This weekend, I went back to Glasgow to take in some of the Celtic Connections festival (a festival celebrating Celtic music). I went to see two concerts: a bagpiping concert and an Irish/bluegrass/banjo concert. I am SO glad that I did this. It was just so much fun. I loved both concerts and I would have come back with a bagful of new CD's had I owned anything on which I could play them.
The piping concert had 4 acts in the first half and then the National Youth Pipe Band of Scotland in the second half. It was educational as well as entertaining. I learned that there is Spanish Celtic music (with Spanish bagpipes), which actually sounds like you think it would (bagpipes with a Spanish flair). And I learned that there are different types of bag pipes - traditional ones, Spanish ones and littler ones (the technical descriptions of course). I think my favorite act of this concert was Ross Ainslie and Jarlath Henderson, who basically just got on stage and jammed with their littler bagpipes (they were probably doing more than just jamming but that's how it came across). Not being a fan of watching jazz artists jam, watching two bagpipers play together was actually really entertaining.
The other concert featured We Banjo 3 and ChessBoxer. I don't really like bluegrass or banjo music so I wasn't sure how much I'd enjoy this but even just watching We Banjo 3 play was awesome. They were so into what they were doing and having so much fun doing it that I think I sat there the whole time with a smile on my face. They were all incredibly talented and the music was fantastic as well (I love me an Irish reel). It was fabulous. I'd go see them again in a heartbeat.
And thus concludes the music review portion of my blog. And for the first time in a while, I'm finally all up to date with my blog posts, sorting through the piles of photos I've taken and posting photos on Facebook... plus I cleaned my room. I feel so productive!
Sunday, 26 January 2014
Dublin
Last weekend I travelled outside the UK for the first time since I've been here - I made the grueling 1 hour flight to Dublin, Ireland. To be honest, it was ok - not horrible but not brilliant. I didn't really have much planned, which may have been part of the problem, and I'm not really sure what I expected of the city either.
Here are the highlights and lowlights:
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| Dublin |
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| Dublin |
Here are the highlights and lowlights:
- I made the obligatory trip to the Guinness Brewery - it was interesting and included the freshest pint of Guinness I've ever had, but I spent the whole time thinking that they must be making a killing (it wasn't cheap and it was packed).
- I went to the Archeology section of the National Museum of Ireland where I learned that they recently (2006, I think) found a book buried in peat that was 1000 years old (pretty neat when I think about it).
- I went to the Modern Art Gallery where I got absolutely none of the exhibits (I can normally understand/appreciate one or two ... but not here).
- I went to the Science Gallery, which, in combination with having a bath tub in my hotel room (exciting when your flat only has a shower), made the weekend for me. It's a gallery that combines science with art and all the exhibits were artists depictions of where they think science and technology can take us in the future. There was one that explained that in the future humans could give birth to other mammals so we could help repopulate endangered species. There was a model of a dolphin in a human uterus (like when you see a model of a human fetus in a uterus at a doctor's office... but instead of a human fetus, it was a dolphin). There was another exhibit showing video of what looked like a pristine landscape but was actually a sort of farm for producing liquid oxygen for fueling space travel. The species of plants and animals on the farm had specific purposing for "growing" the liquid oxygen. It was all a little weird and very interesting!
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| Guinness Brewery |
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| Looking up at the Spire |
Tuesday, 21 January 2014
Aquaducts
Britain's canal system has a bunch of aquaducts along it and for some reason I find this really strange. I know we have aquaducts in Canada (I can think of one... so maybe not all that common) and I completely understand the purpose/necessity of having them, I just think a bridge with water on it (as opposed to under it) is a bit weird. Nonetheless, a couple of weekends ago, I went to see one. I walked along the Union Canal from Falkirk (home of the Falkirk Wheel) to Linlithgow (home of all things Linlithgow). Along the way sits the Avon Aquaduct - Scotland's longest and tallest aquaduct at 250m long and 26m high.
