Southern Highlands

Last post about Scotland! For now at least.... there is something that i'm pretty sure i'll go back and see in May. It's called Alnwick Castle and it is where some of the Harry Potter films were made. So of course I have to see it! We shall see how that plan goes ..... :)

On our last day in Scotland we took a bus tour that showed us some country side (I was quite happy to see some fields and horses and cows!) and eventually took us to the southern part of the highlands. On the way I learned some fun facts from the driver (yes, I was the only one taking notes). 

First he claims that Edinburgh is the smart city in the world, because most of the famous inventions/inventors came from people who lived or were born in Edinburgh. 
Alexander Graham Bell was born in Edinburgh, but his family soon moved to Canada. We all know he invented the telephone, but what I didn't know was that he was originally trying to invent a hearing aid because both his father and mother were deaf. I was quite interested in that fact, because for those of you who don't know.. I am learning American Sign Language and want to work with people or kids who are deaf and possibly want cochlear implants. 

Our first stop was the Wallace Monument 

 I really quite liked the big stone rope going around the monument (above), and loved the key holes in the side of the monument (below).

If you like the movie Brave Heart, then you should be familiar with Wallace. I have not seen the movie! So, I don't know much about the whole battles. I know that the monument is 237 feet tall making it the largest monument "ever erected" or at least in Britain. Haha the tour guide was really really great, but loved Edinburgh that he bragged it up a bit. 

After we saw the monument it was back on the bus... As we were driving I was staring out the windows, and absolutely love love love love love love the moment you start to see faint outline of the mountains. 

  Look really hard!! You can see them! This was taken while we were driving, so it's not the best picture in the world. But it took me down memory lane in an instant. 

We used to make yearly skiing trips in Colorado, but a few years it was the Foutch, Troshynski, Hansen trip! We would gas up the Foutch van and the Troshynski van and pile in Mike, Shelley,  Bill, Shannon, Lance, Lisa, Jake, Nick, Ryan, Nathan, Whitney, Taylor, Emily, (sometimes a friend of hers), Me, Rachie, and Lauren. Can you imagine!! But it was always a competition in each van to see who was the first to see the mountains, or who was the first to reach the front of the van to be in Colorado first. I could remember Taylor running up there while Bill was driving and sticking her fingers in the windshield so she was the first one to be in Colorado. 
Those were the thoughts crossing my mind when seeing the outlines of the mountains. Oh what great memories! I wouldn't have wanted it any other way!  Just made my day a happy one :) 

The next stop was Loch Lomond. There are 33,000 lochs in Scotland. Wow! On Loch Lomond there are 36 islands. We took a little cruise on the loch, and saw a few of those islands. I also saw some famous golf courses for all you golfers out there! I asked Ryan if he thinks he will be able to golf there someday, and he said that they named the course after him. So you may not have known that fact! 

Can you tell which parts are part of the golf courses? ha! They stuck out like a sore thumb. 
You can tell how our weather wasn't as great as the day we climbed Author's seat in the post before! This is more typical UK weather from my experience. 

After our tour we went to a small town to grab some lunch and then a nice scenic mountain cruise to get to another castle. However, half of this one I was like oooohh pretty, and the other half I was scared that I might not make it back to the US. 

Then we had made it to Doune Castle. If you are a fan of Monty Python and the Holy Grail movie you would probably know what I am talking about. Again, I have not seen that movie. I took a few cool pictures, but have nothing else to tell you about the castle because we didn't pay for the headset. Just from walking around I don't know how they went around that thing with no electricity, or how the went up and down those spiral staircases. You want to talk about some steep steps! And they were so tiny that my foot (and I have pretty small feet) were never fully on a step. I was holding on for dear life on the way down. 

See what I mean!?! Maybe it's harder to tell in the picture.... The stair wells were so dark too. Dangerous mix I tell ya! 

And then God lit a tree on fire to end our eventful day. Kind of overly like this picture as well.

