Scotland Part 2

So on to the amazing part of Scotland...

We got up and went to check into Haggis Adventures: Scottish Highland Tours. We boarded Reginica, our bus and were on our way by 8:45. Steve drove us through part of Edinburgh and Tony told us brief snippets of what this and that was. It was already at this point when I knew I had the best of cameras-- out the window pictures turned out pretty well!

Our first stop was at an old bridge. We got out and Tony told us all about the Real Braveheart and the battle that took place at this bridge. So, going back in time, the nasty British Red Coats are trying to conquer Scotland and they hear there is a revolt, so they come up to squash it. They get to this hill and laugh because across the bridge they see a large grouping of mostly women and children with farming equipment as weapons. The Red Coats on horseback start across the bridge and upon reaching the other side realize that they have marched right into a marshy swamp and their horses are sinking in the mud. It is said that the men had their feet on the "ground" while seated the horses had sunk so much. They line up anyway, trying to keep order, when they hear, from over a hillside in the distance, the sound of hundreds upon hundreds of metal weapons hitting metal shields and the slow solid chant of Scottish men. Then, over the top of the hill, come these men in kilts with long vicious looking weapons pounding against their sturdy looking shields. The Red Coats, now intimidated with mud up to their asses (literally) decide maybe they should go back to the other side of the bridge. But they are having trouble moving in the sludge and in all the confusion the Scots attack. At the end of the battle you could walk straight across the river for all the English bodies floating in it.


From where we stood, listening to this story, we could turn around and see the monument built in honor of the man who let that attack. We then drove up to get a closer look.

From there we boarded the bus and headed North. Tony, our charismatic tour guide, used the greatest Scottish accent ever and we stopped all over throughout the trip for a "wee photos". In fact, everything was "wee". A wee castle, a wee photo, a wee lunch break. Everything was wee. :)

One of our first photo stops we ran into some wild life. A goose that Tony fed some crumbs to. The goose was perfectly comfortable getting photographed and hanging with us... well, up to a point. You know how there is always that one person on a tour that is just a little... off. This is the sort of person that asks the awkward questions and follows people around and makes strange comments and is just, well, not cool. Ours was named Ricky, and he quickly earned the nickname "ducky lucky" from Tony as he tried to pet our goose and scared it away. Shawn and I gave him a nickname which we found to be much more appropriate!! Awkward Turtle. That's how we referred to him throughout the trip.

We drove on and I swear there were tons of stories and things that Tony pointed out but it's a matter of remembering all of them and which mountain passages they go with... which, of course, I don't. There was one we heard on Sunday I think about a couple of Irish boys who came to Scotland and fell in love with these two Scottish girls. They stuck around for the week while getting some work done on their boat by the girls' father and at the end of the week they asked for the girls' hands in marriage. The father was sorry but he couldn't give it because he had 5 older daughters and if the younger ones got married off first he was worried the people would wonder what was wrong with the older girls and they would never get married. The two Irish guys sulked away and that night they opened up some whiskey and were "tinkin and drinkin, drinkin and tinkin, tinkin and drinkin" (Tony's Irish accent for thinking) until they came up with a solution. The next day they went back to the father and told him their idea, "we have 5 older brothers back home! We could marry the girls and promise to return with our brothers to marry your lovely older daughters!!" The father thought this was a great idea- all his daughters married at once, how lucky he would be! So he agreed and the 2 Irish boys married the 2 Scottish girls and then left on their boat for home, promising to be back in a couple of weeks. The older daughters waited with impatience and everyday they would ask their dad if he had heard anything from the boys. Sadly he had not. Time went by and the Father began to worry that even if the Irish boys did come that his daughters would age and lose their beauty and the Irish boys wouldn't want to marry them. He was angry with the Irish boys for their failure to keep their promise. So he headed up to the witch on the mountain and asked for her help. But her powers did not extend to Ireland so she couldn't bring the boys back. She said she would think about it and come up with a solution, he should come back tomorrow. So the witch thought about it overnight and when the man came back the next day she told him that she was going to cast a spell on the 5 sisters keeping them beautiful until the time when the Irish boys returned. The father was thrilled. He returned home, however, to realize what the old witch had meant. There were 5 new beautiful, tall mountains surrounding his home. The witch had turned his daughters into mountains- beautiful and eternal- while they waited for love to come and find them.

There were several stories like this one that Tony told along the way.

That day we stopped at The Green Welly for lunch. Tony recommended the Cullin Skink (which I quickly started calling Skank Stew), a white fish and potato chowder. I'm not usually a fish person, but I decided to go for it and I was pleased, it was actually really good, not very "fishy" at all, and nice and warm!!

