Edinburgh

Long tea break, but I'm back now (having been passed from friend to friend and returned back up north to be with family again).

Charlie and I arrived in Edinburgh on Wednesday evening, right in the middle of rush hour. We located roughly where the hotel should be, but, as Charlie hadn't written down the exact address (not that that would really help in this country, as road names are SOMETIMES posted and numbering buildings seems to be completely optional), we did a couple of laps around the block, finally leaning out of the car window and asking the cabbie stopped next to us at the light where the hotel might be. We checked in, threw our bags down, and, after consulting the little tourist brochure (not the one with the typo mentioned in an earlier post), headed off to dinner.

I had chosen a restaurant called "Iglu", because, when playing Scrabble online with him (when one could still do these things), Charlie had put down that dubious spelling of the word, and because the restaurant advertised itself as organic, and I'm a sucker for such things. It was a walk of about a mile, but down a lovely street, and right by the birthplace of Robert Louis Stevenson... of course I'd planned that all along. (Actually I would have totally missed it, had I not been trying to peer in the windows of all the houses, and wondered why that one was particularly nicely decorated. I thought it might have been a hotel of some sort, and even had a big brass plaque next to the door. That's when I saw what it really was.)

We walked into the restaurant, glanced into the bar downstairs which was empty except for one middle-aged man, and headed up the stairs, which is where the sign saying restaurant pointed us. At the top of the stairs we walked right into the kitchen, where we were kindly directed back downstairs where the food was being served this evening. So down we went (later seeing other people make this same trip, and wondering why they didn't cover the sign directing people up, or adding another one saying that they didn't really mean it), and settled in at a table by the window (despite it saying reserved... the barmaid told us to sit there, and just moved the sign to a different table). At this point the bartender and barmaid (I'm sure that there is a more PC term I'm supposed to use, but I've been here for a month, so I can only hear British English rushing around my head... you should hear me try to say any word that has a short "o" in it, for I get desperately confused as to how I short pronounce it) went over to aforementioned man in the pub, and told him it was time to leave. This went on for about five minutes, with the two of them going on about how he had had his one more drink, and he had promised to leave then. I'm not sure what had transpired earlier, but the poor old guy was pretty pathetic (not to mention apparently pretty drunk). He eventually left, and only returned one more time during the evening.

After that, dinner was uneventful and tasty (sticky toffee pudding goodness!). From there Charlie wanted to head into the heart of Edinburgh, The Royal Mile, the stretch of road leading away from the castle, which is laden with pubs. He said we just had to stop and have a drink there to say that we had done so. So we hiked up the hill and got to the top and saw absolutely nothing. There were about a thousand cashmere and/or kilt shops, interspersed with tea shops, every one of them closed. And not a tourist in sight. He was confused and disappointed. I was amused and reminded of downtown St. Louis (not that I hang out there much, but it is what I imagine most of it is like on a weeknight). We wandered down the street, eventually coming across a tour which Charlie wanted to follow... until I pointed out the vest on one fellow which said "Edinburgh Christian Tours". We walked on. We saw a group mingling, getting ready to go on the Haunted Edinburgh tour, but I thought it was scary enough above ground, so felt no need to go under!

The expected nightlife being somewhat of a bust (totally okay by me), we headed back to the hotel and watched the last 20 minutes of Twister, which, of course, I had already seen in some other hotel in years gone by.

Thursday was a bit brighter. The shops were all open, the tourists were out, and the weather was sunny... when it wasn't raining. We went to castle (almost got blown off the ramparts, it was so windy up there) and did the tourist thing. The castle complex has lots of museums in it, every one of them dedicated somehow to war or the Scottish Regiment or battles somehow. Not my cup of tea, but they were out of the wind, so we went into each and every one.


The first museum we wandered through was unexciting, so we went pretty quickly. We got to the last room, which ended up being on the other side of the courtyard from where we started. I saw a door, but was unsure if any alarms would go off if I opened it. I didn't really want to track back through the museum, so asked Charlie if he thought we could leave by this door. At which point it opened a little bit (showing me that alarms were not going to go off), then close, and then opened all the way. As the ghosts were obviously opening the door for us, I thought it rude not to accept this bit of civility, and we exited.

The rest of the castle, and Edinburgh in general, was nice, but not overwhelming. We met up with Adrian again, had lunch (my first fish and chips of my trip), wandered around a bit more, then headed home.

Put a check next to Scotland.

Typo

As I am still in English-speaking countries, I haven't seen any fantastic English translations yet (although my friends just did look at me askance when I said I had waterproof pants for our walk, as here 'pants' refer to underpants... everything else is 'trousers').

