Retrospective post #3: Venice

Getting a bit slack with putting these up - between moving stuff to Canberra and the Gold Coast and just general lazing about.  But here's the last retrospective post, from Venice.  After this, I will either write some more for Paris and the rest of Italy, or just brush on them in a final wrap-up post :) But for now, here's another:

Took the overnight train from Vienna to Venice, which was certainly an experience!  It was my second overnight train (the first being the Caledonian sleeper from Dundee to London) and I have to say the first one was much more comfortable!  Although to be fair, that type of sleeper wouldn’t have worked well for us because I was in a 2 bed berth and there were 3 of us on this train.  We were in a 6 bed berth, at the very top beds, which were surprisingly high up, especially considering they didn’t have any kind of railing or anything.  Getting on the train wasn’t very smooth - when we booked the ticket Jo had asked about if our 3 big suitcases and other bags would all fit and was assured there would be plenty of room.  However when we got on, we discovered there was actually nowhere to put them, and the conductor guy was (at least at first) fairly unhelpful to the point of seeming annoyed about the situation.  It was pretty stressful for a bit, but luckily the only other person in the same berth who got on at Vienna was a lovely Italian guy, who was happy to move into another berth that had a free bed so that we could store our suitcases on his bed.  After that initial confusion it was alright though.  One thing I love about trains in Europe/the UK is that they almost always have powerpoints on the longer distance trains, meaning I can use my computer for as long as I want and also not have to worry about having it all charged the night before.  So Jo and I watched the Hunger Games and then we all went to bed.  Two other people got on at later stops, but as we had already gone to bed we didn’t really see them until we were all woken up for breakfast.  It wasn’t the worst sleep I’ve ever had, and it was definitely a good way to do the long journey between Austria and Italy with minimal time wastage, but we were pretty tired when we finally made it to Venice!  

When we got to Venice, first we had to leave our bags somewhere, and since it was fairly expensive per bag, we combined all the bags as much as possible, leaving just my backpack - hence why I looked even more like a tourist than all the tourists there!  Anyway then we went and caught the water bus to Piazza San Marco.  That was cool, we hung around and got our first Italian gelato, however we were also pretty glad to leave by the time we did due to all the pigeons.  They were everywhere, and disgusting!! Although even worse than the pigeons were the big seagulls, one of which we saw eating a dead pigeon in the middle of the square!  We were also pretty disgusted by all the tourists feeding the pigeons and encouraging them to land on them so they could take pictures.  

We got left the piazza after not too long, and decided to just slowly make our way back to the train station and then get the next train to Rome.  That was nicer.  It is such a maze!  I don’t think we would have gotten far without a map, but all the little back streets off the main tourist tracks were much quieter and just as beautiful.  It is definitely worth a wander, if you don’t mind feeling a little lost most of the time!  

Eventually made it back to the train station, and so got lunch at a little restaurant nearby while we waited for the next train.  I had a delicious carbonara - the authentic stuff is way better than any I’ve had at home (except of course for my Italian flatmate Rughy’s carbonara!).  We also gave in and bought a piece of nougat to share - every second shop had big pieces of it sitting temptingly on display.  This we ate in the train as we made our way to Rome.

Retrospective post #2: Vienna

A beautiful city, with lots of different but equally as nice styles of architecture all together in one place.  Definitely up on the list of nice looking cities, although Edinburgh still holds number one!  Had a really nice time there, although we didn’t achieve a whole lot in terms of sightseeing.  We got there a day early due to our spontaneous early abandonment of Budapest which gave us 3 full days there.  The first night we got there late, and so went to an Irish pub we found around the corner for dinner.  Gotta love Irish pubs - they’re everywhere and generally pretty reliable for a decent meal.  The downside to the pub, and also just to Austria in general, is that its not illegal to smoke inside pubs and even restaurants.  Which means when you come home from dinner you generally smell quite strongly of smoke :S  

Anyway, we stayed at the Wombats im Naschmarkt in Vienna, which I would definitely recommend!  Probably the best hostel I’ve stayed in to date.  Also in a really good location, right near an S-bahn station and also not too far from the historical centre of Vienna.  The next day we took it pretty slow - sleeping in after our bad night in Budapest, then going shopping for some jeans for Jo, among other things.  We also had Wiener schnitzel for dinner at a place that is apparently famous for their Wiener schnitzel.  They were huge! But also quite delicious :)  See picture below:

The next day we went on a walking tour, which was free - provided by the hostel.  That was quite interesting, particularly in terms of the history of all the beautiful buildings we had walked past.  Things I particularly remember from the tour include the Memorial Against War and Fascism, the Habsburg Palace (most of which is now converted into libraries or the like) and the memorial that was erected during times of the plague (if it has a name I can’t remember it!).  The last one is apparently the only one in Europe on which you will find a monarch in a kneeling position/not in a position of power.  It was erected as a place where people could gather and pray not to get the plague.  There was also a chapel in the Habsburg Palace where the Vienna Boys Choir sings and the Vienna Philharmonic play at mass on Sundays.  Would have loved to have gone to that, but unfortunately we weren’t there on a Sunday, and also you have to get there and line up for at least 2 hours before the mass actually starts, which makes it quite early in the morning!  I would have also loved to have seen a Mozart or Beethoven concert while we were there, but I guess because it was winter which is low season, there only seemed to be concerts on the weekend which weren’t much help to us.  

After the walking tour we went and had a quick peek inside Stephansdom, which is a big church in the centre of Vienna.  Like all the big churches in Europe, it was very ornate and beautiful inside.  Had dinner at a little restaurant recommended by the tour guide as having traditional Austrian dishes, which was quite nice.  I had my third goulash (first Prague then Salzburg) which was pretty good, although I think the tastiest was still the one in Prague.  We also went and had our free drink from the Wombar (the bar in the hostel) before going to bed.  Opted for the wine, which was a very bad choice!  I’ve had goon that tasted better :S Can’t really complain though since it was free!  And it was still definitely the best hostel!  

Our last day was lovely as well.  It was snowing, which luckily I still find magical rather than inconvenient so I was loving it.  We were able to leave our bags at the hostel, and we headed to Schönbrunn Palace.  Took lots of photos there, as well as a few videos of Grace’s snow antics.  

We decided to just walk around outside rather than going in, because being winter as usual stuff was closed.  But I have definitely resolved to go back in summer.  And it was a nice, if not very slippery, walk around outside.  After that and some morning tea we were pretty chilly, so decided to do something inside and warmer.  So we found the English cinema in Vienna and went and saw The Hobbit in 3D.  Then we stopped at a supermarket for supplies, grabbed our bags from the hostel and headed for the station to catch the sleeper train to Venice.

Retrospective post #1: Budapest

Well I suppose every trip has to have its not so great parts, and Budapest was definitely the worst place we’ve been so far.  In saying that, it was quite dependent on circumstances and we ended up only being there for around 24 hours so we may not be the best judges of actual quality.  But based on our brief experience, it definitely would not make it on our top 10 list of places to go back to!  

It started with the hostel.  We got there and checked in, and went up to our rooms.  They were actually quite well set up, with each bunk bed having a big division wall of wood between them and a curtain on to the entrance area.  Not ideal for 3 people, as then one person has to be alone, but if you were 2 or 4 it would have been great.  They also had huge lockers, that I was actually able to fit ALL my stuff into - suitcase, big backpack and Sportsgirl bag!  That was about all that was good about the hostel though.  The beds were fairly uncomfortable and the linen was an off yellow colour that made them seem like they were a little bit dirty.  And to top that off, the guy in the next compartment over spent most of the night snoring the place down.  The bathroom was also pretty gross, the worst part being the showers which were supposed to be button operated but lasted like 2 seconds for every press.  That and the fact that the dorm was mixed with a shared bathroom but there was no private area around the showers to get undressed/dressed.  