Not being a fan of heights by any means, I really don't know why I thought it would be fun to walk along an aquaduct. Things were fine until I got about halfway across where, all of a sudden, I became completely convinced I was going to fall into the canal. Why? I have no idea. The path beside the canal was at least a metre and a half wide and I had a really good railing to hold on to. Maybe I knew that I wasn't going to fall off the aquaduct because of the railing so I figured I would fall the other way into the canal. It made for a tense time walking over the rest of the aquaduct with a death grip on the railing but I made it without falling and then spent the next 15 minutes laughing at myself.
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| Avon Aquaduct from the bottom |
Not being a fan of heights by any means, I really don't know why I thought it would be fun to walk along an aquaduct. Things were fine until I got about halfway across where, all of a sudden, I became completely convinced I was going to fall into the canal. Why? I have no idea. The path beside the canal was at least a metre and a half wide and I had a really good railing to hold on to. Maybe I knew that I wasn't going to fall off the aquaduct because of the railing so I figured I would fall the other way into the canal. It made for a tense time walking over the rest of the aquaduct with a death grip on the railing but I made it without falling and then spent the next 15 minutes laughing at myself.
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| Avon Aquaduct (note the easiness of not falling into the canal) |
Monday, 20 January 2014
London, again
After my parents went back home, I figured that I might get homesick again so I decided to distract myself with a trip and took off to London for 4 days. I was originally thinking of Amsterdam or Copenhagen but the flights just didn't work out and London was easier to get to. I'd been to London twice before but never on my own. It was supposed to be a relaxing trip where I spend some time holed up in my hotel room reading and relaxing to recover from a busy December, but in the little time I spent planning (an hour on the Internet the day before I went), I found all sorts of things I wanted to see and do. I ended up having a fantastic time running around London seeing and doing way too much stuff.
I took a self guided tour of some of the famous places in London:
I also found time to go to the Tate Modern (to see the parts of the collection that I didn't get to last time), the Docks Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. I really enjoyed that Victoria and Albert Museum, which was a bonus because I was actually aiming for the Natural History Museum but there was a huge lineup full of screaming kids so I ducked into the Victoria and Albert Museum instead. I also went to see Stomp one night, which was a great show.
I returned to Edinburgh tired and feverish but not homesick so I my plan worked... plus I had an awesome couple of days.
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| Tower Bridge and the Thames |
I took a self guided tour of some of the famous places in London:
- Kings Cross Station (platform 9 3/4 from Harry Potter)
- Paddington Station (a big place - I could see how a bear could get lost... or however that story goes)
- Charing Cross Road (from "Home for a Rest" by Spirit of the West... and then I had that song in my head until I got back to Edinburgh)
- London Bridge (wasn't falling down)
- Trafalgar Square
- Buckingham Palace
- Westminster Abby
- Camden Market (which I enjoyed way more than I thought I would)
- Canary Wharf (which I learned was designed by a Canadian company)
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| View from Trafalgar Square |
I also found time to go to the Tate Modern (to see the parts of the collection that I didn't get to last time), the Docks Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. I really enjoyed that Victoria and Albert Museum, which was a bonus because I was actually aiming for the Natural History Museum but there was a huge lineup full of screaming kids so I ducked into the Victoria and Albert Museum instead. I also went to see Stomp one night, which was a great show.
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| Looks like the angel is flipping people off, no? |
I returned to Edinburgh tired and feverish but not homesick so I my plan worked... plus I had an awesome couple of days.
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| Art |
Monday, 6 January 2014
Inverness, Loch Ness and the Cairngorms
The second road trip my parents and I went on was up to Inverness (about 3 hours north-ish of Edinburgh). We took our time driving up, stopping at Pitlochry and Aviemore. The drive through the mountains/hills was really pretty, especially at one point where there was soft fresh snow and gorgeous light (unfortunately, having just woken up from a backseat nap, I have no idea where this was).
We stayed in Inverness for 2 nights and went on a self-guided driving tour around the area, which included a trip to Loch Ness. Coming from a part of Canada with many, many lakes, it was hard to get excited about a lake but it was pretty impressive how deep it is for its size. We didn't see any monsters (although, really, no one would believe us if we had) but we did see a stag on a small side road. We also saw a very bright rainbow reflected in the ocean (I've never seen that before!).