That is technically the end of my Scotland trip!! I hope you enjoyed reading the blog posts about it! Since it was Valentines day I will leave you with one more story that took place in Edinburgh. We were standing at the corner of the street waiting to cross when another girl maybe a few years older walked over and also was waiting to cross. A man pursues her and says "Excuse me, hi, (smiles) ha, well, i've never really done this before, but, I just saw you walking, and you are so beautiful, and so I wanted to come say hi and maybe introduce myself" The woman really wasn't interested, and when it was time to cross she sure got her power walk on. The man walked home lonely. So, hopefully your Valentines Day was better than his!! 

Lots of love <3 :) 

Witch do you Believe?

The second day of Edinburgh, we got up early can headed down the royal mile to see... 

Palace of Polyroodhouse

It is where the Queen stays when she is in Edinburgh, which is only a few times a year. 

We didn't pay for entry into the Palace, we mainly went to the royal mile to get to Author's Seat. Author's seat is a view that takes a little bit of a climb to get up to it. It didn't seem that bad at the time, but I soon realized (again) how out of shape I am... yikes! 

Here are some pictures on the way up to Author's seat. What do you think? 

Also, a little info about it's past! 

 I love this picture above. The sun is coming up behind this man, and he is just on a nice morning stroll. He is so tiny too! Hard to show the size of the climb upward. It was more than it could look that's for sure. 

 We were lucky for such a beautiful day. Look at that picture perfect sky! The day before this and the day after this was not as pleasant (rainy/cloudy)

I really wanted to take a panoramic photo, but I can only do that on my iphone (boo). 

Sophie did take a couple, so when she posts her pictures then I will just add one or two to the end of a later post. 

After conquering Author's seat, we headed back up the royal mile when we heard.......

At this point my Scotland trip had pretty much been completed. I had seen a lot, done a lot, and had finally heard a lot! It was very very nice, and definitely Scottish! ;) 

We had a special night tour planned called Witch Tours. They are very popular tours in Edinburgh, because it is claimed to be the most haunted place in the UK. 

But before I get to that......

We had a different kind of "entertainment" sneak up on us. We were walking down the royal mile (a couple blocks down from our hostel) to a pub we had seen earlier and decided we were going to have dinner at. We walked in and they weren't serving any longer. Alright. So we walked back up and were standing outside of a pub reading their menu when we heard some yelling. I looked up and saw a man yelling at another man and pursuing him across the street. Then the man that was yelling punch the other man and he fell to the ground. The man and his girlfriend walked off between two buildings. 

     I was in a bit of a wow, ok, comprehend moment. I have seen fights before.. whatever. But this man was making groaning noises on the ground.... still hasn't gotten up. 

A few taxis drive by and he tries to wave from on the ground, but they don't see him. Then he starts asking for help from some people who were walking by (we were at the corner and he was in the middle of the block) they all ignored him. He asks more people they keep ignoring him. Ok we see a group of people about to walk right by him in 20 seconds, they ALL ignore him. 

      So, he starts asking people to call 9-9-9 (their emergency number) people keep ignoring (mind you this is all going on within a minute or two) then i'm like good greif! I thought everything was going to be alright, but when people start begging for an ambulance I'm not going to refuse my help. So we run up there (we are on the opposite side of the street) and call 9-9-9 for him. Now, a man and his two teenage kids have stopped to see if he is ok. We call the ambulance and they tell us we have to wait for them to get there, so stay by his side and if he goes unconscious then turn him on his side. 

     We wait over by him, and the Scottish man and his two kids wait with us (thank gosh). I think his name was Paul and he was 42. Paul was drunk and that's another reason why I was really glad that the man and his kids stayed. After what seemed like a long time waiting we were sirens....finally!! The start coming up the street so we wave our arms....... THEY DRIVE RIGHT  BY US! They somehow don't see 5 people waving their arms, and continue on by. I run to the corner thinking they are going to turn around....... nope!! We have to recall and be like um, they just passed us, can they turn around?? We have to spend more time waiting and Paul is slowly becoming less responsive. 

     Finally, they come and get Paul into the ambulance to check him out. The police show up at the same time. Time to leave??? Nope. We stay for another 15 minutes explaining what happened being eye witnesses! He was asking me all these details, and then asked if I would be able to pick the man out of a lineup. I was wondering if this was really happening to me in Scotland, and yes, yes it was. Then the cop called me later to ask more questions because they found someone on tape that could be him. Everything happened so fast, I am not sure how anyone is reliable in that kind of situation. Although i'm glad I could offer a bit of information. Paul definitely had a broke nose, and he had to go to the hospital to see if his face was fractured. 