The next day didn’t really get much better either.  There was nothing that was overly unpleasant, but of course everything is worse when you’ve had hardly any sleep (and also when comparing it to the loveliness of Austria...).  We went to a supermarket for breakfast, but of course had trouble finding things because we didn’t speak the language.  Did also have a laugh because everywhere on the street there were people shovelling the snow from the footpaths, and then outside the supermarket there was a van full of bread that they appeared to be distributing to a line of people, some of whom were holding snow shovels.  Hence I jokingly concluded that they were paying the people in bread to shovel the footpaths.  Anyway, then we decided to go to one of the baths which Budapest is apparently famous for, experience a bit of culture.  That definitely was an experience!  Firstly just getting there - we were quite unconfident about the public transport so decided to walk, but it had been snowing previously and since none of the roads or paths were salted there was sludgy melting snow everywhere.  Which meant if you happened to be too close to the wrong part of the road when a car drove past, as Grace and Jo found out you get Bridget Jones style splashed from head to toe in dirty melting snow.  They were definitely not happy about that, as you can see below, and we were all paranoid from there on.  

Then we got to the baths.  That was better - they were quite old and beautiful, if not a little run down for the price.  We decided to splurge and get a massage too, which was an experience in itself.  Very glad that they changed one of our original appointments so that we all had women, because when we went in we were told to take everything off - while they stood there and watched.  Pretty sure it was the first time I’ve been completely naked in front of anyone since I was a child!  I didn’t find it so bad because I had expected it and was also pre-warned by Jo as she came out before I went in.  But the fact that she didn’t really turn away or anything was a little disconcerting!  Grace I think had a worse time of it, as she had expected it to be more like home where they tend to leave the room or something and also give you a towel to cover yourself a bit.  She said when the woman turned away to get something she pretty much dove onto the table with her thongs still on, so then was lying there awkwardly trying to kick them off without getting up again. Anyway that was definitely an interesting experience for all of us, and was quite nice.  Well, except for the fact that she worked so hard on my shoulders that they were then sore for the next 3 days.  Still on the topic of awkward nakedness too, there was fairly horrifying sights out in the baths as well - lots of old women in either very revealing or very ill fitting swimmers, who would also then get out and casually strip.  

Anyway when we left we decided that in order to avoid any more snow baths we would get a taxi back.  But this meant we then had to haggle with the taxi driver outside, who wanted the equivalent of about 18 euro for what was a maximum 10 minute drive. Didn’t exactly help maintain any good mood we might have had after the baths!  As a result, when we got back to the hostel we went down to the common area for the internet, then decided to look up trains to Vienna just cos we could.... Which resulted in us realising there was one in 50 mins, so we packed up in about 5 mins and rushed off to Vienna a day early.

Post-travel wrapping up...

So, once again I'm a bit behind!  Funnily enough, I have actually already written a bit more, but I never had internet to put it up at the time of writing.  And now I am once again back in Australia, enjoying the fact that a cool change has gone through making the heat much more easy to adjust to!  So I am going to finish off posting what I've written, then finish with a final post :) Just to explain why I keep posting when I'm not actually away anymore :P  Have to put up the rest of the stuff I wrote, since this blog is my unofficial travel diary!

A Winter Wonderland!

Salzburg = winter wonderland. The best way I can describe it.  Coming into Austria on the train the scenery was beautiful, and Salzburg was just as beautiful.  We weren’t staying in the prettiest area of Salzburg, but the next morning when we woke up and it was snowing, everything looked amazing.  

Sound of Music tour was awesome, but not so much because we were seeing places from a movie, more because we were seeing some beautiful spots, had a hilarious tour guide and listened to a soundtrack that reminded us of childhood on the way.  We also met a lovely Canadian girl called Sophie.  We saw the lake and the gates at the back of Schloss Leopoldskron where Maria and the children capsized the boat in front of the Captain and Baroness first.  That was cool, the edges of the lake were all sluggish and starting to freeze, and three ducks swam past with little drifts of snow on their backs.  Then we went to Hellbrunn Palace where we saw the gazebo from ‘Sixteen Going On Seventeen’.  It was originally at the place on the lake, but so many tourists were jumping the fence day and night to see it/dance around it that they wanted to get rid of it, so it was moved.  Now its also locked, cos apparently a couple of years ago an old lady hurt herself dancing around in it.  Anyway, then we went to Mondsee, which was a gorgeous little town and home to the church where they shot the wedding scenes.  The church was beautiful, though not half as big as it looked in the shots in the movie!  We also had lunch in a little restaurant there - Grace and I tried some Austrian goulash, which like the Czech version was pretty delicious, and Jo and Sophie had Käsespätzle.  We all had tap water too, on the recommendation of the tour guide, and he was right that its definitely delicious water!  Though we were all a bit shocked when they charged us each 50c for a glass of tap water?!  We also drove past the house they used for the von Trapp house in the movie, with the avenue of trees that the children were hanging out of leading up to it.  We weren’t able to get very close to that though, as the road in front is restricted to residents and guests.  And on the way home we watched a video about Salzburg and the Sound of Music, narrated/hosted by a somewhat older Liesl.  Altogether very enjoyable :) Here's a few pics - you can see all the rest on Facebook of course!

In the afternoon we just wandered the streets of Salzburg - had to go and buy a big backpack for me, as unfortunately my suitcase wheel stopped turning in the UK, and as I still had to use it the wheel had worn almost completely down on one side just from dragging it around by the time we got to Salzburg.  So I am now the proud owner of a hiking backpack, which I managed to get on sale.  But its not quite as big as my massive suitcase so I have also had to send a whole bunch of stuff back to Australia - definitely not a cheap exercise! :( Ah well, the joys of travelling I guess!  We also had to stop many times to take lots of snow pictures - it was just so beautiful and I was trying as hard as I could to catch it on camera! Made a wee snowman, checked out the gardens where some of the do-re-mi scenes were filmed... But the other main touristy thing we did in the afternoon was have a piece of the famous Original Sachertorte from the Sacher Hotel, which was very fancy and very delicious.  Sachertorte is basically just a chocolate cake with apricot marmalade and covered in chocolate.  Although the hot chocolate tasted more like warm milk, which was weird but in the end good with the richness of the Sachertorte.  

Anyway after our relatively lazy afternoon we went to the Augustiner Bräu, which is a huge brewery that can seat around 5000 people according to our tour guide.  He also gleefully pointed out that it is both attached to a church and next to a hospital.  It was pretty cool - kinda like a big indoor picnic area as there are just big halls filled with tables, and you go and get your stein of beer served from big kegs and then either bring your own food, or go choose from the wide variety of foods available at the little stall-like shops in one of the area between halls.  Apparently they have really nice big areas outside too when its summer.  We met our new friend Sophie there, and also 4 other Australians that she had met on the salt mine tour she did in the afternoon.  (Note: according to them, if you’re in Salzburg then DON’T do the salt mine tour!).  It was nice to have some company other than each other for a night - you can kinda run out of things to talk about when you hang out with the same people all day every day for a few weeks...  But aside from that, everyone was really cool and we had a really good night.  Had a beer and some dinner at Augustiner, then went to search out the oldest restaurant in Europe.  Turned out they didn’t just serve drinks, and was a very intimidating and fancy fine dining restaurant, so we searched out another bar in the Old Town.  It was quite interesting - it was a little underground and appeared to just be a hole hacked out of rock.  It was also empty except for one guy, and blaring really loud music.  But we all sat down and got a drink, and eventually a massive group of about 40 guys came in.  We stayed for a bit, debating what would cause such a large group of just guys to go out together (buck’s night, sports team...), and after Jo and I chatted with one guy and found out why they were there (not a football team, but a group of football team FANS out for a belated Christmas do?!) we headed to a rooftop bar across the river.  Then after that we headed home.  

We were going to try and do something like the Red Bull hangar the next morning, but then left the hotel and had so much stuff with us that we decided to just head straight to Budapest.  Little did we know... But I will elaborate more on that in my next post, which should be soon as we're on a train all night tomorrow night! :P

Prague!

