Edinburgh

Outside My Window At School--I Thought It Was Snow--It's Really Just Thick Frost :(
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Edinburgh is now at the top of the list (along with Paris) for the best weekend trips ever. We left Friday morning around midnight and made it to Edinburgh (by bus) by 8:30am. Of course this is the one trip where NO ONE could sleep on the bus so everyone was exhausted by the time we arrived. With that, the first thing to do was to check into our rooms and take a much needed nap.

After the nap, me, Ashleigh and Mike went out to explore the city and to eat lunch. Interestingly enough, this is where we met up w/ Prat (a friend from HS, for those of you out of the South Brunswick loop). The four of us spent the day traveling around Edinburgh. First we visited Edinburgh castle where we got to walk through all of the sights of this old historic place. We saw the dungeon where the prisoners were kept as well as the crown jewels. I also found the biggest cannon in the world which i could fit into rather easily.

...real scottish meal...pizza hut...

I Really Wish It Was Snow Though
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After the castle, the boys had the urge to go to the Whiskey Factory tour, Ashleigh and I used this time to nap but we did get a shot of whiskey and a whiskey glass for going. The tour was interesting because we got to see how it is made and got to go on a little ride at the end, but they kept turning the lights off, I felt like I was in English class looking at slides and taking a nap. After the tour, at this point it was around dinner time and we began looking for places to eat. Of course since in Scotland we figured we would get a real scottish meal so we decided to eat at an American Diner :)...and for lunch we had Pizza Hut in case anyone was wondering. After dinner we headed back to the hotel for another nap (we were so tired, what can I say). I couldn't manage to wake myself up until 11pm where I then met everyone else at the bar inside of the hotel. We decided to spend the night relaxing and make it a movie night because its up early tomorrow for another busy day of sightseeing.

Edinburgh
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The hotel served us a free breakfast, which was actually real food from a menu instead of us a buffet with a roll and tea. Afterwards we all got on the coach to take a trip to the Royal Britannia Yacht. The Yacht was actually really awesome, we got to walk through the entire thing (with yet again, another audio tour guide). I was really interesting to think that the members of the royal family had actually slept in those beds and walked in the same places that I was walking. Since the Yacht was so conviently located outside of a mall, Mike and I spent the next 2 hours before the bus brought us back doing a little shopping. It was really exciting to see all the christmas decorations all over the mall...Santa was even there!!!

Overlooking Edinburgh From The Highest Point Of The Castle
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Getting back to the hotel...guess what time it was? Nap time..of course!!! After a nice 2 hour nap Mike, Ashleigh and I went to explore and find out about going on one of the hauted ghost tours. Since the tour was not until late, Mike and I went off to find dinner...in our travels one man tried to talk to us, both of us ignored him and began walking by until he said "I'm a monk and..." Well, we are both suckers and ended up talking to this guy who tried to sell us some crazy monk band music, when we told him we couldn't afford it he asked for a donation, being smart I felt around in my pocket for small change and got off the hook with donating 25p...Mike on the otherhand apparently does not have the best sense of touch because after reaching around in his pocket he pulled out 2 POUNDS!! Oy Vey!! Well lucky for him, that 2 pounds bought him this super duper Indian bible or something...sucker!

Overlooking Edinburgh From The Highest Point Of The Castle
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Anyway, we ate dinner at a little pub and went to meet up w/ Ashleigh for our ghost tour. Dispointingly, the tour wasn't really scary at all. It was rather exciting to go into the underground vaults, underneath the city...but nothing was really scary about it. Oh well, it was an experience. That night Me, Tracy, and Mike took Ashleigh out for her 20th Birthday!! We went to a nice pub that played really good (American) music, and got her nice and drunked up. Just like in England...all the god damn pubs close sooo early, 1 am is when this bar closed, so we all head home.

Overlooking Edinburgh From The Highest Point Of The Castle
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The next morning we left Edinburgh for our 8 hour drive back to Wroxton. The weekend, although short, was amazing!! We all had such a good time, and I was so happy to get to meet up with Prat out of the coincidence that we happened to be in the same country and city at the same time! Now there are only 4 weeks left in the semester and I'm starting to wonder how sad I'm going to be when the time really starts to wind down, suddenly, I'm not ready to go home yet. Oh well, papers are coming up this week so I'm sure the time will fly...I'm going to make the best of it though!!