I was, however, quite amused while in a hotel room in Edinburgh reading the tourist book on the city. It was explaining all the varied and interesting things that there were to do there. In Edinburgh there was something "to suit all testes". Not much for the women to do, I guess.

Impromtu trip to Scotland

I have told myself that, while I am on my Grand Tour, if anyone asks if I want to do something, I ought to say yes (while staying safe and legal, of course, for I am still me). Thus I found myself on a hiking trip in Scotland this past week. I was staying with friends in Northampton a few weeks ago, and one asked me if I wanted to go "walking" in Scotland with him for a few days. (They walk here, rather than hike. Not sure why, except that maybe it's because the highest point in the whole UK is 4406 feet.) So, after overstaying my welcome with my relatives (don't worry, I'll be back there in a couple of days), I took the train up to Glasgow where my friend would collect me.

I was a bit sceptical about the train at first, as it pulled into the station with no announcement ("Now arriving, train to Glasgow"), and pulled away with no announcement ("This is the train to Glasgow Central"), and most of the people on the platform didn't get on the train. I wondered if it was a scheduled train at all, or if I'd just boarded the Brigadoon Express (but Brigadoon is in Scotland, right?). I felt a little better when an announcement about the dining car was almost indecipherable given the thick Scottish accent. So I sat back, relaxed, a read a book about lions (attacks by and the hunting thereof) in Kenya in 1900 (research for the next leg of my trip, you know).

The train did take me to Scotland, and Charlie was there to pick me up (once he found the train station). I've known Charlie since we were both little, as our fathers were flatmates in Montreal a million years ago. When he was young, he was the annoying, hyperactive little brother in the family. Now he's older, but just as hyper. (It's by no means annoying though. Comical, but not annoying.) He drove me up to the hostel where we were meeting his friend, Adrian, and where we would be staying the night.

I have very little experience with Youth Hostels. I remember a small house on the California Coast when I was in high school, and a grungy apartment in Rome when I was in college. This was something all together different. We spent the night at Auchendannen House next to Loch Lomond. And by House, they mean castle. (We did have bunk beds with beastly mattresses and pillows, but the dining room was pretty impressive.)

We headed off at a reasonable hour in the morning (once the sun was up, which was about 8 am!) and went north. I gazed with wonder at the lovely hills and craggy mountains we passed. When we got to just about our destination, I giggled with disbelief at the absolute barrenness of the place. Rannach Moor had nothing, and I mean NOTHING in it. I've never seen anything like it. We stopped at the only inn/restaurant/pub/tea house, struggled to get to the door of the place through the 40-60 mph winds that had been forecast for the area, and sat by the fire with cups of tea to plan our outing.

Charlie had grand ideas of climbing one of the Munroes (any mountain over 300m is known as a Munroe). He had said earlier that he wanted to get to the top of something craggy and see the sea. There would be no seeing of the sea today. We'd be lucky to see the path we just came up, as the clouds were hanging quite low. He and Adrian had just about sorted what we would climb up (I was just along for the ride, and willing to do whatever they told me to), when our Guardian Angle, in the form of an old Scot, came up with his map saying he heard we wanted to do a circular walk, and what if we walked AROUND this mountain, rather than over it. Excellent choice, given the horizontal rain and hail that we were met with not an hour later.

So we walked-- or slogged rather-- around Buachaille Etive Beag. (I kept calling it something like beu-call-ay-lee bairg, but apparently it sounds more like byoo-call ett-iv beg. Gaelic is totally beyond me.) The first thing we had to do was ford a stream. This might have been a stream at one point, but today, with the rain pouring down, it was a raging torrent. We had two somewhat dicey fords right off, but I made it across (with assistance... my jetes are a bit weak since I haven't had ballet in a while!).

My new waterproof boots worked for about an hour, then became more water-resistant, then moved on to water-retaining. The nice thing was, though, that I didn't have to worry about keeping my feet dry any more. Good thing, as our path, when it wasn't a full on muddy bog, had a stream running down it. Please remember the sideways rain and hail I mentioned earlier. When it started to hail, I just laughed, for what else can you do when you are on the side of a mountain without a tree in sight? Although wet, I stayed warm the whole time, so no worries. Every now and again the rain would stop, so we could look up and actually see where we were going. The views then were really, really lovely.