On the very long train from Prague to Salzburg, which leaves plenty of time for a more in detail recount of Prague.  Hence after not having posted at all for a long time I have now done two within a day of each other!  Unfortunately Hogmanay and Berlin etc didn’t get the same in depth descriptions, but oh well.  I definitely plan on going back to those places at some point.  Prague I could go back to, but I would definitely want to learn at least a few phrases/useful words in Czech first.  I’d forgotten how hard it is to be in a country where you don’t speak the language at all - my only other experience of this was in France on two separate days.  Though to be fair I at least know a handful of words in French, whereas I have not the first clue when it comes to Czech.  

But yeah, regardless of the language barrier, I did quite enjoy Prague.  It’s a beautiful city, probably the second prettiest I’ve been to yet, coming in second to Edinburgh and with Strasbourg in third (note city, because the little villages we saw in Elsass and some I saw on the train through Germany were gorgeous!).  It is remarkably well preserved considering it went through WWII and the following years of Soviet communism.  Did a free walking tour in the morning, from which I learnt the following facts.  There is a concert hall in Prague that is the last remaining building in Europe that Mozart played in live.  They also have a huge astronomical clock that is either 600 or 800 years old (my memory gets a  little fuzzy when it gets down to specifics!) and the largest medieval castle I think in Eastern Europe.... But anyway, there’s a lot of beautiful old buildings all throughout Prague, many of which are a bit run down now but still beautiful.  

The walking tour was really interesting, went through the Old Town and a bit of the New Town with a Czech guy who studied drama therapy at university, so was very enthusiastic and dramatic!  We also saw the Jewish Quarter with lots of synagogues, one of which was a museum that apparently Hitler established and stored items taken by the SS etc to create a museum of an extinct race.  Also saw an old church which has two “creepy and spooky” legends/stories with it.  First is that there was an old rich guy who went to sleep in his study and slept for several days, and so his servants thought he was dead and had him buried in the family crypt.  He then woke up and managed to push the top off his coffin, but couldn’t get the door to the crypt open.  People heard yelling and loud noises from inside and assumed his spirit couldn’t rest, and so the priest took holy water and blessed the door of the crypt, and after a few days the noises stopped.  But not long after another member of the family died, and when they opened the door to the crypt and found the guy sitting leaning on the coffin, with a grimace on his face because he’d died in such distress.  The other story is about a statue of Mary inside the church, which apparently has a beautiful necklace on it.  A thief saw it and decided he’d like to steal it, so he got himself locked inside the church one night.  But when he reached up to take it, the statue grabbed his hand.  So he was stuck standing there with his arm above his head.  He tried bargaining with Mary, but remained stuck there.  When the priest found him the next day, he looked at it and said “We’ll just have to chop the hand off”.  The thief was relieved, until he realised the priest meant his hand.  So now there is a mummified black hand still hanging there - didn’t get to see it properly cos the church wasn’t open, but we peered through the window and could sort of make out a bit of it.  

I also got the impression from the tour guide that the Czech people are very proud of their democracy and their tradition of tendency towards democracy and democratic values even when they were held back from it.  Many stories included past kings who were very liberal about religion and supported science and the arts.  We also heard stories about the Prague Spring when Dubcek introduced “communism with a human face” and also about the students who set themselves on fire in protest when the liberties introduced during the Prague Spring were taken away again by the Soviets.  We also saw the site where there used to stand a huge statue of Stalin with a group of workers behind him.  Unsurprisingly it was blown up around the Velvet Revolution when the Czechs separated from the USSR.  It was actually amazing to remember how new the democracy of the Czech Republic is.  Our guide was saying they have presidential elections in a few days which will be the first (or one of the first?) since they became the Czech Republic.  And he was also saying that one of the potential candidates is a Czech of Germany heritage whose family was made leave all their possessions behind and leave Czechoslovakia back when the Nazis were threatening to invade.  This property included a big palace up on the hill with all the castle buildings.  But he forgave and forgot, and came back to Czechoslovakia to make a career as a politician.

Lots of very interesting stuff, which certainly delighted my inner history/politics nerd.  And we had still more of it in the afternoon, as we decided to go with the same guide on his castle tour that started just after the morning walking tour.  That was pretty cool too, there was a lot to see up there as well, the highlights of which were probably the first courtyard, the big cathedral and Golden Lane.  The courtyard wasn’t particularly finely adorned - the guide described the design as minimalist before minimalism became popular - but it had this awesome little spot which I have put a picture of below:

 

Doesn’t look particularly special, but if you stand in the middle of the circle (where Jo is standing) with your chin up and facing back towards the steps, when you speak it is amplified so that it sounds like you have two speakers on either side of your head.  Though it only sounds like that to you, not to anyone else.  It was pretty amazing, though something that you really have to experience cos you can’t really imagine it.  The cathedral took I think around 100 years to finish buildings, as it was a slow process interrupted by wars and other things.  It was an amazing big structure of Gothic architecture, that strongly reminded me of the Scott Monument in Edinburgh and probably also other churches around Edinburgh too.  This is it below:

It also had lots of big stained glass windows, with the exception of one which was handpainted in art nouveau style.  It is also the place where they store the royal jewels in a  casket which has seven locks and seven different people hold the keys, including the president.  The place where they store it is also along an outer wall, behind a huge mosaic which is made up of more than 1 million little pieces. Tried to get a picture of that too, although it was a little big.  Very impressive though!

Then Golden Lane, which I liked simply because it was so cute.  It used to be servants quarters, and is lots of little houses built into the bottom of what was a very thick wall.  Jo and Grace made me pose next to one of the doors because I was actually slightly too tall for it.  The famous writer Kafka also lived in one of the little houses at one point.  Above the houses you could walk inside the wall, where they displayed suits of armour, and also at one end medieval weapons of torture.  They also had a little gift shop, in which above the door they had a chastity belt! (Though it wasn’t an Everlast :P ).  Had a laugh about that, and of course had to get a picture.

 

We met a nice Canadian guy on the afternoon tour who was doing his masters in Edinburgh, and who strongly reminded me of my Canadian friend Karl from Freiburg!  Also met a couple from Wollongong, who were hilarious.  It was also strange, because the guy reminded Grace and I a lot of our cousin Tim, and we also found out he used to live in the same suburb our cousin currently lives in too!  We had a good laugh with them about the Brazilian guy in the group who would step directly in front of the tablet screen when the guide was showing us pictures, blocking the view of everyone standing behind him.  We also ran into them again not long after the tour which was lucky cos they were able to guide us back to where we needed to go.

Had some Czech food that night, namely goulash served in bread.  It was pretty delicious.  The previous night (just after we’d arrived) we had gone out in search of a place recommended to us by the hostel receptionist, but somehow managed to find ourselves in an Azerbaijani restaurant so ended up sampling some traditional Azerbaijani food.  Easy to do when everything is in Czech!  The Azerbaijani place also didn’t have English menus, but luckily someone there spoke English so he came over and translated the menu for us and gave us recommendations.  

But we’re now in Austria, which I am liking already.  Aside from the fact that its nice being able to read the signs and mostly understand people again, the views from the train were beautiful.  Lots of snow-dusted little villages and a very alpine-y landscape.  Looking forward to exploring Salzburg tomorrow, and Vienna next week.  Will hopefully do a Sound of Music tour tomorrow too! :)

Farewell Scotland, hello continental Europe!

Have gotten a bit slack over Christmas in the blog department, but realistically this is a trend that will probably continue for the rest of my travels.  Who knew simply writing down past events in a not so creative way could be such an effort?!

So anyway, brief run-down of Christmas and Hogmanay....  I think last I wrote was just before I met Grace in Germany.  We were in Germany for 4 days, and we spent pretty much the entire time at Christmas markets - went to the ones in Mainz (which was literally right down the street from the apartment we stayed in), Frankfurt and Wiesbaden.  They were all amazing!  And the last one we went to in Wiesbaden was the best, despite the icy rain for most of it, because I got to catch up with Jasmina! That was lovely, just wish we'd been in Germany a bit longer so we could hang out some more.  But yeah, so far still love Germany - am yet to have a bad experience :)

Had a lovely Christmas at Jo's place.  Got to meet some of her friends, experience a carvery meal, see a wee bit of London (which was dominated by shopping lol), attend our first Christingle service and eat a delicious Christmas dinner.  Then on Boxing Day we headed to Dub and Dee's (again for me, first time for Grace).  It was great to see them again, went for a walk around Elsenham and saw some thatched cottages, went to Anglesey Abbey and had a conservation tour of the house, and spent a few hours in Cambridge.  Both Grace and I have put pictures up on Facebook.

