We spent the last ten days or so with Heather's extended family in Johnstone (just outside of Glasgow). The first night we got there Heather's cousin Laura took us to a Sheep Shearing Competition. There were guys there who could shear a lamb in 30 seconds flat! By the end of the night there was a giant bag of wool and a pen full of naked and slightly disheveled lambs. We asked one of the farmers how much the bag of wool was worth and he said it was only worth about £20! We thought that seemed like a lot of work for only forty bucks. We promptly spent the next days pub crawling in Glasgow, enjoying the street theatre at the Edinburgh fringe, going out with Heather's crazy uncle to his favourite bars in Glasgow ... read more

We are spending a couple of days here in Bath before heading for one night in London. After London we are heading to Glasgow to meet up with Heather Catte. It is going to be nice to see someone from home! Bath is beautiful. The stone here is all a redish cream colour. All of the buildings (even the brand spanking new ones!) are made of this Bath stone. We even coughed up the cash to go inside the Roman Baths today. Believe it or not Alex was glad he spent it! It is amazing to walk on the floor that the ancient Romans and Brits did almost 2000 years ago. Yeah they really let us go right in the old part of the building and touch the structure. I thought they would be more protective ... read more

Getting out of Oxford didn't proove to be super easy. We booked a cheap bus called 'Megabus' that picked us up on the opposite side of town. So we packed up our tent and took a series of buses to get to the stop. When we got there the bus was an hour late! This particularly sucked because we were trying to get to the only hostel in Bournemouth before reception closed at 6:30! Needless to say we missed it, and ended up spending the night in an expensive (but rather questionable) hotel. Well we have made it to the Bournemouth Backpackers hostel now and are enjoying it. The people are really friendly, and us Canadians make up the majority of the guests! Funny how that works. Tomorrow we are heading toward Exeter. But on the ... read more

Well we're here on the Isle of Man. We have spent four days here, absorbing the culture, and are preparing to head out for the ferry to Liverpool in the morning. We hope the ride to Britan is smoother than the ride from Dublin. Jay almost lost her cookies on the way here. So far our stay here has been free thanks to an incompetent park attendant who hasn't asked for any fees. We spent one day travelling all over the island by electric rail, steam rail, horse tram, and by a very cool three railed electric mountain railcar. We can't post pictures of these yet... but the're soon to come! We also checked out the museum, which was suprisingly huge. I (Jay) even looked up some family history at the graveyard and the historical archives. ... read more

Wow, what a trip we have been on the last few days! We managed to hitch rides out of Limerick (we caught a bus to Limerick from Dublin) on the 12th I think. We made it to the town of Dingle, which is super cute. But one of the fellows who drove us part of the way was a tour guide in the Dingle penisula. He told us we should go to the Blasket Islands off the town of Dunquin. So the next day we hitched there because the busses wern't running. We caught a water taxi accross with the intention of spending the night on this deserted island with it all to ourselves. However there were a couple of 'Grand' Irish girls camping there. They invited us over for some drinks and we took them ... read more