After all that happening it was 9:30 pm and we still hadn't had anything to eat. So we went back to the pub that we were checking out, and they weren't serving any longer either. We finally found a place and ate a bite before our tour!! 

The tour was about witches and ghosts and then ended with what they call the underground city--the vaults. 

     Witches. Witches a lot of witch prosecution went on back in the day. Anyone with red hair, 3rd nipple (which was used to feed the devil off of), and certain typical features like big moles or warts, etc. If you had any of these features then you were forced to confess. Once they didn't confess they would nail their thumbs and toes to a chair and throw them into a river. This particular river was used quite often, and not recreationally. When they had no plumbing they had these bins to keep their um, wastes, in. They used to just empty their bins by turning it upside down out of their window. But people kept complaining about getting unpleasant wastes on their head. Finally the city said that is enough! You can only do that at 10am and 10pm and that still didn't work, so eventually they said everyone take your wastes to this river. That was conveniently during the witch era. 

     They would throw the witch nailed to the chair in the river and if they floated they were a witch (which they usually did because of the chair and other things, um, in the river), and if they didn't they drowned and died (but they weren't a witch!!) They would get the floating witches and tell them to confess that they are witches. If they confessed they were witches then they would be tortured and then burned. If they didn't confess then they would just be burned. 

So maybe there are angry spirits that decided to hang around Edinburgh a bit longer. 

And now we have the ghost part. 

Our tour guide was really good, and told us many stories. I sucked in all the information I could, but i'm not wonder woman. 

Here is an interesting story that he told us before we entered the vaults. 

     There was this man who founded a very Christian section of religion and gained many loyal followers. One day he confessed to them all that he has sinned. He has been sinning, sins against the flesh. But no one believed him.  How could this man so loyal and God loving do terrible things? They thought he had gone mad. So they had doctors come and check his mental state out. After a few doctors visited him, they all concluded that he was driving himself mad because of his guilty conscience. They went to his sister to ask if she knew what was going on, and she confessed everything. How they sold their souls to the devil in the woods when coming back from a different town. She kept telling them more and more information and told them about his crooked staff that he always used to walk around with....and how that was given to him by the devil himself and that it gave him special powers. They decided to sparate him and the staff. They took him to the town square where they burned him. After he was dead they threw in the staff. They say that when the staff was thrown into the fire it started jumping around, dancing, and spinning. People say that sometimes they see a carriage driving up the street, the devil driving, and stopping by where his house used to be... then a man would walk to the carriage, get in, and drive to hell. 

     He told us to watch out for this while we walked to the vaults. The underground city are vaults hundreds of years old. It's 3 floors below the ground that we walk on top which is pretty neat! These sections used to be used for businesses, then a man thought of the idea to build on top of them because they were running out of space in the city for new buildings. Once the new buildings were up they vaults weren't used that often. The businesses at first thought they could be used for storage and workshops, but water would drip and it was just bad conditions. So teh next best thing happened... it was occupied by thieves, body snatchers, murders, prostitutes, etc. After this went on for a long time and bad things happening down there, cops raided the place and kicked everyone out. They then bricked up the entrances and that was the end of that. 

Until, 100 years later a pub owner was moving some kegs and one was dropped and it went through the floor into the underground city, rediscovering it. 

     The city allowed for the entrance was to be opened up where they discovered more and more vaults. They now take people down there (for a small price) because so many people have claimed to have seen ghosts. One particular vault was claimed to be the exact, most haunted place in Britain. I took a lot of pictures hoping to see a lot of orbes, but that failed me as well. We we were in the most haunted valut (they packed us all in there) he told us a story of a lady a few years ago when they were in that vault. How she was in the back and she felt a cold wind on her neck (he informed us there shouldn't be any gusts of wind because we are so far underground and it's completely sealed). She ignored it, hoping it was nothing, then she could then feel it all around her. It was really close to her, and then she knew she was staring right at the face of a ghost because she could smell his breath of whiskey and cigarettes. Then he whispered, "Get out now" and she screamed and freaked out and wouldn't settle down. Finally when the particular tour guide settled her down she was able to tell him the story. Some say that has smelled the exact some breath, and have felt the same presence. 