After that we headed back into London and got a bit more stuck into the touristy stuff - went and saw Buckingham Palace, took a walk along the Diana Memorial Walk, went to the Churchill War Room and then headed over to the Tower of London. Unfortunately we wasted so much time trying to find our way around the interrupted tube services in the morning when we got there that by the time we made it to the Tower it was too late to be worth going in.  But we had a look around the outside and took a few pictures.  Just another thing on my list of things to do next time I'm there.  A list that just keeps getting longer the more places I go!  Anyway after that we went and met Jo at Victoria Station and headed to Manchester.

Manchester wasn't very successful in terms of sightseeing, was more of a rest and recuperation stop on the way to Hogmanay.  Quite liked what I saw of it though.  Had one full day there, then headed on to Edinburgh for Hogmanay!  That was great, I remembered how much I love Scotland when I got back there.  Did a few more touristy things like Edinburgh Castle and a tour of some of Edinburgh's underground vaults where the homeless and criminals used to hide out back when being homeless was illegal in Edinburgh. There was also a Wiccan temple (not sure about both spelling and terminology there, but anyway it was a vault that modern day witches now use as their meeting place).  Also got to meet up with Hannah again, which was awesome! And just to top that off managed to beat all odds and find Jenna and a whole bunch of other Dundee people at the crowded street party! Unfortunately didn't manage to catch up with Meredith, Beth, Maria and Calum.  But all  in all Hogmanay was pretty good fun.  Fireworks over the castle looked pretty amazing.

After Edinburgh we ducked up to Inverness for our last two days in Scotland, which was lovely. Just wish we could have had a little more time! Stayed at a lovely little B&B that my parents and also cousins had previously stayed at and highly recommended.  It was also very conveniently located right across the river from the town centre. Inverness itself was lovely. Got some nice pictures of the buildings along the riverside. We did an afternoon tour which included a short cruise across Loch Ness to the ruins of Urquhart Castle. Then had a delicious Scottish dinner at the Hootananny - a pub known for its Scottish music. But I have decided to make a seperate blog (probably on Tumblr this time) where I will now note and describe in more detail all the amazing food I come across :) So I'll try and avoid repeating that now.

Anyway, after bidding a fond farewell to Scotland and the UK, we headed over to Berlin to begin our continental adventures. Spent about 4 full days in Berlin, which was awesome. After my second experience of Germany, albeit a lot shorter one this time, I'm still loving Germany. Public transport is amazing, lots of interesting history, and delicious food. We were a bit laid back, which meant that we didn't fit in as much as we probably could have, but we saw some of the main touristy sights in Berlin, the highlights of which were probably Hohenschoenhausen Prison, the Berlin Cathedral and the dome at the top of the German Reichstag.  Everything we saw was pretty awesome, but those are probably what stood out the most.  The second two in particular offered great views over Berlin, and the prison was fascinating but terrible - atrocities that continued to go on after WWII, just no longer carried out by Nazis.  It was also amazing getting to see bits of the wall and seeing it marked where it used to stand around the city.  The Brandenburger Tor was also pretty cool, and the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe was also really interesting.  Incredibly depressing/saddening information centre underneath it as well.  We also went to see Pitch Perfect at the cinema in Potsdamer Platz, which is where they have the film premieres in Berlin.

Now in Prague, which I will talk about in the next post as I really should be sleeping... But for mum and dad (/any other interested parties) we're headed to Salzburg tomorrow and then Budapest after that :) So that's me done for now - will try not to leave quite as long til my next post this time!

Travelling and time wasting

As the title might suggest, I'm once again travelling and finding myself with an abundance of time to waste.  Feeling very thankful to multinational chains right now, as I sit here taking full advantage of Starbucks and its 2 hours of free wifi.  So I think the last time I posted I was still in Dundee and feeling rather excited about Christmas....

I have now left Dundee for good.  Caught a sleeper train to London with Jo last Wednesday night, which was a fun little adventure.  It was bittersweet leaving - while I still have a lot of fun travelling to look forward to, I really enjoyed my time in Dundee and met some lovely people.  Will definitely have to try and get back to visit sometime in the near future.  Also I realised I never actually climbed the law!   I guess I was on crutches when everyone else did it, so kinda forgot about it and had noone else wanting to do it to remind me.  But anyway, I definitely really enjoyed my exchange experience and am so blessed I got the opportunity to do it.  All thats left from exchange is to await my final marks, and hope I don't have to struggle with the German department too much to get credit when I get home....

So moving on, I have been visiting Dub and Dee for the past few days, at their place near London.  That has been nice - I think I definitely crashed a little bit, sleeping in really late two of the mornings I was there.  But it was great to see them again, and meet baby Jessica.  Even got to go on a tour of the British museum led by Dub, looking at the many artefacts on display there that corroborate events and people described in the Bible.  That was really interesting, and a little bit mind-blowing.  Its really amazing that stuff from that long ago has been dug up again and we're able to see it.  I was also weirdly/nerdily excited that I got to hold a real Roman denarius while I was there - made from real silver. It was only small, but much heavier than I expected.  Can't imagine carrying around a bag of them!   Also went with the whole family to Cambridge yesterday afternoon, which was nice.  Actually had some nice weather - 8 degrees and sunny!  Walked around a bit and looked at the beautiful old buildings and the river punters and the markets.  Didn't go into King's College, which apparently is the more famous one and has an amazing chapel, cos its like 10 quid just to go in.  But I did have quick look in Trinity College - which apparently Isaac Newton had a room at, and Prince Charles stayed at when he went to uni.  It also had a little statue of Henry VIII over the entrance, which the history nerd in me loved.  I also paid to go in and have a look at St John's College, which was lovely too - like all them really.  But it has a replica of the Bridge of Sighs in Venice, which is very picturesque.

I have to say, its all the history that really makes Europe and the UK for me.  I mean I love the scenery and the sights too, but I think Australia is better for natural wonders, with our great beaches and stuff like the Barrier Reef.  But everywhere you go here just has so much history behind it - and a lot of it I have studied too, which makes it even more interesting I guess!

So anyway as I said before, I'm now sitting in a Starbucks wasting time while I wait for Grace to meet me.  We will probably just have a quiet day today, as I'm guessing Grace will be a bit jetlagged.  But there are Christmas markets to look forward to, and catching up with Jasmina when she gets to Germany too!  Looking forward to that, feels like forever since I last saw her.  I also need to sort out my luggage situation, as my suitcase has somehow managed to break - one of the wheels is no longer working, making it rather painful as I'm essentially dragging a 20kg bag behind me (that will be closer to 30 once I reclaim the stuff I left behind for the week in the UK :S).  But yeah, a week in Germany, then Christmas and New Year in the UK!  Can't wait!

And since this will probably be my last post before Christmas, I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas, celebrating the biggest birthday in the world with family and friends!  And if I don't make it on again before New Years either, Happy New Year as well!  Look forward to seeing everyone in Australia again in the new year :)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Firstly, when you read the title it should sound like the line in Michael Buble's version of this song :)
But yes, actually starting to get really excited for Christmas this year - and its only the start of December!  I think there's something about the fact that its winter so it feels more Christmassy... Which I know is a little ridiculous as I have never experienced a winter christmas in my life!  I blame the Christmas carols and retailers (snowmen, snowflakes, reindeer etc..).  The only downside is that I won't be with most of my family for Christmas, but Grace is coming over and we'll be staying at the lovely Jo's place for Christmas and then heading to Dub and Dee's place for Boxing Day so it promises to be fun nonetheless!

Quick summary of events since my last blog, before I go on to more Christmas stuff! From where I left off I have since made it through the terrible week of assessments, which I ended on a good note with a trip to St Andrews with the history society (picture below - see Facebook for more photos).

