"Wild and Sexy!" - Haggis Tour

So this past weekend was probably one of the best weekends I’ve had so far! Myself, Cati, Shannon, and Ellie all went on a “Haggis Tour”! Great name I know, and the side of the bus says “Wild and Sexy” and the other side says “Gorgeous”. Perfectly fitting for us girls naturally :)

So anyways, we left Friday morning very early so we could make sure we got sweet spots on the bus…which we did; right behind our lovely 24 year old tour guide from Stirling, Dan. We started off on our adventure and headed out and our first stop was to meet “Hamish” the highland cow. Lovely thing it was. Lots of hair, big horns, ya know.

Then we passed through Ft. William, saw Ben Nevis, and headed off to some more photo stop points. It started to rain a wee bit J and so we took a tour through Ben Nevis Whiskey Distillery. It smelled like vomit. No really, it did. The guy that ran the place basically said the Americans don’t know how to drink whiskey, that they don’t drink it for the ‘taste’ and are missing out on some great whiskey. Hmmm…as if we weren’t already aware of that haha. Oh he also basically said they ship all the crappy whiskey to the states and keep the good stuff for themselves. Just thought you whiskey lovers should know that. Anyways, we also took a stop at a location where Dan the tour guide told me they were filming some Harry Potter that day….FAKE OUT. I was so disappointed. I even had my scarf on hand so I could run on set to try and blend in! I told Dan this and he told me I would look like a “some Scottish name” that I can’t quite remember….and when I asked what it meant he said “idiot”. Haha GREAT. But don’t worry, Dan wasn’t being mean, we were his favorites, I’m sure of it. Here’s a picture from that location...

We ended that evening in Loch Ness, where we stayed in a hostel Friday and Saturday night. We went to a pub for dinner in the local town…which is VERY small. And we got a lot of weird looks from the locals in the pub, it was the first time I felt like I was seriously being stared at in a negative way for being American haha. But the food was good! After that our tour went to this little building and a local Scotsman was there to demonstrate to us how the Scottish clans lived in the highlands back in the day. It is unbelievably interesting and amazing to say the least. They would live in groups of up to 20 in little tiny hut things, and only shower maybe one a year (shower meaning wash their face). They wore the same outfit all year and brought in the animals at night to escape the cold…so there were 20 people plus animals and more in their houses. Their kilts can seriously function about a billion different ways it’s crazy. After being shown their weapons, I would rather get shot in the face 10 times then ever come across the things they used to kill people. Let’s just say for the guys, wearing a cup would do nothing for you, it’d probably make the killing process worse. The guy demonstrating these weapons scared me a few times in the too….

The next morning we headed out to start our journey to the Isle of Skye. First though, we stopped at the Eilean Donan Castle where they filmed some of the James Bond movies, and more importantly…Made of Honor!

We then drove on and ended up in the capital of Skye; Portree. Situated in a little harbor, it’s a very picturesque city with brightly colored houses along the water (story about why to come later).

We ate at this little café and we ate some amazing food for very cheap…gotta love that! We then went shopping around the area and got back on the bus. Dan told us that the tour usually stops there and turns around…but he said that was lame and that he knew of a spot that he wanted to take us all. I’m definitely glad he did, because you really didn’t see much of Skye from Portree, and where Dan took us ended up being one of the most amazing places I’ve ever been! As we traveled up to the lookout spot, the ocean came into view with all the hills and mountains in the background. It was unreal. One of those moments where you just kinda have to remind yourself that you’re really truly in Scotland! It was awesome, what I saw I’d only seen on postcards and on google images…never thought I’d see such amazing sights in person. The only scary part was the road he took our “Wild and Sexy” bus on…I literally thought we were just gonna fall over the edge. But Dan knows whats up, and he got us there safely! (He drives like my dad, so those of you that know how that is can understand why I was so nervous.) When we finally got to our destination, I thought I was in a painting. You looked out over the edge of the cliff on to monstrous green hills, an amazing blue sky with white fluffy clouds, and a blue ocean. We decided that seeing this one location itself in person was worth all the money we spent on this entire trip…it was that amazing! (my parents might disagree with that statement….seeing one location for the amount of tuition, I’ll try to fit a few more things in before I come home J ) haha. Anyways, we then decided to climb up this “little” hill that we saw that Dan told us was the best look out spot and that you could see everything from the top. Well…that LITTLE hill was not so little. Just when you thought you were at the top, another hill continuing up appeared. I thought I was in shape. I was wrong. Anyways, we made it to the top and the view was even better! We took some jumping pictures of course!

