August 9, 2004

Day 6 - Bus Tour to Isle of Skye

MacCurdy's Island Experience - "Life is like the wind: it's not there if there isn't any

544 p.m. (local time)

Alright, so I'm a bit behind on the journal entries. Funnily enough, all the fun started just AFTER my last entry, so I've got lots to tell. We went down to the bar that night and just had an absolute blast meeting people and learning about their various cultures. We started off talking to three Irish girls who had come over to Scotland for a short holiday. They'd gone to see the city during the day, were planning to party all night and then get back up the next morning and go home. Must be nice to be able to take a day-trip to Scotland (!!), although I'm sure they think the same thing about us and the United States. That night we also met four American girls who were taking a small break from their studies at Sterling University in Brighton, England. Apparently the program they're in is designed to allow them time to travel around the UK as well as study in their chosen field. They were very nice and after a pleasant conversation and a pint we decided it might be fun to see the city together as they also had only just arrived.

Another group we met was of three Italian boys, which I must say, fit EVERY stereotype I've ever heard of how Italian boys behave. Their accents were priceless, being hardly able to scrape a few words together in English, but they were very nice and gentlemanly, not to mention highly entertaining. We got to bed at a fairly decent hour so that we would have as much of the next day as possible to tour the city.

The next morning only two of the four Americans showed up downstairs for breakfast. Adrianne and Daniella had decided they didn't feel well and were going to stick around the hostel for the day. Nicole and Jenny, the two that did show up, didn't seem at all surprised that they weren't coming out, saying that the four of them had vacationed together before and they hadn't really gotten along too well on the road. One would wonder why they would travel together again if it hadn't worked out so well the first time, but it seemed like a long and complicated situation, and quite frankly I didn't care enough to hear it.

Anyway, the four of us decided to head out without the other two, and we headed back to the Royal Mile. We started out at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the Queen's residence in Scotland. It is a gorgeous building, and not as astronomically expensive as Edinburgh Castle, so we decided that a tour was worth it. We got audio boxes and headsets and walked around the rooms, inside and out of the castle, learning all about the Scottish and English history that accompanies the building and its artifacts. I took tons of pictures to say the least. After that we walked the Mile again, this time going into a few shops to satisfy the Americans' constant need to buy things. Not sure what it is, but they tend to value material things more than we do. I walked out of there at the end of the day with a shot glass with the Harrison clan crest and motto on it (who knew I had Scottish heritage!) and a few postcards and that suited me just fine.

At the other end of the Mile is Edinburgh Castle, which we walked the grounds of again to please the Americans who had yet to see anything of the city. We ate lunch at a famous pub called The World's End, and after that we headed off the Mile and onto Princes Street which houses more shops and tourist attractions. After almost eight solid hours of walking the city's streets we decided it was time for dinner and a pint so we caught the shuttle back to the hostel to relax for the evening. Noble intentions they were but the end result wound up being quite different. Nicole and Jenny were adamant about wanting to go back downtown to the Hard Rock Café for dinner, but Lauren and I surely didn't travel six hours by plane to eat at a crappy American restaurant that we have at home, so we bid them farewell after that.

We headed down to the canteen at the hostel and purchased our cheapest meal yet: a McCain microwave pizza for 1£ each. After that we decided that another night in the hostel pub was unacceptable as Edinburgh is known for being just as beautiful at night as it is during the day. We got dressed up, grabbed our cameras and hopped back on the shuttle to go back to the city. On the way we met another Canadian who was staying at the hostel, whom I came to know only as "Saskatchewan." He told me his real name (Bret, I think), but we were so proud to have met someone from home that we wanted to refer to it as much as possible. He had been traveling in Scotland for a few months already, and had even acquired a Scottish tint to his Canadian accent, which to most Americans sounds Scottish enough already.

Anyway, he had also met from Americans from Sterling U and had decided it was time to paint the town red. Lauren and I decided to abandon our plan of photographing the castle, going for a walk and getting an early night in preparation for the Haggis tour the next day, and join them. Sask., like ourselves, found the Americans to be very nice people, but with far different priorities from Canadians and horribly ignorant about the place they were visiting. As soon as we joined the crowd, however, a rivalry ensued as to who were the best drinkers, Canada or the US, and a mighty good pub crawl began.

We started at a place with live music, but left after a fight broke out, which sort of spoiled the good vibe it had going on. After that we decided it was time to head down to the Grass Market, where Edinburgh nightlife is best, and went into a club which was offering free shots with every pint. The shot was a strawberry-and-cream type deal, and was surprisingly good despite the baby-pink colour (not the kind of shot one would think to find in a whiskey-loving country!). We also had a pint there and left soon after when we noticed our company was predominantly males who seemed much more interested in each other than us five girls walking around the bar in shorts and short skirts.

The next pub was in a more traditional style, called The Last Drop, so named because of the gallows which at one point stood near-by. More shots were passed around and we met a Brit, a Scot and an Australian who were all involved in the Military Tattoo which was going on at Edinburgh Castle during the festival. Finally we wound up at a Russian-style dance-club that had four floors plus and dance floor which the American girls and Lauren were very excited about, and me and the boys could care less for. We went and drank some more, which was probably a bad idea since we were pretty shit-faced (a Scottish expression in origin!) by then anyway! Lauren and I finally decided it was time to go by about 1 a.m., knowing that we had to get up at 6 a.m. to be back downtown for the tour the next morning. We cabbed our way back to the hostel, being far to drunk to find our way back to Waverly Bridge, and collapsed in our beds for what was really more of a detox than an actual sleep.