    Other ghosts that have been seen by many are a little boy who likes to tug on you hands if they are hanging because he wants to play....a woman who sits in the corner crying because she couldn't get pregnant so she comes out to those who are pregnant or who don't even know they are pregnant (but find out they are when they see her) spoiler alert! .....a man who sits on top of the door guarding the place...a few others but those are the ones I can remember! 

Here are some pictures from the underground vaults 

What do you think???? Do you believe in ghosts???? 

I do believe in ghosts, because Nathan, Emily, and I all think we have some (friendly) ones in our house. :) Now, who wants to come over for tea when I get back??? 

Pete The Penguin

Today I said farewell to Hank, but adopted a new baby. I will miss Hank. Maybe he will come around again later when he is grown. 

Until then, 

We have Pete! He is a cutie. It snowed here last night, and it's fluffy and sticks to the tree branches. It will last, well I don't know, but I'll give it to tomorrow afternoon until it's all gone. No complaint there! It gets too sloppy. Anyhoo, that is where Pete comes into the picture for a little while. 

He likes to play, and of course, eat! You can feed Pete like you fed Hank by clicking the more button below him (with a wee scroll). If you want to "play" with him.. you have to click on him a few times and he will eventually fall off the ice! Silly boy!!! 

Today I sat down to write an essay, but watched a movie instead. I think I will write my essay tomorrow, and then maybe even a new post! But if it goes like today, then you may have to wait a couple days ;)

Happy happy happy. 

Edinburgh Stories

I told you all that I would have more about Edinburgh... I just didn't think I would actually take this long to get it all blogged. Well I will have everything I have to say about Edinburgh done by this weekend, because I will have a new place to blog about after that. I think i'll leave it as a surprise :) 

First story I will tell is about Maggie Dickson. If you remember from my last post I shared that only famous people get a pub named after them in Edinburgh. So here is Maggie's story. 

Maggie's story takes place in the Grass Market. The Grass Market wasn't just used as a market. It was also where the hangings took place. 

So, Maggie Dickson was a woman who was married to a man. She either left him or just went and cheated on him, and ended up being impregnated by a different man.  She kept her pregnancy a secret by telling no one, and wearing clothes that hid her belly. When the baby was born (still no one knew) she took it to the river and left the baby beside the river. She was soon arrested. What was she arrested for? Because it was a law back then that it was illegal to conceal the fact that you were pregnant. The penalty? Death by hanging. 

Soon Maggie was hung in front of everyone who wanted to watch (which was usually large crowds because it was like their equivalent to college game day). She was to be hung until pronounced dead. So they hung her and after a while the doctor there said that was enough and that she would be dead. They put her body into a wooden coffin and nailed the top shut. After the coffin was sealed a man drove the coffin to her hometown, and the spectators started parting ways. 

The man was driving the wagon when he heard a pounding sound. He checked all around the wagon and he didn't see anything so he continued. He heard the sound again. So he stopped and looked around again not seeing anything, but was closer to it when it sounded again. He looked at the coffin. He started taking all the nails out and moved the lid. Maggie sat up gasping for breath. She wasn't dead! The man pushed her back into the coffin and nailed it shut, and drove right back into town. "She's alive!! Come back everyone! She's alive!" People started coming back to the market expecting to see another hanging!! (overtime) 

Until a lawyer in the crowd said no way. You cannot rehang her. The law states that she was to be hung until pronounced dead, and she was already pronounced dead. So Maggie was off the hook and got to live! So when other hangings occurred it was said that she would go up to the person and say relax, the first time it's not that bad. 

Burke and Hare Murders 

My next story is about murders that took place in 1828. I showed a picture in my last post of body snatcher cages they used so people wouldn't take the bodies. Well, William Burke and William Hare figured out a different method. 