On the return trip along the other side of the mountain we saw that the path crossed a stream three times. (We had left the path at this point and were going cross-country along the end of the mountain, cutting off a down- and then up-hill. I wasn't thrilled about this part, as it was steep, wet, and a bit windy. We eventually got back to the path, having avoided the first ford.) We decided that it was silly to ford the same stream twice, so we blazed our own trail (except they don't actually have blazes on the trails in this country-- probably because there are no trees upon which to put them-- you just follow the path of mud with the footprints in it). And then we found the reason that the trail crossed to the other side... A huge crevasse was carved into the side of the mountain by a stream. Whoops! We went to the bottom of it, where it met the other stream, and just walked into the water. (Once you're wet, who cares if you are wetter?) My boots did dry out eventually (five days later).

When we got back to the car, we made a bee-line for the nearest pub, and huddled next to their pathetic little fire. Hot chocolates all round, and one whiskey (we were in Scotland, after all). Once heated a bit we headed north up to our bunkhouse. Not a castle this time, but not bad. It did have a "drying room" for all of our stuff, which probably would have worked better had we turned on either the heater or the dehumidifier.

At dinner, both boys started to feel ill. Immediately after dinner both boys got ill. Not sure what hit them, as the only thing they'd had that I hadn't was a bag of crisps (potato chips) and a shower. (I obviously blame the shower. Good reason to avoid such things.) So Charlie's plans to hike Ben Nevis (that mountain of 4406 feet) went down the toilet (or into the bushes, as the toilet was occupied by his friend). Poor guys!

On Tuesday we walked up the valley by Ben Nevis (reaching a whopping 150 meters, we figured later), but all the while congratulating ourselves for our good decision NOT to hike up the mountain, as the winds were again at 40 mph, and snow was predicted. (We did get snow for a few minutes, even at our low altitude.) After walking for an hour, we headed to the tea shop, then drove around the countryside for a few hours.

There are a remarkable number of rainbows in Scotland, which I guess makes sense given all the rain. Poor Charlie heard me yell "STOP THE CAR!" more than once. Eventually they became commonplace, I didn't need to take any more pictures, so let Charlie drive on in peace. (My favorite was the rainbow that ended right in a lake.)

There was a lot of napping going on that afternoon when we got back to the lodge, then we went out to a seafood place for dinner. (The blokes obviously were feeling better at this point.)

Wednesday we left Adrian, and Charlie and I struck out across country, stopping at points of interested marked on his road atlas. This led us to a dilapidated house wrapped in a tarp, a stone circle in the front yard of a farm, Dewar's Distillery, and across a mountain pass. (As you can see, some points good, some a little underwhelming. By the way, no one here has heard of Dewar's, so I'm guessing it's a pretty crappy, export-only, kind of whiskey.) We had a lovely day, though, and eventually ended in Edinburgh.

(As I'm sure this post is ridiculously long already, I'll write about Edinburgh in another post, so you can go off and get a cup of tea, and then regroup when you are ready. I'll go have a cup of tea myself, and continue writing when I am ready.)

English Food

I don't know why the British have a reputation for dubious food. Bangers and Mash, Toad in the Hole, Bubble and Squeak... How can a country that gives you these have that reputation? Well, there was the morning that my hostess was making French Toast and reached not for cinnamon and sugar, but for salt and pepper and parsley. That was a bit of a shock.

I made myself some proper French Toast this morning, but they don't seem to have syrup (maple or corn) here, so I had to make due with Nutella. Life is rough. With my breakfast I decided to have some milk, which gets delivered by the milkman in glass bottles left on the step in the morning. So civilized! I particularly enjoyed starting to pour the milk, but it not coming out because there was a lovely little cap of cream on the top. Mmmmmmm, cream......

My cousin, upon finding out that I have not (that I can remember) eaten pheasant, partridge, venison, or game of any kind, decided to make it her mission to make me a more well-rounded eater. The venison (cooked with slabs of bacon atop) was lovely. I left before getting any of the birds, alas.

When in Scotland this past week I decided to try the local fare and have a Scottish pie from a little bakery. I knew this would be meat not sweet, so that wasn't a surprise. But I have to say it was about the most disgusting thing that I have ever eaten half of. Ground meat of some (or every) sort which was fatty and mushy and salty. The day was not a culinary failure, though, for that evening I ordered sticky toffee pudding for dessert. As that is one of my favorite desserts at home, I had high expectations and was delighted that it was exactly the same as the pudding at the Tap Room in St. Louis. Whew!

I have definitely figured out the English affinity for tea. It has nothing to do with the taste, I'm sure. It has to do with being able to turn the stove on, and then having something warm to hold in one's hands. I've never said yes to so many cups of tea in my life! I think I might have to go get one now, as my toes are numb and my nose is dripping. Then maybe I'll go in search of some pickled eggs for lunch.

