Traveling the UK: Part 2 (Scotland)!

So here is the second and final part of my two part series: Traveling the UK. This past weekend may have been my favorite weekend so far in Ireland. From Thursday to Sunday, my friends and I meandered through the streets of Glasgow and Edinburgh, Scotland. We stayed in the "Redrum" at one hostel, saw where Sean Connery was knighted, ate haggis and fried Mars bars, and may have seen a few ghosts in the Edinburgh graveyards. Let's get into a little more detail though, shall we?

First up on the agenda was Glasgow. Upon arrival, we made the long trek from the bus station to the Blue Sky Hostel. It was a really cool and funky place with spray paint on the walls and wacky themes for each room. Yes, we were in the room themed after "The Shining," complete with a huge picture of a crazed Jack Nicholson on the door and the words "REDRUM" painted across the bottom. When we walked inside, there was no surprise, the whole room was painted red. Don't worry though, we were all okay. Thankfully, our work to fun ratio tipped entirely to the "fun" side so we didn't go insane. (Lame joke, I know). So for one day and night, we explored Glasgow. It's your basic city. We headed into the center where all the shops are along with the City Hall which was really nice. We saw some typical red stone Scottish architecture and spent the night at Ashton Lane, a very cool little cobblestone street with plenty of cool pubs and restaurants. It was a brief stay but a good one nonetheless.

Friday morning we got on yet another bus and made our way to Edinburgh. I have to say it here and I'll probably say it again: Edinburgh is an awesome city. I mean really awesome. When we first arrived I could see all of the medieval architecture and knew that this would be a great weekend. Just thinking about the history of it made me giddy being the nerdy history major that I am. Edinburgh is kind of divided into the old town and new town. Thankfully, we stayed in the old town. But we didn't stay in some run of the mill youth hostel. We stayed in the Castle Rock Hostel, named for the fact that it sits at the bottom of Castle Rock. Outside our window, the magnificent Edinburgh Castle hovered over us. Off in the distance outside our hostel, we could see the snow-capped mountain ranges of Scotland. For the next two days and nights, we explored almost every inch of Edinburgh. Friday we were on our own as we walked down the Royal Mile, the main road in the old town, past all sorts of old pubs and tons of Scotland souvenir shops.

Saturday was the big though. We first had a big Scottish breakfast, complete with haggis (all kinds of pig innards cooked in a pig's stomach and seasoned with some spices). Honestly, it was pretty good. It tasted like sausage which is never a bad thing. From there we made our way to the starting point of a free guided walking tour of the city. Our tour guide was a totally cool young guy named Ronnie. He had a great Scottish accent and gave us a great tour. We walked up and down the Royal Mile, down the Grassmarket area where most executions took place many years ago, and saw some very cool Harry Potter historic spots. We stood outside the window where JK Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book. Just around the corner from there is the castle off of which she based Hogwarts, and finally, we saw the grave of a man named "Tom Riddell." Now, although the name is spelt differently in real life, this was the inspiration for "He Who Must Not Be Named." (Again, lame). At the end of the tour we were told the story of the Scottish "Stone of Destiny." It is a totally wacky story and too long for me to write in here. I suggest everyone google it though! Saturday night brought yet another tour: the Edinburgh Ghost Tour. With our Jesus look-alike tour guide Alan, we walked through the Edinburgh night to various graveyards and monuments that are said to be haunted. We saw the grave of philosopher David Hume and stood atop a hill overlooking the city at night while Alan told us all kinds of ghost stories.

After a fun-filled day of touring Edinburgh, we were all exhausted and hit the hay pretty quickly. We slept in a very happily themed room this time: The Happy Days Room." Each bed had its own Happy Days character. My bed was Big Al. Wish I watched Happy Days more b/c I don't know who that is. Oh well.

Here it comes again: Edinburgh is an awesome city. Best city I've visited so far by a "royal mile." The lame jokes just keep on coming today.

Hope you're not bored out of your mind yet. If you got through all of this, I appreciate it. I really enjoy writing these and I hope you enjoy reading them.

I'll be heading to the Aran Islands on Saturday so another post should be coming soon.

Conor