I finally made it to St Andrews, and it was as lovely as everyone has said :) We went to the castle and cathedral (both ruins) before going to a pub quiz with the St Andrews uni history society.  Have to say the best part of the castle was the old mine and countermine - where people outside the walls tried to tunnel in, and the people inside the walls built their own tunnel to meet up with the one from the outside.  It was a little creepy cos it was very small and obviously dark, but definitely the most adventurous part of the trip :P  Got lucky with the weather - although it was freezing the whole time, at least for the start of the trip there was a nice bit of sun. Enough for me to optimistically wear my sunnies for maybe an hour anyway!  Am planning on going back there for a bit more of a look around probably tomorrow with Jo - despite the fact that I should be studying, I have a whole week between exams which also happens to be my last week in Dundee, so I'm not inclined to waste the entire time studying!  Had my first exam yesterday, so it's one down one to go now.

But back to what I've done, the other exciting thing I've done, which incidentally ties in with my Christmas theme, was the Christmas dinner on Saturday night put on by Beth and Maria in their flat downstairs.  Although I had to leave kinda early to study for my exam, it was an awesome party.  I was so impressed with all the effort that went into it!  There were lots of decorations - a wall of paper snowflakes for starters, and Christmas stockings pinned to the notice board, a big snowman to take pictures with, a little Christmas tree with presents, a piece of mistletoe hanging in the corner, Christmas crackers and even reindeer poo in the hallway!  We also had a visit from Santa, who had all the presents everyone brought in a big sack, and everyone had to go sit on his knee to receive one :P

I also got to try two new delicious desserts that I will definitely have to remember in future.  Namely peppermint bark and oreo truffles.  Thank you Morgan for introducing me to those!  Also thanks to the party I am now the proud owner of a 46p santa hat from Tesco! Altogether it was a great party, with great company, great atmosphere, and great food.  Definitely put me in the right mood to be getting super excited about Christmas!

Which leads me to my future Christmas plans.  Firstly, and what will be the official beginning of my Christmas markets tour, is the last Stammtisch at the Edinburgh German Christmas market this Friday.  While it will be bittersweet, cos I have loved going to Stammtisch this semester and getting to know a great group of people and this will be the last time I get to hang out with them, it'll still be lots of fun :) I shall also finish my Scottish souvenir shopping while in Edinburgh - mainly the tartan kilted skirt I am still determined to get!

Next week I will bid a fond farewell to Dundee, ending with a Christmas dinner at Jenna's house which will be my first real 'traditional' Christmas dinner. Looking forward to that! Then I'll be off to get the sleeper train to London with Jo (which will be an adventure in itself - sleepover on a train! There will definitely be pictures!), where I'll stay with Dub and Dee until I fly to Germany on the 17th to meet Grace in Frankfurt.  Then we have a cute little apartment in Mainz for 4 nights and the Christmas market tour will really take place!  We have 3 full days in which I plan to attempt to go to the Christmas markets in Wiesbaden, Mainz, Ruedesheim, and Frankfurt.  Am also on a mission to find a cinema that will be showing The Hobbit in original version (i.e. English!).  And of course the highlight of the trip will be seeing Jasmina!! :) Can't wait to explore a Christmas market or two together.

All of this ending of course with Christmas in London - first at Jo's, then heading to Dub and Dee's for Boxing Day :) Can't wait! Basically, I am blessed to have a lot to look forward to this month, and it promises to be awesome!  Having so many other plans this month is also making me forget the sad fact that I'm leaving Dundee in a week's time - I don't know where the semester has gone?! But even though its been short it has been awesome, and I have met lots of lovely people while here.  But more on that later - I'm sure in my procrastination I will write another blog entry soon :)

Slipping...

Just realised exactly how long it has been since my last post!  I left off at Northern Ireland, which was now over a month ago!   But I'm afraid as the end of semester approaches and it has become super busy everything has been let slide a little - firstly this blog, but also things like grocery shopping, room cleaning and laundry...  So yes I am currently wearing the last of my clean clothes and have already had to resort to buying new underwear as I ran out, and I'm living one day at a time food-wise, mainly on Tesco sandwiches!  End of semester = good times! :P

So anyway, will have to just summarise things as I've missed so much and also am procrastinating right now from doing work on the 6 various assessments I have due this week :S  In a quick summary, what I have missed since my last (proper) post:  Republic of Ireland, Skyfall, Wales, Guy Fawkes Day, rugby matches in Edinburgh, Stammtisch, Katie's visit.  And now I should briefly expand on these things!  In no real order...

Skyfall: Ended up going to see it twice, here in Dundee with Jo and then again in Swansea with Meredith.  Lucky it was such a good movie!  I also put it down as experiencing yet another small part of British culture :)  In fact it made Jo very patriotic, and also very fervent in her desire to be a Bond girl  :P  Another interesting thing is that like Germany, sweet popcorn is a common thing here in the cinema.  But unlike Germany, they seem to also have butter/salted as an alternative option.

Guy Fawkes Day - So I'm guessing it's less of a deal in Scotland, judging by photos I've seen of Guy Fawkes Day celebrations elsewhere, and I would love to go to celebrations in England some day, but it was still nice here as well.  Got to trek through a large park and stand in the freezing cold and see a bonfire and some fireworks :) Reminded me a little of Skyfire, without the picnic and the lake and the warmer weather.  So actually not much like Skyfire :P But I guess they were the last fireworks I saw before then, so I automatically thought of it.  It also made me sad to realise that I won't be hanging with my cousins seeing the fireworks in Wollongong for New Years Eve this year.  Even though Hogmanay (Scottish name for NYE) in Edinburgh will definitely be awesome - would be even more awesome if they could be there with us!

Republic of Ireland - Ok so I talked at length about Northern Ireland in my last post, but will hve to be a bit shorter with the second half of that week I'm afraid.  Went to Dublin first, where I met Meredith.  Then the next day we wandered around Dublin a bit with a girl from Perth we met in the hostel, and also went to the Guinness Storehouse.  That was pretty cool, and Meredith was more than happy to benefit from the fact that I don't really like Guinness!  But we both got certificates for learning to pour the perfect pint of Guinness :) Then after planning a quiet dinner and a movie back at the hostel, we ended up going on a pub crawl in Dublin, as we were in the Temple Bar area.  That was fun, met some random people and went for a bit of a walk around.  The highlight of that though was definitely the last place we went to, which has this guy doing live music who was amazing!  Started to get a bit of a sore throat from cheering and singing along!  Then the next day we got a bus to Limerick, which turned out to be even more awesome than we thought.   Stayed at the Robin's Nest Guesthouse, which I most definitely recommend to anyone headed to Limerick!  Dave and Rosie were the people who owned the place and they were lovely hosts.  We went on a Paddywagon tour to the Cliffs of Moher and the Burren - it was pretty amazing, just for all the beautiful scenery! Took a scenic drive through County Clare as well, and also got lovely views of Galway Bay.  Saw an ancient tomb in the Burren, and also just the weird landscape was interesting - I think the guide said people say its similar to what the surface of the moon would look like.  We also managed to run into a girl who from memory was from Wollongong, that we met on the pub crawl in Dublin while at the Cliffs.  Also, fun fact that I may have also put under the pics I put on Facebook, but the Cliffs of Moher were the Cliffs of Insanity from the Princess Bride! :)  Anyway, that night Dave and Rosie invited us for dinner, which was lovely - a home-cooked meal and some real Irish company!  Got to try my first Irish coffee, and we ended the night watching Downton Abbey.  Then the next day they gave us a lift into town, and ended up keeping our bags for us while we spontaneously went to the rugby match that was on.  That was awesome - the atmosphere of joining the crowds streaming down the street to the stadium, and then being there for a home win.  Munster, which was the home team, was playing Edinburgh.  Was slightly conflicted about who to go for, but had to go for Munster, as they were the home team and I was also inadvertently already wearing their colours!  So that was awesome, and afterwards Dave and Rosie came back in with our bags and gave us a lift to the bus back to Dublin - some of the nicest people I have met, and I can't recommend their guesthouse enough!  Got back to Dublin, and had close call with printing my boarding pass for Ryanair - something to be careful of in future, as I hadn't realised if you don't pre-print it they charge like 60 quid for them to print it for you!  But we got that done at an internet cafe, and then just headed to the airport and spent the night there - actually managed to get a bit of sleep, as they had some padded booths in the food court that were free :)  