After this trip, we went back to the hostel on Loch Ness and spent our last night there. The next morning we got up and drove on to stop on the shores of Loch Ness and the gift shop. This is probably the best gift shop ever! Everything you don’t need, yet everything you want is in this place! It’s great stuff I tell ya. I bought a loch ness coffee mug. It’s awesome. Nessie’s neck is the handle, and her head connects to the top of the mug while the rest of her body is the bottom of the mug. Love it. After this we really just made a few other stops; the battle site of Culloden and some other places before we made it back home. Needless to say it was a great day! We even got to clean our Haggis Tour bus……hah oh what fun. Cleaning the windows with Windex only reminded me of what awaits me at work when I arrive home…But the cleaning did get us a free ride home! Oh the things we do to save a few pounds. (aka DOLLARS for you non Scottish knowing folk.)

P.S. So Dan told us LOTS of really awesome Scottish stories. I have them written down so I don’t forget, but to add them to this post would make this ridiculously long. SO keep an eye out for upcoming updates with some fun Scottish stories!

It's Just a Flesh Wound!

Welllll lots has gone on here in good ole' stirling and its surrounding areas these past few days. My mom came up Friday, had a little flight trouble but she made it here! Long story short, I'll put it this way: She was supposed to fly out of KC to Newark, then Newark to Edinburgh...she ended up flying out of Omaha to Newark, then Newark to London, then London to Edinburgh...getting here about half a day later...but hey I didn't have to get up as early to go meet her at the airport :) No I was glad she made it, they were telling her she might not have gotten here till yesterday!

Saturday we went to Doune Castle, which is where 'Monty Python and the Holy Grail' was filmed! It was a great day outside, so it was fun to explore that. The town of Doune is sooo cute and small too! Definitely a stereotypical Scottish town. It was so quiet when we got there, and wondered where everyone was, then we heard a whistle and some cheering...so everyone must've been at the local 'football' game. I fell on the way up to the castle and totally busted my face open and just started bleeding like crazy everywhere...to which I just shouted out to everyone, "IT'S JUST A FLESH WOUND!!!" haha only joking...that never happened, so please don't be concerned for my face. Here is a picture of us galloping up towards the castle...we could not find any coconuts. That is a true statement.

On the way back we sat in front of a lovely Scotsman on the little bus. He had definitely been having some fun at the Doune pubs before getting on. He told me I was gorgeous, stunning, and beautiful, and asked if American men thought this as well (given my current relationship status, need I answer that question?? lol joking)...Oh and he also said I was definitely a 9 out of 10 (shoot...I don't settle for anything less than perfect, come on! hahah) Well, this was all very nice of him to say, except for the fact that he was plastered and he was talking so fast and drunken that I couldn't make out any word he said! My mom couldn't understand either. Cati was our interpreter. The guy asked me if I was french, since Cati was having to tell me what he was saying...to which I replied quite loudly "FRENCH?!" (so hopefully there weren't any French on board that bus). Anyways, he then proceeded to tell me that even though he has a girlfriend, he would have my hand in marriage. After he got off the bus and we started to take off, he ran along the side of it, jumped up and kissed my window. The guy in front of us turned around and said "We're not all like that ya know". hahah it was great. Uncomfortable and awkward, but none the less great! ha

Yesterday we took a tour of the Highlands, we went to Glencoe, Loch Ness, and drove through Inverness. There are some spectacular views! Everything is even more amazing in person. Here are some pictures from Glencoe....

and Loch Ness...no we didn't see 'Nessie'. I was hoping, cause I'd take the money that you'd for sure get for getting a picture of it!