One day a little old lady was crying outside her door. William Burke saw her and asked what was wrong. She told him that was staying with her (had been renting a room for a few months) died in his sleep last night! He said well it's alright. The lady was still devastated because he had owed her 4 pounds. That was a full months rent, and she would not get by without that money. The man said not to worry, he would take care of the body and get her her money. 

So Burke got his best friend William Hare and they took the body to the University of Edinburgh to Doctor Knox. The University of Edinburgh at the time was one of the most advanced medical schools in the world making progress. They used bodies frequently for their anatomy classes, and for other teachings. Burke and Hare took the body to Dr. Knox and he gave them 7 pounds for the body!! The men were thrilled. They went to the lady gave her her 4 pounds, and keep the last 3 pounds for themselves. 

What did they do next you ask?? Well they were proper Irish men, so they went to the pub and drank and drank and drank and drank for days. The 3 pounds they earned was enough to buy them 500 pints......each. After days of drinking and then maybe a few to sober up they realized how much money they had made and how easy it was. So they decided they were going to get Dr. Knox some more bodies. Now body snatching was so common back then that it was almost difficult to get the task done due to guards or cages like the one above in the picture. So they decided to skip those messy steps and kill unimportant people and get Dr. Knox fresh bodies. 

They had killed around 16 people when they killed a prostitute and sold her. It just so happens that one of the medical students went to class that day and recognized her from the previous weekend...he had a little.. uh.. fun. He was curious as to how she had died when just last weekend she was, uh, up and moving pretty well should we say. He told the cops and they did some investigation. They found the men and went into their house where they had their latest victim laying just under the bed. That wasn't enough to get them convicted. So the cops took the men and put them in separate rooms. They knew that William Burke was pretty intelligent and was most likely the brains behind this grand idea. So the cops went to Hare and said look, if you tell us that Burke did it, did everything and it was all his idea, then we will let you go free. Hares said look, I grew up with that man, he has been my best friend for ages and we moved from Ireland to come over here. And, yep he did it. It was all him. I didn't do anything. 

They let Hare go and he fled the country (the citizens of Edinburgh weren't too pleased with the men). Burke was sentenced to be hung. But people were mad. Real mad. They didn't want him to get off that easy. So on the day of the hanging between 20,000-25,000 people showed up. (I told you these were a big deal.. this one was the superbowl) He was hung and then dragged behind a wagon for all to see his dead body as it went all through the crowd so everyone could get a good look. There wasn't much skin left on the backside. The next day the body was taken to the University to be dissected in anatomy class. So many people wanted to see the dissection, but there weren't enough tickets/seats that a riot almost broke out. They wrote messages with his blood.

To this day his skull is on display at the University of Edinburgh Medical School. We didn't make the trip to go see it, but nonetheless interesting story. 

For the last story I will leave you on a happier note. 

There was this man who was a grave keeper and ended up being a little lonely around graves all day, so he bought a little "guard dog" (to also help keep away body snatchers). However this dog isn't very big or fierce. Here is a little statue of him below. (Not a animal person, as you know, so I do not know what kind of dog this is.)

Anyway, this was the most loyal dog and stuck by his owners side all day and all night. After only two years together the owner passed away, and was buried. The dog being the loyal dog he is sat on his owners grave for days and days and days.  Dogs were not allowed to be unowned and would have been taken away. But the city council was amazed by this dog still not leaving his owner that they adopted the dog so it wouldn't be taken away. There were no dogs allowed in the grave yard where the owner was buried, but all the dog did was sit on his grave... day and night. Days turn to weeks which turned to months which turned to years. They didn't have the heart to kick the dog out of the grave yard so they let him and only him be allowed. The dog stayed by his owners side for 14 years. That is when the little dog passed away himself. 

He could not be buried by his owners side, because only members of the church (or same faith) were allowed to be buried there and they didn't know which faith the dog was. So the dog was buried as close as he could be without breaking any church/city laws. (Forgot to mention the dog's name was Bobby. Just thought of it. ;) 

This is his grave. People come from all over the world to give gifts to Bobby and share love.   

When you walk out of the grave yard there is a sign that says "No dogs allowed" ironic?