Walk around QP

The sun was actually shining when I got up this morning, so I decided I better make hay... or at least go for a walk while it lasted. So here are some pictures of my walk around Quernmore (pronounced roughly quor-mer) Park, which is the estate that my father's family owned back when they had money (round about the same time my mother's family had money... the late 19th century was good to us, but where did it all go???). "Dear Uncle Jack" (my father's uncle) lost said money, and had to sell off the big house. (My father has read this and adds the following corrections: Uncle Jack did not sell the big house, but rather GAVE it to a bunch of monks, and sold off the land at a fraction of its value. Good money skills, obviously.) The rest of the land and the various cottages, for the most part, is still owned by my cousin. (We're in England, where they have that whole "first born son gets it all" thing. Bummer for the younger twin son of my cousin!)

Enjoy! (I did.)

What is it?

It didn't take long for my cousin, Carol, to discover my penchant for cleaning and sorting and organizing (perhaps walking into her kitchen and finding me dusting and arranging her shelves of glasses gave her a hint), and yesterday she set me the task of sorting out her junk drawer.

We all have 'junk drawers' in our houses (even if it is a shoebox in the closet which your husband swears you don't need... not sure where he is going to look for string), but this was the most impressive one I've seen (and this is coming from ME, who found FIVE meat grinders one day when looking for an apple peeler). The drawer is about 12" x 12" x 30", so many, many years worth of terribly important stuff was stored in there. Carol swore that she had cleaned it out before moving across the county three years ago, but admitted upon seeing the treasures therein that maybe she hadn't. It had much of the stuff one would expect: picture hooks, electric cords, latches, light bulbs, a brass button polishing shield thing. But there was one thing that none of us could identify.

It was cast iron, stood about 2 feet tall, and obviously was meant to stick into the ground. It had a weight that would fall, a little cup with a lid, and a little arm that could go up and down. We were pretty baffled until Glenn (son-in-law, who obviously was up to no good many times in his youth) walked in an immediately identified it.

It is a booby trap to ward off poachers. You tie a string to the arm and when a poacher trips it, the weight slams down onto the cup, which, of course, has a cartridge in it. Zuky (Carol's husband) was planning on putting it out on the property today. You've got to love the English!

The Godfather

The other night I had dinner with my godfather at his flat in London. It was a lovely evening, though he plied me lots of wine (relatively speaking for me... I think I had TWO whole glasses in three hours) and put me on the tube a little on the late side. Most of you probably don't have a map of the tube in front of you, so suffice it to say that I started out in the NW area of the map, and was trying to get to the NE area (the map does not exactly correspond if you overlay it onto a map of London, so you can be duped into thinking things are close or in a direct line which aren't, because the tube map looks that way). He told me that the best bet was to go into the heart of the city and then change to the Victoria line, which would take me back out to where I wanted to be.

Sounds good. Unfortunately, when I got out of my tube in Oxford Circus, I heard the nice British man on the loudspeaker announcing that there would be no more trains going on the Victoria line that evening. Yes, a choice four-letter word came out of my mouth. Luckily, being a tourist, I had a map with me that actually had bus routes on it, so I looked at that, and hopped back on the tube to take one more stop further into the city to Picadilly Circus where I could catch a bus to take me home. Picadilly Circus appears to be London's version of Times Square, so at the late hour of 11:30 (I haven't been out that late since I don't know when!), it was absolutly packed with people (a few of them even speaking English).

I found the bus stop, checked the times, and saw that my bus would eventually show up. I saw that another bus went almost all the way home, so when it arrived I hopped onto that. It was pretty full, but not packed, so at the next stop I had a clear view of the altercation that ensued right in front of me. Some English guy was yelling at and pushing another guy to keep him from getting on the bus. The other guy had a cut over his eye and blood all over his face. The guy eventually let him on the bus, and the rest of us just shifted a bit further away. Whatever had happened earlier in the evening, the man was definitely past the point of being belligerent by now, so everyone just carried on with their conversations.

As soon as I saw my proper bus trailing the one I was on, I hopped of and switched. That bus had the distinction of driving by all the pubs as they let out, so a lot of red-cheeked, glassy-eyed people were getting on. Who ARE all these people and what are they all doing at midnight on a weeknight?

I eventually did get home, but I was reminded that there is a good reason I don't go out much. I also am thinking that my godfather might need to be stripped of his duties (whatever they might be).

