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.



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.

Avon Aquaduct
(note the easiness of not falling into the canal)

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.



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)



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.
 

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.

Art

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!).

Sunset in Nairn

Loch Ness

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.



Cairngorms



A hillside of deer!
(this photo would make a horrible jigsaw puzzle)

Cairngorms

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...).

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.

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.

Castleton

Scenery near Castleton

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.

St. Andrew's Day in St. Andrews

November 30th was St. Andrew's Day, which is Scotland's national day. To celebrate, Historic Scotland (who runs the historical sites around Scotland) gave free admission to its sites. I decided to take advantage of the offer and check out the cathedral and castle in St. Andrews (because, really, where else would you go to spend St. Andrew's Day?). I just went for the day and really enjoyed the town. If I wanted to get away somewhere for 3 or 4 days just to chill, I would go to St. Andrews. It has a great main street and a fabulous beach that you can walk along forever.

St. Andrews Cathedral

 I wandered around the cathedral ruins and the castle ruins (where I learned that castles were not only built for royalty but also to protect religious leaders) and then headed out to the west sands to go for a walk on the beach. On my way to the West Sands, I passed the golf museum. I'm not a huge golf fan (or really any sort of golf fan) but entry to the museum was free for St. Andrew's day so I went in and completely surprised myself by finding it interesting! I learned about how golf balls have been made throughout time and about the evolution of golf clubs. I was fascinated except for some other stuff in there about famous golfers and who won what (i.e. the other 85% of the museum content).

The West Sands

St. Andrews is a great town and I'd like to go back but I have to admit that my favorite part of the day (other than actually finding the golf museum interesting) was the bus ride back to Edinburgh. I'd been noticing that when I go places on weekends, I always feel slightly disappointed when my train/bus actually gets to its destination. I realized that it was because on the train/bus, I didn't have to do anything like figure out where to go or what to do - I was free to just sit there and do nothing. The bus ride back from St. Andrews was even better because it was two hours long and it was dark outside, which meant that I didn't even feel like I should be paying attention to the scenery. I just put my earphones in and sat there listening to music. The perfect ending to a great day.



St. Andrews

London

Two weeks ago I made a weekend trip to London. I stayed with an aunt and uncle who live about 45 minutes outside of London and who graciously invited me to stay with them. We spent Saturday in London doing touristy things: seeing Big Ben and the parliament buildings, going on the London Eye (of which I enjoyed the coming back down part.... not a fan of heights or ferris wheels), touring the London Tower and taking in some art at the Tate Modern. Sunday we had lunch with my cousins (who I previously only had vague recollections of meeting) and their families.

View of London from the Eye

View of London from the Eye

View of London from the Eye

Obligatory Tower Bridge photo

 

It was a great weekend. I think my favorite part (other than getting to know family that I don't see very often) was looking through old photos of my dad and uncle from when they were growing up. I am definitely my father's daughter - even I could see the resemblance.

Reading News and Learning Lingo

I'm a bit behind on my posting but thought I would post this one before I forget. This morning I had a reminder that I should really pay more attention to local news. I woke up and got ready for work and just before I left, I opened my curtains and that's when I realized that it was pouring rain... horizontally. We were having some sort of gale weather event of the magnitude that if it occurred in Ontario would require "Storm Watch 2013" status (not that we over exaggerate weather at all...). I shrugged, put on my rain jacket and headed out to the bus stop. I didn't realize how major the event was until I got to work and discovered that there were 80 mph winds and flood warnings, all the trains in Scotland were cancelled and they closed the bridge over the Forth. We don't have a tv in our flat, I don't have a radio and I've never been much for buying newspapers but I'm starting to think that I should at least check out some local news websites every once in a while just to ensure that I don't shrug, put on a rain coat and head off to work during the apocalypse.

The weather did provide me with a learning opportunity today though. I will probably never forget the difference between pants and trousers in the UK. "Pants" mean "underwear" here, which I had learned before but had forgotten in the midst of trying to keep everything else straight (remind me to tell you about the time I accidentally flipped off a co-worker when he asked some question to which the answer was two so I held up two fingers). Anyhoo, I had gotten soaked walking from the bus stop to the office this morning and just before lunch I said "Ugh, my pants are still wet!". The guy sitting next to me gave me a really weird look and then clued in and said "Trousers! Your trousers are still wet!", while everyone else had a good laugh. Always learning...