This is the same grave yard that the body snatcher cage above is in as well as all my Harry Potter people :) 

And guess what else was done for Bobby.. this famous, famous dog. You guessed it....

He now has a pub named after him. 

(The grave yard is right behind this pub). 

I still have more to share about Edinburgh believe it or not!! I will be finishing the posts this week, so check back for more about Edinburgh (if you aren't tired of it yet!) 

GOOD NEWS: for anyone who has tried to comment but needed an account.. have no fear! I have found the magical settings button where I change it so anyone can comment (otherwise what would the fun be?!) However, if you don't have an account it will be anonymous, so please put your name so I can comment back! (I will anyways, but would like to know who the commenter is :) 

Great!! Have a good week everyone! And come back later for some more Scotland fun! 

Cheers! 

P.S. I will have a new pet tomorrow. 

Edinburgh, Scotland

Last Thursday, January 31, Sophie, Annie and I hopped on a bus to Edinburgh. Annie is Sophie's roommate. She is also an exchange student, and is from Spain. Annie came at the beginning of the year in September (which I think most exchange students do in the European area) and initially came to better her English. She sounds great! 

So we hoped on a bus at 10:30 p.m. After 9 hours of driving we had arrived in Edinburgh at 7:30 a.m. We had a full day ahead of us! We check into our hostel called the Royal Mile Backpackers first. This was my first hostel experience. Have you all been in hostels before? If not, they have a few different rooms (some all girls, some all guys, and some mixed), and then you pretty much rent a bed in that room. We stay in a ten bed all girls room. 

Above is a corner of our room. That's my bed on the right bottom and that's Sophie's on the top right. They also name the beds. Mine was called Late! They have bathrooms for you to use, and also a common area for you to hangout and maybe meet some other travelers. There were some Spanish girls in our room when we first got there, and they were talking in spanish wondering if we were going to go through their stuff and take their ipod. Why do I know this? Because Annie of course! She was going to tell them that we weren't going to take their stuff, but thought we would keep her language knowledge hidden a little while longer. As soon as Annie spoke English they would be able to tell that she was Spanish by her accent. 

So fair warning to everyone, when I come back I will have an British/Spanish/Southern/Abby accent. :)

The first touristy thing we did in Edinburgh was go to Edinburgh Castle. Wow. Is all I have to say. 

Front View (above) 

Left of the front

 More left to the one above

Clear Right side based from the front view photo

What do you think? I couldn't even really believe it was real at first. I just wanted to stare at it forever. It also made my heart beat a little faster, but it's the closest thing that I have ever seen to Hogwarts. 

WARNING: I am a HUGE Harry Potter fan. I just love love love love everything about every book, movie, etc. So this trip was like wow! maybe it IS real ;) Hogwarts is the school that Harry attends, and yes, it is a castle. 

You walk through the gates (a little pricey with 15 pounds) and then you have 25 museums or places to look and see and learn. It's truly amazing! Maybe I am just in awe because it's really different from American history, with the kings and queens and all that jazz. Anyways. You should all go to Edinburgh. I was already in love with the place and I hadn't even been there an hour! 

I should mention in Edinburgh they have this famous (almost mile) called the Royal Mile. The Royal Mile starts at Edinburgh castle and continues (all down hill from the castle) it ends at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, which is where Queen Elizabeth stays when she comes to Scotland once or twice a year. You can walk straight down the street and you'll hit it directly... kind of cool! At the very least it is convenient for tourists! Everything is so close in Edinburgh too, so it was great. 

Picture of Sophie, Annie, and I by a classic Scottish wooden man. 

After about 3 hours in the museum (we started hurrying because the weather turned really windy and rainy...they say save at the very least 3 hours to see off all Edinburgh Castle!) we had time to grab a small bite to eat before our free walking tour that we found (score!)  

We popped into a small cafe. And it just happened to be one of the things on our list to do... Elephant House!!! Why is this so exciting??? You'll catch on eventually... 

Where J.K. Rowling sat and starting writing... what was she writing??? 

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone! 

My tour guide said that they said she would go there and buy a cup of coffee and write, because letting her coffee go cold was cheaper than heating her house. (If you don't know, J.K. Rowling went from nothing to everything quite quickly with the Harry Potter series)

More about Harry Potter later, a little more about the walking tour for now. 