The drive back to Edinburgh was also pretty spectacular. We took a different route through the Cairngorms and the scenery was absolutely amazing. It made me want to stick around until spring/summer so that I could go hiking through them (it's a wee bit dangerous in the winter). It's scenery that makes me feel really small, but in a good way.
I'm really grateful that my parents came to visit and took me along on their road trips - I got to see a lot of Scotland and England that I might not have gotten to see otherwise and it inspired more ideas for future trips (not that I'm really short on ideas...).
We stayed in Inverness for 2 nights and went on a self-guided driving tour around the area, which included a trip to Loch Ness. Coming from a part of Canada with many, many lakes, it was hard to get excited about a lake but it was pretty impressive how deep it is for its size. We didn't see any monsters (although, really, no one would believe us if we had) but we did see a stag on a small side road. We also saw a very bright rainbow reflected in the ocean (I've never seen that before!).
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| Sunset in Nairn |
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| Loch Ness |
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| Rainbow reflected in the Inverness Firth |
The drive back to Edinburgh was also pretty spectacular. We took a different route through the Cairngorms and the scenery was absolutely amazing. It made me want to stick around until spring/summer so that I could go hiking through them (it's a wee bit dangerous in the winter). It's scenery that makes me feel really small, but in a good way.
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| Cairngorms |
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| A hillside of deer! (this photo would make a horrible jigsaw puzzle) |
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| Cairngorms |
Peak District, Lake District and a Wall
Behind on updates again but December was a busy month, which involved a lot of fun and travelling, and then I got sick, which involved a lot of lying in bed and watching youtube videos. My parents came to visit for the holidays, which was great. I really enjoyed showing them around my new city and sharing whatever knowledge I had accumulated over the past 2 months. We also went on two road trips. The first was down to the north of England to visit some of my mom's relatives and see some sights along the way.
Our first stop was near Hexham (Mom/Dad, please correct me if I'm wrong), where we stopped to see a random bit of Hadrian's Wall. I was the scout to go see if it actually was Hadrian's Wall while my parents waited in the car. Having no clue what Hadrian's Wall looked like, I took a picture of the piece of wall and took it back to the car. My parents also weren't sure if it was the wall so I googled it and found images that matched the photo so we decided it was in fact Hadrian's Wall (you know, just like how the Roman's would have identified it). We then went off to Corbridge to tour the remains of a Roman fort (it was an official British heritage site to which we had to pay admission, so we had no troubles identifying this one). And then it was off to the first set of relatives.
The next day we drove through the Peak District on the way to the second set of relatives. We stopped in Castleton to stretch our legs, get some food and visit a castle. I'd like to go back to Castleton at some point - there are lots of hill walking trails and beautiful scenery.
On the way back to Edinburgh, we drove through the Lake District. I'm sure it's a lovely place but it was being hit with pouring rain and heavy winds when we went through so it didn't look overly appealing.
It was nice to meet/re-meet my mom's relatives. After being told how much I resemble my dad when I visited his brother, it was amusing being told how much I resemble my mom. I guess I'm a good mix of both.
Our first stop was near Hexham (Mom/Dad, please correct me if I'm wrong), where we stopped to see a random bit of Hadrian's Wall. I was the scout to go see if it actually was Hadrian's Wall while my parents waited in the car. Having no clue what Hadrian's Wall looked like, I took a picture of the piece of wall and took it back to the car. My parents also weren't sure if it was the wall so I googled it and found images that matched the photo so we decided it was in fact Hadrian's Wall (you know, just like how the Roman's would have identified it). We then went off to Corbridge to tour the remains of a Roman fort (it was an official British heritage site to which we had to pay admission, so we had no troubles identifying this one). And then it was off to the first set of relatives.
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| Hadrian's Wall (probably) |
The next day we drove through the Peak District on the way to the second set of relatives. We stopped in Castleton to stretch our legs, get some food and visit a castle. I'd like to go back to Castleton at some point - there are lots of hill walking trails and beautiful scenery.
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| Castleton |
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| Scenery near Castleton |
It was nice to meet/re-meet my mom's relatives. After being told how much I resemble my dad when I visited his brother, it was amusing being told how much I resemble my mom. I guess I'm a good mix of both.
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