St. Andrews

I finally made it to the one place I wanted to visit...St. Andrews. The birthplace of golf! Since it's a rather small town and they have no train station, we had to go by bus. After meeting an oh so lovely bus driver...(not) and having a rather scary charter bus drive, we made it to St. Andrews. We first went to eat at a local pub on their main street, where the bar tender asked Cati if she would like "chips" with her meal. Of course, we've already figured out that chips are fries, but since she hestitated for maybe a second, the guy looked at her and said "would you like fries with that" in an attempted American accent. Thank you. But the guy was actually nice so we couldn't be too offended! Anyways, lunch was great and we headed to the castle, which they were closing down to take a lunch break, so we headed off to the beach! We took some pretty awesome pictures I've gotta say. I think we've got sort of a jumping theme going on, I'll have to think of some new ones here soon... But the views are amazing! I've never seen such a beautiful place. It really was unbelievable!

Anyways, we went out to this little sand bar thing to take some pictures...and we were having so much fun that we did not realize the tide rising and surrounding our little "island". Before we know it, we were pretty much trapped out in the North Sea. Ok, so it wasn't that life threatening...but we were kinda trapped and had to figure out how to run through the water to get back to some dry land.

After that adventure we made it to the golf course which is just off the beach. We walked around there for a bit and took some pictures on the "Old Course". That was pretty awesome to be on as well. So many people have golf there, it was just incredible! We ventured into the gift shop to spend all sorts of money on souvenirs of course :)

Then we managed to get back to the castle where the views were even more spectacular. The castle isn't much of a castle anymore but of just ruins. But none the less it was really cool to explore. Especially the mine shafts underneath....not so much. I definitely was anticipating either the walls to cave in on top of us or some guy with a saw to run out in a mask. Needless to say we were all anxious to get out of there.

We took some more jumping pics in the castle as well...we had a blast. Definitely the most fun trip I've had so far!

After that we made it to the cathedral and climbed the "tower"....to what I assumed heaven because we walked SO many winding stairs. My thighs were burning by the time we got to the top we basically almost all collapsed once we reached it. But again...of course it had some amazing views....

To end our trip, we ended up in a little ice cream parlor where we had the BEST sundae I've ever had in my life... a Banoffee Sundae. Its basically bananas, toffee, vanilla ice cream, whip cream..and amazingness.

Our trip was definitely my favorite place I've been so far. I loved the small town feel and the great scenery...and of course the golf course! We will definitely be making a trip or two back there...hopefully to play some golf!

Polo!...(and I'm not referring to Ralph Lauren clothing)

I had a polo lesson yesterday. As in polo on horses. Ya know...where you ride around in the awesome helmets swinging a stick trying to hit the ball. Personally I've only ever seen it played in movies, so I felt sort of like royalty when I got on the horse. I actually got on the horse quite easily...getting off I got stuck halfway down and basically was laying draped over this big brown horse with my head crushed into its huge side. The instructor just looked at me and asked if I was alright....no sir, I'm not alright, can you not see my face is sticking into the side of the horse right now and i can't move? I didn't actually say that...especially since my instructor was a 23 year old English guy who I'd definitely pay the 30 pound weekly lesson fee if it were him that would be teaching the lessons. But he's not..oh well. Anyways, the other instructor there, an older man was describing the equipment used for the game. He was showing us the stick. Apparently that's what it's called; the 'stick'. To which he quickly added, "The Americans call it a mallet. They are wrong. The Americans are often...wrong." After this I started singing our national anthem. Only joking...I kept quiet and didn't saying anything naturally haha. But anyways, I've decided I do love riding horses...except when they move their head around and you can't control it and it looks as if they're trying to bite your foot off...that's not so cool. But other than that, the whole evening was very fun learning how to sort of play. We only learned to ride, and then learned how to use the stick and hit the ball...we didn't actually put two and two together. You have to pay more to come back for that...so I guess that will be the end of my polo career! haha. But I actually do have this new desire to buy a horse some day so I can just ride it around wherever I want. Yep.