Wales - This was my first prolonged experience of typical UK weather - rained at some point every day we were there.  But it was still nice :) Flew into Cardiff in the morning, so had most of the day to wander around there which was good.  Found a Wetherspoons right next to the bus/train stations that had very decent prices for food - we ended up going there several times while in Cardiff! - and that was our first stop of the day.  Then we went to Cardiff Bay, and from there started our own self-guided Torchwood/Doctor Who tour of Cardiff - which you can see from pictures I have put on Facebook.  The highlight of this was the shrine to Ianto Jones that people made where the entrance to Torchwood was - some people are far to obsessed with TV shows, but it was certainly interesting and a little amusing to see - and also the church from the episode where Rose's dad dies.  Then went for a walk down Cardiff's high street after dropping our bags off at the hostel.  It was pretty cool - they had lots of different flags along the street, and we also found a market where we got some curry, cheese and chips, and also some UK flags.  Best thing we found was definitely the dalek sitting outside a costume shop in a little arcade though!  There was a massive line around it though cos of Halloween, so we went back the next morning to be touristy/nerdy and take pictures!  Anyway, the next morning we met Barbara - who I met on the course in Freiburg and goes to uni in Wales - and we went to the Doctor Who Experience!  It was amazing - only slightly disappointing thing being it was very much orientated around the current Doctor, so there wasn't half as much tenth doctor as I could have liked!  But yeah, that was awesome.  Then afterwards we headed to Swansea, where we stayed with Barbara for most of the rest of our trip.  It was quite nice - there was a nice beach that we went for a walk on, as well as going for a wander around the town itself.  That's also where we went and saw Skyfall, and I was also a nerd and spent a few hours in the Swansea Uni library working on an essay I had forgotten about until just before we left!  Altogether it was nice and relaxing, and nice to catch up with Barbara again :) 

[Ok so this is not staying as brief as I would have liked, which is definitely not a good thing for the amount of work I'm getting done...! :S But oh well, it's nice reliving these memories anyway :) And we're on the home stretch now!]

Rugby matches - these were awesome!  Both were at Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh.  The first one was definitely the best - the All Blacks vs Scotland, with a sold out crowd.  Went with my flatmate Calum - who I also stayed with - his brother Rory, and my other flatmate Camilla and her boyfriend.  We also were with a bunch of friends - all exchange students - at first, but weren't sitting with them as they bought their tickets separately.  But yeah, both of them were great, I love the atmosphere.  As you may have gathered from my comments on the pictures I put up on Facebook!  Bagpipes, kilts, and some rugby thrown in - whats not to love?!  Actually that is definitely one thing I love about Scotland - how Scottish men will use any occasion as an excuse to wear their kilt.  That and the fact that in Edinburgh you will always find at least one busking bagpiper, and usually more than one.  But anyway, the rugby was definitely an awesome experience, from the meandering there past stalls with match day scarves and street percussionists and young boys playing bagpipes or fundraising for their rugby clubs in a crowd of people wearing jerseys and kilts, to the walking back afterwards in a crush of people who use their people power to just walk in front of the traffic.  Love it all.  We also went to an Australian bar the first weekend in Edinburgh, which was funny - I swear there were more French than Aussies in there cos they were showing the live broadcast of the Wallabies playing France.  Was pretty gutted that they didn't have twisties as was advertised on their website, but had a Bundy rum and coke with Beth, Meredith and Maria as an alternative taste of home :P 

So that was the last 2 weekends, and then this weekend I was in Edinburgh again with Jenna as our friend Katie, who we met in Freiburg and has been working there since, came to visit :)  That was fun, we did slightly more touristy stuff like going to the foot of the castle, going to a whisky bar and trying some of the whiskies, having a look in St Giles Cathedral, and just walking around Edinburgh a bit.  Then went to dinner with some of Jenna's friends before going back to her friend Rachel's place for the night.  All in all was a good day, and a good weekend back in Dundee - didn't do anything too major, just hung out and went out on Saturday night.  

Lastly I have to mention Stammtisch - which I may or may not have mentioned before I'm not sure.  Basically its just a bunch of German speakers and learners of German meeting up for a few drinks at the pub every so often - in theory to speak German, though gotta be honest thats more rare than it should be...  Its a great group of people and its been fun hanging out with them every few weeks this semester!  But I'm reminded of it because our last one for the year, and my last one ever :( will be in Edinburgh next weekend, cos they have a German Christmas market!  Should be fun, I'm looking forward to it.  Can then compare it to the christmas markets we'll go to in Frankfurt soon!  

But anyways, given the length of this post it is definitely time for me to stop procrastinating and get back to work!  That's me all caught up for now, and there will probably be no further news for at least a week or so while I get past the next week or so of assessment hell, and then the two exams I have left.  But after that is when the real travels begin - definitely something to look forward to!  So until then ;)

Quick wee update...

Hey! I just realised I'm actually not sure who bothers to read this other than my parents and Jo, Paul and Emily.... but anyway, along whoever else does bother to regularly read this, just wanted to reassure you all that I haven't given up on my oh-so-inspiring blog writing just yet!  Will finish off Ireland and also talk a bit about Wales and the Doctor Who Experience just as soon as I have finished this pesky essay due on Wednesday.  Will also then have time to upload some photos to Facebook :) But in the meantime, its the library for me!

Catch up: the Emerald Isle and a bit of British culture.

Ok! Just realised it had been awhile since my last post, and since I'm going away again tonight I have a bit of catching up to do, so here goes.  Apologies if its a little long...  But since my last post I've spent a week in Ireland, and also had a week of relaxing time spent hanging out with friends and soaking in a little bit more of British 'culture' :)  Have also not spent enough time doing work - hard to remember sometimes that I am still at uni!

So anyway, starting with my reading week trip to Ireland.  They don't have mid-semester break as such over here, but some schools have what's called a reading week, where you just don't have any lecture or tutes for a week.  And since I didn't really have any work due around this week, I decided to just spend the whole week in Ireland.

Flew to Belfast first, on the Monday morning.  Got there early afternoon, and after dropping my stuff at the hostel wasn't sure what to do so went for a walk into the centre of the city.  Belfast isn't the prettiest city I've seen, but it has lots of interesting old buildings which make it not too bad.  The first impressive buildings that come to mind include the Crown Liquor Saloon, the City Hall, and St Anne's Cathedral.  But I also found it interesting the amount of old looking buildings that had been either abandoned or neglected and so had lots of little greenery growing all over them, in or near the city centre.

Didn't a whole heap on Monday - the downside to travelling alone is that I don't really feel safe going anywhere alone at night.  So I bought my first ever burrito, which was actually pretty delicious, and headed back to the hostel.  Stayed at a place called Global Village, which I would definitely recommend to anyone going to Belfast.  It was fairly close to everything, clean and comfortable, the staff were really friendly and helpful, and it was nice and cheap.  It also happened to be filled with Australians when I was there - most from Melbourne but I shared a room with 3 girls from Sydney.  So everyone was quite friendly which was nice.

Did a day trip on Tuesday to Giant's Causeway and the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge.  That was really good - a bit of a long day, but the beautiful scenery made up for it.  Saw the castle at Carrickfergus first.  That was just a 10 minute photo stop, but a nice view to start off the day.  Then drove through some beautiful countryside to the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge.  Main feature I noticed was that most of the fences on farms had shrubby trees planted along them - whether they were low stone fences or newer wire-style fences.  The views of and around the bridge were beautiful, and made me wish I had a better camera that could do the views a bit more justice! Still got some rather nice pics though.  Unfortunately the bridge was closed for repairs so only got to see it not cross it.

