... read more