We drove through the highlands, stopping a couple of places to get breath-taking pictures and hear more fun stories. Then around 4:30ish, as the sun was set and it got dark, we pulled into Loch Ness-- sadly there are no pictures (they wouldn't have turned out in the dark) and we didn't see the monster. Maybe next time.

Then we went for a presentation on the highlanders, their way of life and their clothing mostly. Ken, our presenter, wore a traditional kilt which, when unfolded and laid out is approximately 17 feet long. He showed us how to fold it and explained the historically practical uses for it in the very difficult lifestyle the highlanders lived. The kilt can be worn in different ways depending on the needs of the people-- long for warmth or tucked up shorter (as we typically see today) for hunting or dancing. Then our very own Awkward Turtle volunteered to put on the kilt and we all laughed at his shyness as Ken told him to take off his silly trousers and he tried to hide and pull his shirt down and all that. He was so excited to do it, but then so afraid. He finally got dressed like a highlander and then Ken needed a woman to volunteer to get dressed up as well. We all sat there for a while looking around at each other and when it became apparent that no one else would do it, I got up. Lucky for me I didn't have to undress. I just tossed on a nightgown looking thing over my clothes and then got my own "kilt" of sorts. Apparently back in the day the bigger your backside the sexier you were, so the goal was to fold up as much of the material as you could so it hung over your butt. There are pictures of Turtle and I all dressed up in our highlander gear- I'm holding a pot of oatmeal with a mouse in it. Yum.

Then we got out of our highlander clothes and sat down and Ken asked for a volunteer to die. It took a minute, but Shawn volunteered to die for the team. So he got up and Ken proceeded to show us the typical highlander weapons and how they are used. Damn those guys were vicious!!
After the presentation was finished we went to check into our hostel for the night. There we ate Haggis, potatoes and salad for dinner. Really, the Haggis wasn't bad. You just can't think about what you're eating. It's sort of like spiced up ground beef.

That evening the "Scottish Robby Williams," as Tony described him, was playing at our hostel's bar. Yeah, that's right-- our hostel had a bar!! It was pretty sweet! So yeah, Shawn and I played Jenga with a college girl and her Aunt that were on our tour while listening to acoustic covers and fun Scottish music. At one point Tony and our musician teamed up to teach us a Scottish folk dance and Shawn and I did it quite well I think :) Walk Forward (1, 2, 3, 4), swivel walk backwards (5, 6, 7, 8), no swivel- just walk forwards (1, 2, 3, 4), swivel walk backwards (5, 6, 7, 8), 4 spins (1- 8) and doe-see-doe (1- 8). SO MUCH FUN!!!

That night finished out with the pulling out of a karaoke machine! We had some swing songs, mostly sun by this kid David who had a great voice, and then some oldies classics and of course MC Hammer's Can't Touch This- to which we had a little dance off. GREAT FUN!!

We slept well that night after such a long, fun-filled day!!

On Saturday we woke to a light dusting of snow!! Shawn and I, both midwesterners knowing that snow in London and Lyon wasn't likely any time soon, were thrilled with this development, as were the 3 Indian people who had never seen snow. We all had breakfast at the hostel and were on the bus again by 8:30. Off we went for another great day of touring!


While on the bus Tony told us about DSL. At first I think many of us were wondering what modern computer technology had to do with the Scottish Highlands but soon we discovered that DSL stood for Deep Scottish Love. We had been counting white horses since the day before and now we got to understand why: In Scottish myth seeing a Unicorn means that you will fall deeply in love with the next person who's hand you tough. Sadly, though, unicorns in the highlands are, nowadays anyway, few and far between. Good news though! If you see 50 white horses it counts as a unicorn!! So we were counting horses all weekend long and ended 8 shy of DSL. Sad story.

On our journey today we stopped at the valley of Glencoe and Tony told us the story of the Massacre of Glencoe. This is a super sad story!!! I don't really feel like writing it right now, but maybe I'll add it later. Anyway, as I'm sure you can gather- lots of Scottish people died. But it was a beautiful area and so we climbed up part of the mountain side and took some more pictures.

Our next stop was at a castle that people still live in today! Eilean Donan Castle was a medieval stronghold castle. But when the English were taking over Scotland they were worried and didn't want any strongholds to exist so they ordered the destruction of all such castles. Eilean Donan, along with many others, was blown apart. But before this happened, all the castles had been claimed as the ownership of the King of England. And since he wanted to know what all he owned, sketches were taken of all the castles. So, in the early 1900s when a stone mason/architect saw the drawings and was in need of work he went to the original family owners of the castle- still rich- and asked if they wanted their home rebuilt for them in its original state. And thus we have Eilean Donan Castle- rebuilt in 1929 or something like that even though it looks like it is much older than that. While standing in front of the castle drinking hot chocolate and eating little cookies Steve and Tony had bought for us, listening to the story, 2 old women (sisters) and one of their husbands all came out of the castle and locked the gigantic front door. They STILL live there!!! CRAZY!!!