After that headed along the coast to the little town of Doolin for a lunch break, then continued along the coast to the Giant's Causeway.  That really was amazing. Was too skint to pay the extra money to go into the brand new visitors centre, so I remain mystified by how the causeway was formed.  But I definitely recommend visiting both the bridge and the causeway if you're ever in Northern Ireland, especially if you can get there on a nice day.

Anyway, overall was lucky with the beautiful weather, and had a great day.  Didn't get back til late and so decided to grab some fish and chips for dinner.  Went to a fish and chip shop, and as I was deciding what to get - standing right next to the door - this young guy probably about my age walked into the shop, then starting yelling "Everybody get down! I'm robbing this joint, I've got a hamster (?) in my pocket!".  It was a little frightening really - though maybe I would have been slightly more worried if I'd understood what a 'hamster' was.  But I was definitely edging to the door.  However everyone in the shop just ignored him, and after yelling a few more times, the woman behind the counter called out next please, and he gave this really odd laugh and ran out of the shop.  It was really weird - I guess he must have been either drunk or stoned?  But anyway the rest of the night was pretty uneventful after that, just watched a movie with some Australian girls, and tried to figure out how to make the best of the time I had left in Belfast the next day.

Ended up getting a sightseeing bus on Wednesday morning.  Wanted to do a black taxi tour, where they take you around all the sites of political significance, but unfortunately it was too expensive to do on my own.  So the sightseeing bus was the second option, as it went through political areas just in less detail.  The bus route was really interesting - went through Titanic quarter, Stormont, Shankhill, Sandy Row, among other places.  Made me wish I had more time in Belfast though - cos I wanted the time to actually get off at all the stops and walk around for myself.  The weather also wasn't that great - a bit rainy - meaning we had to sit inside the bus and couldn't get many good pictures.  But I did have time for a walking tour of the Titanic quarter, which was really interesting.  It left from the brand new Titanic centre, and went through where it was designed and built.  It was a little mind blowing, seeing just how immense the ship was from the size of the places it was built.  In particular the dry dock.  The guide was great too.  Both on the bus and on the tour the guides told us about the inquiry in Belfast after the Titanic sank - apparently all they got from it was that Belfast only built her and she was fine when she left, it wasn't their fault she had an English captain, a Scottish navigator and hit a Canadian iceberg.

I found out a whole bunch of interesting stuff on my sightseeing tour, some of which I wrote down.  but unfortunately/lucky for you I don't really have to time or inclination to list them right now.  So moving on... I got the train to Dublin late afternoon after going back to the hostel to collect my stuff.  The train was fine - after some initial confusion where I got into a reserved carriage and took someone else's seat, I just spent the rest of the trip reading all the brochures I had collected in Belfast.  When I got to Dublin I dropped my stuff at the hostel, went for a walk to get some dinner, then chilled in the common room with some ciders until Meredith came.

And now I'm actually going to have to cut this short, as I have to leave shortly for Wales! So I'll have to come back to my time in the Republic of Ireland later..

But last week I will briefly talk about - the week in between Ireland and Wales :)  Didn't travel, but still had a great week.  Had my first experience of Nandos with Jo - despite walking past the Nandos in Canberra almost every day for at least a year, I had never been.  So that was tasty :) Along with that, I soaked up a little more British culture with Jo in the form of some films - watched the Inbetweeners movie on Wednesday night, Johnny English Reborn on Thursday night, and went and saw the new James Bond film Skyfall on Sunday.  Love it!  Also got to catch up briefly with Hannah, when she crashed at mine for the night on the way from Ireland to Elgin.  Luckily this reunion was not as eventful as the last one!

Also went to Jenna's 21st on Friday, with Jo as my lovely date :) Had a girly moment, and went shopping with Jo and bought a new dress, new shoes and even some makeup!  It was good, though there was a DJ who had a bit of a power complex, and also really did not seem to understand that DJs are there to play music, not constantly drown out the music with talking/announcements.  Though I'm beginning to think this is a Scottish DJ thing, because I saw another DJ thats supposed to be kinda famous at the Union, and he also talked far more than I think a DJ should!

Anyways, thats me done for now... Am taking my computer with me to Wales, as this time I actually have to do some work while I'm there :S So will possibly attempt to catch up the rest of Ireland soon.  But otherwise watch this space for some fun tales from Wales!

[And yes it is awesome that that rhymed, and it will probably be the title of my Wales blog :)]

zzOMBIE...

Ok so just reread that last paragraph of the last post and realised it really does not make much sense - I have to admit at this point I was actually falling asleep at the keyboard.  And this is exactly why I can no longer do all-nighters writing essays - imagine the marks I'd get for that!!  Edited one of the sentences, but decided to leave the other one there for your amusement...

So just to revise, I am indeed determined to get a tartan skirt, but I'm uncertain how that relates to being king... Basically it's because I figure I'm in Scotland, so when else is going to be a better time to get one?  I saw some in Edinburgh yesterday on my way to dinner, so I definitely have them in my sights.  Just gotta save up so I can actually afford to get to Edinburgh again (seriously!).

Also it was requested that I do go back to the last part a little more, cos I kept it pretty short last night.  No worries, this won't be a long addition as I don't have heaps more to say (on a quick side note though, I get laughed at whenever I say heaps, because everyone says loads not heaps over here) but just a few more quick comments...

Balmaha as I said was quite cute - a very small village surrounded by beautiful scenery and next to Loch Lomond of course.  As you can see in one of my photos, there were lots of boats there, and I did see people heading out in a canoe while I was standing there.  I also came across some campers when I when for a short exploratory walk near the loch.  Looked like a pretty nice spot, though I reckon it'd be pretty cold!!

Aberfoyle was also quite cute though a little bigger than Balmaha. Had a steak pie for lunch - probably my favourite dish so far over here.  I just love that they call it a pie when its not.  Actually will have to take a photo the next time I have one so you guys can see what I mean.  But yeah, didn't do much here cos we only stopped for lunch.

Duke's Pass was indeed very pretty, though it was hard to take many photos through the window of a bus.  Loch Katrine was also really beautiful, though it was definitely a bit chilly standing outside in the wind!  But worth it for the views I think.  This reminds me that I still definitely need to get a winter jacket - probably sooner rather than later - and also some good boots for walking.  Actually in all the writing I did yesterday, I forgot to say - I'M SO GLAD I CAN WALK NORMALLY AGAIN! :D Slopes are still not the best, as I can definitely still feel it pulling a bit, but I'm practically back to normal which is great.  Though I have to admit I was not too adventurous with climbing around on the yacht while it was moving, just because I didn't want to either step wrong and wreck it all over again, and also I had less faith in my ability to catch myself if I did trip, and didn't really fancy going for a dip in the water.

Not much else to say about Hamish, but hairy coo is definitely a thing - we passed another bus that had hairy coo tours written all over it. And Stirling Castle was pretty cool. I found that the inside felt a little fake - you can see in my photos how colourful it is, because it was all recently repainted and renovated.  Apparently they tried to replicate how it would have been, but you could still tell it was all new, which sort of took away from the authentic feeling.  But the castle is still very impressive, and from the outside I guess it's pretty much the same as it would have been when it was occupied (though maybe a little more weathered).  The views are definitely the most stunning feature of the castle - you just can't beat that location.  I also didn't figure out how the food was served when the kitchens seemed to be detached from the other buildings... obviously wasn't looking closely enough!  The old graveyard just down from the castle was quite picturesque too - as one of the girls I was with said, even the dead get a view!  Found the grave of a William Drummond, but I'm unsure why that name is familiar.  Figured he was someone important though, as his grave was set apart from most of the others.

The town of Stirling also seemed really cool as we were driving through - think I might have to go back there if I can find the time before I leave. Lots of cool old monuments and statues, and nice parks etc.  Anyway, that turned out slightly longer than expected, and now I need to get back to the real world and do some reading for my next tute!

On the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond...

While it's only been just over a week since my last post, contrary to the trend of the past few weeks I actually feel like I've had an action packed time between then and now!  This is probably also just left over from doing a day tour with so many things crammed into it today, but nonetheless I am very pleased to actually have exciting things to report in this blog!

