Highlands Round 2: Now With More Cows

Wow its been a whole week since I last posted. I'm just gonna go ahead and blame that 100% on Kate, as on our travels together, rather than switching cameras all the time, we just took the other's pictures on our own camera, so I've been waiting to get the pictures of me from her.

So yeah. Kate's fault.

Obviously all credit for photos of me thus go to Kate, while the rest are my own.

The tour we took this time was the Hairy Coo's free highlands tour.

This is the Forth Bridge, a cantilever railway bridge over the Firth of Forth, just west of Edinburgh. It connects Edinburgh with Fife. 

So to get to Edinburgh to Fife you'd cross the Forth Bridge over the Firth of Forth.

You're welcome.

The bridge was begun in 1883, took seven years to complete, and cost 98 lives.

The Forth Road Bridge is just east of the railway bridge and was built in 1964 to replace a centuries-old ferry. There is also apparently a good chance it is going to be decommissioned soon, as when it was built there were very few cars in Scotland, and the engineers did not take into account the exponential increase in automobile ownership.

Hi Kate. 

The National Sir Walter Wallace monument from a distance.

Have I mentioned yet that I love the forests here?

They're so magical and old-world.

The first stop was at the Sir Walter Wallace monument, where we walked up the hill to the monument itself.

It was a really impressive sight. We didn't go inside, but apparently the tower houses his broadsword, which would have come up to his chin. I guess he was a tall dude. 

Stirling. I love how unlike Canadian cities the cities here look... you see this, and you know you're in the UK.

The tower was built in 1869.

There was a small path leading off the main one to this lovely "viewpoint"... which Kate and I mercilessly made fun of.

According to our tour guid, the official explanation for the large mound there is that it is the old gardens for Stirling castle. The unofficial explanation is that there is a UFO buried there.

LITTLE FENCES DIVIDING FEILDS.

Stirling Castle. Supa historically and architecturally interesting.

If I'm gonna keep gallivanting about with my DSLR, I'm really gonna have to stop cradling my camera so awkwardly in every picture taken of me.

Stone fences. Man.

Our very subtle and understated tour bus. Tourists? Us?

Nah.

Not us.

Sheep are everywhere.

How is this country *this* picturesque?

See all those little white spots? More sheep.

I love how half the tourist sites here are like "MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS WAS HERE ONCE SHE STOPPED HERE FOR A SNACK DID YOU KNOW THAT"

The Romans called Scotland Caledonia, meaning forested area.

Most of the pine trees in Scotland were planted by the Forestry Service after the war, when they realized that they had deforested much of the area, because they grew much faster than the native deciduous trees. Now, they are concentrating on replanting native trees.

What is apparently a hotel. Supa casual.

Also where we stopped to feed and pet some hairy coos.

Sorry, there is about to be a lot of pictures of cows.

THEY'RE JUST SO CUTE.

Lookit that face.

Kate made a friend.

Perfect day for running about the countryside.

We also stopped at Loch Katrine, which is the fictional setting of Sir Walter Scott's The Lady of the Lake. 

Our final stop for the day was Doune Castle which is where all of the castles except for the final one in Monty Python and the Holy Grail were filmed. 

It was set to close shortly after we arrived, so we didn't actually go inside, but instead just wandered around the outside and took pictures.

Yah think?

Overall, another excellent tour, and a good jaunt about the area just north of Edinburgh with Kate. Definitely didn't get anywhere near as far north or into the highlands as we did on the other tour I went on, and it involved a lot more stops, but was another fun and informative tour, and the payment structure was definitely suited for my budget!

Instagram, More Like InstaGLAM

Amiright?

Went on another tour of the highlands today. Will hopefully be getting internet back in the flat tomorrow, so I'll be making a post and putting up photos from the trip then. 

Until then, this is the link to my Instagram account, which is public, so you can see the photos I put up even if you don't have Instagram. I put photos up there that I don't necessarily put on the blog or Facebook, so it'll be something different if you'd like to stalk me further ;)

http://instagram.com/kikijensine

Afternoon Tea

While classes are picking up (there seems to be quite a bit of group work) we are still enjoying a rather light course load, which we took advantage of to meet up for afternoon tea at 2:30 on Wednesday. Candice, Eve, Harriet, Michele, Kate, and I met up at Eteaket (isn't that the greatest name?) for a proper Scottish tea. Which was ridiculously big. It included a sandwich (I ordered brie and cranberry), mini patisseries, a scone with Devonshire clotted cream & Scottish strawberry jam, and a pot of tea. However, when we went they were out of patisseries, so we instead were given a selection of their cakes. 

Our waitress brought all of our tea pots over at once, then proceeded to identify the majority of them by simply looking into the tea baskets, which was amazing, and the ones that she couldn't tell by sight alone, she just smelled the lid and then was able to identify them (still crazy impressive).

The big stand in the foreground was shared between Kate and I, as we both ordered the Brie and Cranberry sandwiches. The smaller stand in the background was Harriets, as she was the only one to order the salmon sandwich.

So much food! We were all very full afterwards. 

After we ate, Eve took us on a meandering walk home, pointing out her favourite shops, which was really awesome - not exactly the kind of information any tour guide is going to give you!

A really lovely day off. Still don't have internet at home, but hopefully we will by next week! 

Disappearing Photos and Day in Edinburgh

Most of the photos on this post are courtesy of Tori, as I didn't bother to bring my camera with me the other day.

As some of you have commented, my earlier posts seem to be not showing the photos - I know why this is, and will be working to fix it, but it might take me a while, given that my internet use is still limited to the times I am on campus or in a coffee shop seeking out wifi. 

ETA: October has now been fixed, but its September that has all the castle pictures, and will take a while to fix. 

These were from our tour yesterday, but I didn't manage to get as good a picture as Tori did - you can read about the statues in the Scotsman here, but they are already amazing - I can't wait to see them when they are finished. 

Friggin tourists. 

Sunday Caty, Tori, and I spend the day within the city.

Edinburgh Castle... I suspect I will have about a billion pictures of this thing by the time I leave here. 

Tori, Caty, and me. 

Scott Monument (featuring Walter Scott of course)

Lovely menu stand at the pub where we ate dinner. 

Had a delicious veggie haggis for dinner (or more properly, Veggie Haggis, Neeps, and Tatties) - while I don't have anything to compare it with, it was very good.

Tori, me, and Kate (also from Canada - one of my classmates)

Scott Memorial

Parliament and Calton Hill. 

After spending the morning at Starbucks stealing internet, Tori, Caty, and I met up with Kate and went to the absolutely amazing, huge, and free National Museum of Scotland. 

Loom from the museum

While we just quickly went through the Scottish history portion of the museum, there was a huge amount we didn't even touch on, and Kate and I have decided we need to return again and spend a lot longer there. It was very cool that it was free, though it did feel a bit strange to go in without paying anything. 

After that we spent a considerable amount of time wandering around the Royal Mile, before heading to Princes Street for supper.