Oh, random note...my New Hollywood Cinema professor is going to be gone for the next two weeks. Where's he going?? Oh yes, he will be in the audience at the Academy Awards. NICE.

Is it bad that when I type all of this, in my mind I'm hearing both English and Scottish accents say everything??? Oh no...

Some American Pride!

Well it's been a few days since I've updated, so I thought I'd so now. I haven't been anywhere unbelievably exciting since my last post, but I've had a lot of interesting conversations with some people over the last few days. I think my favorite have been the German guys I met trying to understand what baton twirling is...so they added me on facebook to watch the videos and it is now to them called the "stick dance". Also, I had someone from Glasgow ask me how my batons (while pronouncing them BA-tons) were doing and if they could see them sometime...haha that was different but hilarious.

The other night I was with all of my roommates watching the USA/Canada hockey game I learned some intersting things about Scotland and the UK. It's interesting to hear how different major historical things are perceived in different countries...the differences in reactions to 9/11 compared to my views and their views...the differences in the death of Princess Diana. It's just intriguing to hear how they reacted. I think the best question asked was how the US reacted to Michael Jackson's death....ha.ha.ha. While of course I am the first one to admit of my huge love for MJ, I had to tell them truth of how every one of our tv channels was Michael Jackson watch 24/7 for 2 months straight. The were quite surprised at that, though they also said it was a big deal here...just didn't go on as long as ours apparently did.

Also, I knew Scotland hated England...but i didn't know they HATED England. I mean...there's shirts being printed right now in relation to the South Africa World Cup coming up that say "Anybody But England"...basically since Scotland didn't qualify, they're cheering for anyone but England...and they play the US first ironically! But supposedly these shirts are being looked at because there are some who think they're racist! I couldn't believe that. I don't know, maybe I'm being naive, but I can't quite see how that's being racist.....but what do I know? So anyways, there's some elections coming up here in Scotland that are gonna be a pretty big deal here in May and June. They're voting on trying to get complete independence from England...but here's the kicker, you can't actually vote "no". To put it easily, you can basically vote for " a little change", "moderate change", or "complete independence from england". Which is what everyone wants here anyways I guess. So the UK consists of Northern Ireland, Scotland, England, and Whales....and apparently they all don't like England that much, but especially Scotland doesn't. From how my roommates described it, it kinda seems like England is running some sort of little dictatorship over here!..to which my roommates agreed to that statement.

I also learned the in the UK, Catholic schools are paid for by the government....as in the government FUNDS the catholic schools....so none of the kids have to pay to attend. I found that very very interesting.

Another thing that I've come to learn...I've become very protective of my country. I thought about this today and try to relate when I explain this:

- When you hear someone talking about your friend...you get defensive right? It's almost as if you get this feeling where your blood kinda boils and you just kinda wanna just start shouting out all the good things about your friend.

- So then the same goes for when you hear someone bash a club or group or organization your a part of...or have good friends in. The same feeling occurs...you want to protect them.

- And then the same goes when someone starts bad mouthing your school or university...(aka also known as the KU/K-State banter haha just trying to make it relatable)...so you start going back and forth as to why your school is better...because you have pride in your school and you think it's the best..you know it's the best!

- Then the same thing goes for when someone stereotypes or makes fun of your town or state...you immediately become defensive and try to fix the image they have in their mind. Because you're proud of it and all the people that live there...even if some of those people are from the 'school down the road', because they're still in your state...which you're still proud of.

- And then there's our country...when someone tries to say something about your country...the same feeling happens. It doesn't matter if someone from your country is from the school you hate, or the club or organization your'e not fond of...or friends with the person that you don't particularly like...because everyone is now part of this category...everyone is a part of your country and you have pride in that and want to protect it's image because in your mind it's the best place to be!

I just kind of came to that realization tonight...it's not super deep or well though out, but I found it interesting how the same feeling can happen on such a small level, and then the next moment you're getting the same thing and trying to defend the entire country. I think it's great that we can all be "rivals" within different groups back home...but the second someone tries to bring down our country, we all come together.

So not so much interesting random facts of what I've learned...but just some things I've really actually have come to learn in just the few weeks of being here.