So anyway, onto the actual things I've done!  First of all, I finally felt like a real uni student again last week, while going to the library with Jo for study sessions every day except Friday!  (On a side note, is it confusing for anyone else that I now have two friends called Jo who I could be writing about? Lol.)
Had a horrible class test for comparative politics this week, that I was actually semi-organised and studied early for.

But anyway the (first) main event was going on the Dundee University Sailing Club's annual Booze Cruise!  This involved taking a bus across to Oben, which is on the west coast, then sailing from there up the Sound of Mull to the little town of Tobermory and back again the next day.  It was definitely a weekend of experiences - most importantly my first experience of real sailing.  But I think the best way to describe it is in chronological order, so I'll go back to the start!

Around midday on Friday I got a bus with about 13 other people (the larger group was split into minibuses and cars for the trip) to Oben.  Our bus went a bit earlier than everyone else's, so we could do a tour of the whisky distillery at Oben before it closed.  That was pretty interesting, I learnt that whisky only has 3 ingredients - barley, yeast and water - and that it takes a hell of a long time to fully finish a batch!  Also had a tasting of some whisky - both from a cask they had opened early (12 years instead of the usual 14) and from a fully matured bottle.  Actually preferred the younger one which was a lot more alcoholic, but possibly this was because I drank it all in one long sip, instead of trying to take lots of little sips.  I definitely find the taste too strong to take lots of little sips...  Anyway, after that we went and got fish and chips for dinner then headed down to the docks (marina?) to unload our stuff from the bus to the yachts that would be our accommodation for the weekend.  I've decided to try and be fancy and put some pics and stuff in this entry, but if you've been on Facebook you will have already seen them anyway :) So there were 5 yachts with 10 people on each (I think they were 40 something foot?).  And my yacht for the weekend was called the Oceanlord.

Inside they really were just like a caravan - fully decked out with beds aka berths, kitchen aka galley, sitting area aka saloon, etc etc. A caravan, but for water.  So yeah, eventually everyone made it to the docks and onto their boats, and then the trip really began with general partying on the boats.

The next day was a bit of a slow start, as I think many people were recovering.  But we eventually got out (my boat was a close second to being first out!) and then the sailing experience began.  We motored out, and then put up the sails and turned the motor off.  It really was quite cool - tacking in particular is definitely an experience.  To go faster you sail on an angle, that at times was alarming sharp!  Everything loose was sliding around in the cabin, but of course the boat is very well designed, so that even when you're on an angle like that, you can still boil the kettle for some tea.  So yeah, sailing up the Sound of Mull to Tobermory took most of the day (a good 6 hours at least I think), but the scenery was beautiful and it was quite peaceful.  Have to admit I had a wee snooze at one point inside the cabin, as a week of poor sleep caught up to me.

Once we got to Tobermory, we had about an hour to use the bathrooms/go to the supermarket or whatever before we all met for dinner at one of the local pubs.  Then we had dinner and drinks, including a 'boat race' which was basically a small team representing each boat, in a tag team to finish their drinks first.  I have to note, there was one guy who wore his kilt - something which I find awesomely in keeping with stereotypes!  Someone told me that Scottish boys will use any excuse to get their kilts out, and so far I have found this to be fairly true.  I love it!  Definitely means there's no forgetting where you are! :P But anyway, eventually the party was then moved both to the other local pub called The Mish Nish (love the name!) which even has a 'disco', and also back to the boats.  All round another good night had by all - though I have to admit I crashed early, cos I was so tired I wasn't functioning very well...  But I learnt an awesome tip for having a gin and tonic - don't just put in a slice of lime, but add a slice of cucumber as well.  It tasted great.  Jo (Australian) you should definitely try it the next time you make a gin and tonic, and then let me know what you think :)

Anyway, managed to make a relatively early start the next morning, which was good.  My boat was actually the first out that morning.  But it didn't leave before I went for a walk and found a bakery from which I got a coffee and a lamington - yes a LAMINGTON!  No idea what an Australian cake was doing in a tiny bakery in an isolated little island town, but it was delicious so I won't even question it.  Also managed to get a few really nice shots of the waterfront of the town (which was basically the whole town).  I reckon it has to be one of the most colourful towns in Scotland, it was so cute.

Thats not the best shot - see my Facebook for a better one - but you get the idea :) So anyway, as there was next to no wind, we motored the whole way back.  Which was actually really great, cos it meant that everyone could relax a bit, and we travelled in a kind of convoy all the way back.  We hoisted one of the guys on my boat up the mast in a harness, and then sent him up his brekkie (a beer and a bacon roll) in a bucket, so he could enjoy it while hanging up there on the mast.  A few other people on the boat tried it too, and then soon all the boats had someone up the mast.  We also watched some guys on one of the other boats wake boarding behind it. I wouldn't have thought they could go fast enough to make it possible, but I realised that because the rope they hold is attached to the top of the mast, its much easier to get up because they are literally pulled up.  But yeah, that looked pretty awesome.  Another boat had their own guitar player, so they were just chilling on the deck listening to him play and sing/having singalongs.  Basically it was just a really chilled ride, ending with all the boats rafting up together and everyone climbing onto the boats to hang out, get pictures and what not.  Some crazy guys even went swimming - despite the fact that I was sitting there in like 4 layers and not super warm!
Altogether it was a really good weekend, and I'm glad I got to go along despite not being a member of the sailing club.

The other main event of this past week was today, as I went on a day tour of Loch Lomond, the Trossachs and Stirling Castle.  This was the day tour I did, and while action packed it was really enjoyable.  Definitely glad I'm finally getting to see a bit of Scotland too!  So anyway, as the tour left from Edinburgh at 9:15am, I had to get up around 6am to first get the train to Edinburgh.  That was not easy believe me, and my mood wasn't improved when the return ticket cost a ridiculous amount of money, and then when I got to Edinburgh and had to pee I couldn't because it cost 30p and I didn't have a 10p coin!  That and they also had absolutely no bins around!  But definitely cheered up on the walk between the station and the tour meeting point.  Edinburgh is a beautiful city.  Not even because its that 'nice' specifically.  But everything is so old, and consistently old unlike York with its weird mix of architectures.  You get the feeling Edinburgh has just always been there, and has weathered the time with dignity and just the right amount of change.  And yes, thats the end of me waxing poetical, because yes it does sound a little odd.  But basically what I'm trying to say is that while it is not beautiful in a strictly aesthetic way like Strasbourg for example, it has a character that makes it beautiful in its own way.

So anyway, eventually found the tour, and we all boarded the bus and headed for our first stop which was Balmaha, a village on the shores of Loch Lomond.  That was cute, and we had a bit of time to go off ourselves and look at the loch and surrounding area.  Then we went to the nearby village of Aberfoyle for lunch, where I met and had lunch with 2 American girls from the bus.  They were both really nice, and it was nice to have someone to hang out with - the sole travelling thing can be a little lonely.  After Aberfoyle we headed to Loch Katrine for the cruise, going over Duke's Pass on the way - the prettiest road in Scotland in our tour guides opinion.

The cruise was nice - saw some really beautiful scenery, which you can see some of in my photos on Facebook.  Then we headed to Stirling Castle, via a quick visit to Hamish the Highland Cow, aka Hamis the Hairy Coo.  He is apparently so famous a bull that he has his own Facebook page Hamish the Highland Cow.  Our bus driver also took great joy in telling us several times that they are also known as 'hairy coos'.  He also took great joy in playing us some old Scottish folk songs.  As the title of this post might suggest, I definitely got them stuck in my head, especially the Loch Lomond song

But yeah, Stirling Castle was also great - quite interesting, especially compared to the few castles I have.  Definitely a bit different - especially size-wise - than other castles I have seen so far.  But awesome all the same.  I'm thinking Edinburgh Castle must be a similar size though - will have to go there soon and see for myself!

Could talk a lot more particularly about Stirling, but I'm pretty tired now!  So might need to come back next time.  New obsession is getting a tartan skirt cos I'm in Scotland so any of the point I'm totally king.  But now I desperately need some sleep so I shall bid you all adieu and til next time! :)