The walking tour was really great for it being like I said windy and rainy..... and 3 hours long... We saw a lot of the main points of Edinburgh, and we learned a lot. We headed up the Royal Mile and she pointed out a few things. 

This is on the sidewalk of the Royal Mile. People claim that it is the dirtiest place in Edinburgh. Hundreds of years ago when people were still hanged, tortured, not a solid "jail" system, and no plumbing. 

There was a small building used for taxes and to house criminals. They were usually nailed to the outside of the building. So people hated that building because it took their money, and there were always criminals there. They would walk by and spit on the criminals or just the building if there were no criminals. They would also take their bins (that they used for their toilet) and would empty the bins on the criminals as well. 

The heart in the sidewalk is the only thing left of all the mess, and it is still tradition to spit on the heart as you walk by (so it's still pretty dirty!)

Yes, I spit. No, Sophie and Annie didn't. I blame it on softball? Having two brothers? Half living in the country with Rachel? 

One of my favorite parts of the walking tour was the stories (more to come tomorrow), and a little graveyard we went to. 

This drunken fool was quite amusing. He was with a buddy and a woman and they were hanging out in the doorway to the left of him. He came out and yelled, "I'm alive!! I'm alive!! Ahhhhhhh!! Boo!" 

Haha.

I personally got a kick out of it, I'm not sure if everyone else did. 

The cage above were used often to save the bodies from body snatchers. More on body snatchers tomorrow! 

So, are you bored with the graveyard? Thinking why was it that exciting and such a great thing for me to see? 

   Take a look. 

NOTICE ANYTHING FAMILIAR?! 

Fine...... It has also been said that as J.K. Rowling would write and then she would walk around Edinburgh for hours. So, why is this a big deal?!

Because have you ever heard of Lord Voldemort? If so, you may have heard that his real name was Tom Riddle. The first head stone indeed says Thomas Riddell (with a little spelling adjustment to the last name).  

The second stone says William McGonagall. The last name may sound familiar to, I don't know, Professor Minerva McGonagall.

The third headstone isn't spelled the same, but could also be the name of the character Alastor Moody aka Mad-Eye Moody. 

Pretty exciting for a Harry Potter fan! I must say!! 

I'll leave this post with a few pictures from the rest of the tour. 

Annie, Sophie, and I with Edinburgh Castle behind us. All the green is Princess Gardens. 

 A couple city pictures of Edinburgh. 

Haggis, neeps, and tatties.

Considered the national dish of Scotland! 

For those of you who know me, I am not an extreme meat eater. So if it's not beef or chicken I will usually pass it up, because I am perfectly satisfied with side dishes! 

I knew that I had to try things on my trip, so this is me spreading my wings. 

I asked the bartender what was in the haggis. She said that it was sheep, mixed with oatmeal, and some spices. 

Big breath. Big girl pants. I ordered it. 

Neeps and Tatties are turnips and potatoes. 

On the left is a whiskey gravy sauce that I put on it. 

Now, Haggis is traditionally cooked in an intestine. Yep. I didn't ask if this one was, but if not, it is usually cooked in a sausage casing. I'm assuming since this is a little pub, that it would be the sausage case. 

First bite, very small first bite, was alright. It kind of tasted like breakfast sausage. I ate maybe one of those circles, but probably not quite. Mostly because of the texture. It was loosely put together and so you would scoop it on your fork and put it in your mouth, and the pieces went every where. I had to swish my mouth with my beer after each bite to get it out of the crack of my gum/lip. Now that is what weirds me out, and that was the biggest problem. 

I did eat all the neeps and tatties... and finished my beer. So overall, not too bad of a meal! 

Now, after I just googled what is traditionally in Haggis I better cross my fingers that that is not what I ate, because I will forever stay away from new meat encounters. 

Haggis is a savory pudding containing sheep's pluck (heart, liver and lungs); minced with onion, oatmeal,suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally encased in the animal's stomach and simmered for approximately three hours.

I will post a the few other stories I mentioned in the next few days! This was only half of day one that I just shared. Yikes!!! 

Cheers!