Scotland

Haggis
Kilts
Whiskey
Loch Ness monster
Castles

End of story.


Thats pretty much it. Scotland in nutshell. But in case you are interested here is the slightly more elaborate version.

I was thinking that I needed to see more of the UK since I have been here and mostly traveled to destinations outside the kingdom. For some reason Dublin didnt interest me and I heard it was redic expensive. And wales sounded less than amazing. So Scotland it was.
Plus I could take a train which was a major bonus since I hate the whole hassle of airport travel and the preperations that accompany it. So last week was reading week. Me and my friend Karen both shared our desire to explore the northern UK region. So we booked trains to Glasgow and Edinburgh.
In Glasgow we found a cheap hotel that was really nice and luxurious. and It was like 2 minutes to inside the train station. which is so convenient! I cannot stress enough how much I hate airport travel. packing all my shit into 3 oz. bottles. weight restrictions. no water bottles. no sharp objects. all that shit just makes me too stressed so hoping on a train in central london and then arriving litereally just outside our hotel in Scotland was a dream come true!
Anyhow Glasgow is not a tourist destination. In fact most tourist never stop here. Unless it is for business. The city is growing rapidly and this can be witnessed by the imense amound of construction all around the city. Its hard to explain Glasgow. But it reminded me a lot of seattle. It is built along the rive Clyde. the area near the river was industrial like and had lots of new highrises. this reminded me of the area in seattle by the Safeco Field or the area by the train station. I am forgetting the name of things in Seattle. this is weird. We walked around the center of the city which was nice and had lots of shopping and food and stuff. We went to the GOMA. gallery of modern art.it was small but nice. and then we also explored the west end. this area was really cool. the university of Glasgow was there and also the kelvin galleries. the university was old and beautiful and there was a huge park with beautiful gardens and stuff. we went around to where the art institute was. It was not touristy at all but very much a student life area. I could definatly see myself living there. It was cool.

yum I just bought donuts and ate like 4 of them. a dozen for a pound. fuck yes.
but i have a headache which isnt helped by the fact that I just ate 4 sugar covered yumsters.

Anyhow Glasgow was great dispite everyone telling me it was shithole and not to go there.
Next we took the train to Edinburgh. A city which I virtually knew nothing about. So I didnt have any expectations. As soon as we got there I loved it. It is comrable to most other European cities. in the romantic old city feeling way. There was the castle built on top of a volcano and visible from most areas of the city. the old city was elevated up on the rocks it was built on. This was built this way during the middle ages for reasons of protection and shit. It would be hard to invade that shit. But since the city was high up and looked down on the rest of edinburgh it felt to me like a ski resort type of city. on amountain high in elevation plus it had that feel. It reminded me of Park City in Utah as well as Toledo in spain. the idea of a walled in city is really interesting. It is kind of a surreal experience because it feels rahter isolated but not desolate. I just loved being surrounded by all the history. Everything was old and beautiful. Even our hostel was in a huge old rock building that felt like a castle. there was not even wired electrical plugs in our rooms. I cant really describe how amazing it was. I was really in awe of the city. I will put up some pictures on facebook.

I also encountered the drunkest and cutest old men I have ever seen! so many random people would talk to us. But the best was these two like 75 year olds who were drunk at 11 Am and harassing our tour. The tour that we took also gives a ghost tour at night. the guys kept yelling ILL GIVE YOU A FUCKING GHOST TOUR! and he was drooling and the other dropped his bottle of white cider. BEST GHOST TOUR YOULL EVER SEE. they also just kept calling everyone fuckers and yelling at the tour guides.the best thing was that they were not homeless. they were just two friends shooting the shit harassing tourists. the one wearing the sweat track suit won my heart. I was going to give him a big kiss but had to follow the tour. here are some pics!!! ahhh i love cute old men!!!![ please notice that he is wearing a track suit and a gold medal.and drinking white cider- the cheapest and most potent alcohol known to man





We also took a day trip to Loch Ness and the highlands. Really beautiful. Islept through most the bus tour but still enjoyed the scenery i managed to take in.


Loch Ness.
Unfortunatly I didnt see the monster. But the castle was pretty legit.

there are many more details and adventures but basically I was very satisfied with this trip and would recommend that everyone pay a visit to this wonderful country. especially if you enjoy history and boozin.