Shopping in London

Aside from food (which is mostly mayonaisse based, it seems), I haven't purchased many things while here in London. I bought a train ticket north and a train ticket to Paris. (Oui, oui!) I bought a ticket to see Momix, an American dance troupe that I've always wanted to see. (So worth it, even if it was twice the price of a ticket at home.) I bought some airmail envelopes and paper (with the Indian proprietor of the shop saying that nobody writes letters anymore, even to India).

I did go to a craft fair yesterday (apparently I AM my mother's daughter). While I drooled over some wooden bowls, and I really wanted to take an attractive furniture-maker home with me (his furniture was attractive too, but that was secondary), I did make a small purchase of some lavendar sachets. They were more in my budget (and weight limit) than anything else. And they smelled nice. (That will probably be welcome after a couple of months of travelling.)

Today I wandered around Islington and popped into a couple of shops. I went into one clothing boutique called Frostfrench or something. Surprisingly, everything there was made in England. Go figure. I'm not really one for fashion. (1-800-221-4221 is my fashion hotline... that's LL Bean, in case you didn't recognize the number. Yes, I am wearing something from them right now.) I just don't understand why some people think things look attractive. I mean come on, the bubble skirt is back? Women in London seem to think that trousers are optional if their shirt is long enough. I can almost understand all of that. But when I was going through the racks of shirts and skirts and trousers at this boutique, I came across a garment that could only be described as cashmere knickers. Yes, panties. They looked rather like the things that people put over diapers. (I don't have any kids, so I don't know the technical name of that piece of clothing.) I was tempted to ask about these, but decided to just put them back and move on. But you can be sure that I will be looking at those women with the long shirts and no trousers more carefully from now on to see if maybe their ARE wearing something else under there.

Spinster at the Wedding

I've been down in Cornwall for the last few days with all of my British relatives for a cousin's wedding. The weather has been, well, British... bloody cold and raining. One of my cousins mocked me for not taking off my coat in the church at the wedding, but it quite a fashionable coat (I got it in Rome last year, therefore it must be fashionable), and all those other women with just a shawl wrapped around their shoulders were freezing, and I was quite happy. The nice thing about being a foreigner is that you can blame all manner of ills on the fact that you ARE a foreigner. They can just assume that in the (backwards) colonies, we all wear coats all the time (or at least we do when faced with bone-chilling English weather).

I am staying in some cottages with almost all the relations. (One family isn't here, and number of the children weren't invited.) It's lovely to see them all, and even more fun knowing that I'll see them all again soon, so I don't have to worry about doing all my catching up right now. I have noticed a few things while being here with all of them though.

1) They all smoke like bloody chimneys. In my world at home I have no close friends who smoke (that I know of-- they know better than to tell me!), no family members, and really can only think of a couple of relations. Here, about half of them smoke. There is always a group huddled outside puffing away. (Disgusting it is, but at least they do it outside!)

2) I sound like a rube. I have worked so hard in the states to portray myself (totally true, of course) as an erudite person. But here I just open my mouth, and this godawful twangy accent comes out, and no matter what I say, I sound (to myself at least) like an uneducated boob. (Yes, I'll be working on my accent.)

3) The Brits, at least those in my family, are so good about social formalities. Another cousin is getting married in a month, and the invitation said that they "would like to invite you". They "would", but they can't apparently. I guess that's a grammatical no-no over here. (Think off all those weddings I've crashed over the years, because I wasn't actually invited...) At the reception last night, people were wonderful about introducing me. I was talking with one gentleman whose son I would be sitting next to at dinner, (we had assigned seats, boy-girl-boy-girl, of course, but also couples were split up so that you would be able to meet and chat with someone new) who later, as I was approaching the table and his son, made a mad dash from I don't know where so that he could properly introduce us.

4) A couple of people thought I was Canadian. I took this as a compliment (and patted myself on the back for that good practice on my accent). Perhaps they just assume that Americans don't travel. (I was asked a couple of times if it was true that only 5% Americans have passports. How would I know?)

5) I am, officially, the only single person left in my age group. I normally don't mind this at all (and actually, I still don't), but last night for the first time I wished I had a date so that I could have a dance partner. At home I have no qualms about stealing a friend from his wife and dragging him out to dance, but I thought that might not go over so well with strangers. "Hi, I'm Lucie, the American cousin, and I'd like to just borrow your hubby for a bit..." The husband of one of my cousins (aged 55, I would guess) did take pity on me at one point and took me out to the floor. I supposed I could have just gone out on my own and started dancing, and everyone would have just assumed that that is what they do in Canada.