From there we piled back into Reginica and went off to see more gorgeous things. We stopped at a lake but I don't remember which one... it might have been Loch Ness actually... apparently Loch Ness is something like 23 miles long and more than 700 feet deep in some places. You could fit the entire population of earth- all the people in the world- into Loch Ness and still have space. Ridiculous!

Anyway, so we stopped and saw some more good views and then we went to see Saucy Mary's castle. So THIS castle is actually in ruins; it is along a water passage that is the safest way to avoid the harsh open waters and get from one part of Scotland to another. Mary, being the snazzy business woman that she was, decided to toll the passage past her castle. I'm sure she made tons of money. But she earned the name Saucy Mary for doing a little something special. You see, breasts are supposed to be calmers of waters and bringers of good weather- hence the busty women that lead the way out to sea on all the tall old ships. And so Mary, after each ship paid their toll, would flash her breast as they past, wishing them good weather and safe sailing.

Tony suggested that the women on our trip pull Saucy Mary's to help better the weather as it was cold and slightly rainy. One girl from Australia, Tali, was gutsy enough!! Whether because of her Sauciness or just the turn of events, the weather did get better as the day went on.

We stopped off for a couple more wee photos on our way to lunch. The town we stopped in for lunch had the most deadly of all sea gulls ever! Tony even warned us. Shawn and David, the cool grad student with the good voice and decent swing dancing skills, and I grabbed some food from a bakery and headed towards the shore. We chatted about David's grad work and his thesis and all that sort of thing as we wandered. Then, as we were heading back towards the bus, Shawn saw a sea gull and was like, ok, let's just try this. He threw a small piece of what was left of his sandwich into the air and sea gulls seemed to pop out of thin air to attack it! Then it was like a game- Shawn tried to see how close he could get a sea gull to take the food- so he held it out in his hand and one almost took off his head as it flew directly at him to get it. Of course we did not get this on camera and it was his last piece of bread. But Shawn wanted to try anyway- so he gave me his camera and we started recording- he tried to trick a sea gull into thinking that he food, but it wasn't buying. But at his feet another sea gull was getting closer and closer. All of the sudden Shawn sort of kicked and the sea gull, frightened, flew up into my face. I, of course, screamed. This is where the video ends. We got a laugh out of watching that repeatedly over the course of the weekend. :)

After another gorgeous wee photo we stopped at the River of Tears. (This exact story is in the captions of the photos- if you have read it already, skip ahead :) )

River of Tears-- Ok, so there was a man and a woman. They lived in the highlands and every summer they would climb up to the top of the mountains in the previous photos and spend their days looking out at the glorious country. One day the old man woke to his wife crying beside him as they sat up on he mountain top. "What's wrong?" he asked. "I'm an old woman and I don't think my body can make the climb anymore. I think this will be the last time I can come up here." The old man tried, to no avail, to comfort his wife. But up in the mountains lived the Wee People/Fairies. They loved the old man and the old woman; for years they hid and listened to the old woman chatter on to her husband as he sat, half sleeping, beside her. Watching her with sadness they ran to the king of the Wee People, Elvin, and told him about the woman's sadness.

Elvin went to the old couple and overheard them saying how they wish they could stay there on the mountain top forever. Elvin, in his mercy and magic, turned the old woman into a large rock, her face looking out to her beloved Scotland. The man cried out and began to weep, "What have you done to my wife?" Elvin explained how she would now be able to rest on the mountain top forever, he had granted her wish. The old man continued to weep for his wife and Elvin, moved by compassion, turned the old man into a rock next to his wife. The two stand, side by side, overlooking Scotland forevermore. The creek here is said to be the tears the old man cried for his wife. (Personal note: What kind of fairy king thinks it's nice to turn people into rocks? rude.)

The story continues:

So there was a lady named Maggie and she was due to unite her family with an enemy family via marriage. She and her husband to be spent a week together on a deserted island to be sure they could live together in marriage, as was the custom. They fell deeply in love! They returned to their homes and set the date for the next weekend. On her way to her wedding ceremony Maggie fell off her horse and gouged her eye out on a rock (great story, right!). She was worried about her now hideous face but was sure her husband to be would love her anyway and continued on her way, after bandaging herself up first I'm sure. She got to her wedding ceremony and her husband to be saw her and, thinking someone in her own family had done this to spite him- "make me marry an ugly woman, huh?"- he went around punching people and getting into fights. It didn't take long for the old feuds to rekindle and the whole place was a brawl. He didn't want to marry Maggie looking the way she did (jerkface).

Maggie's dad, pissed at the turn of events, blamed Maggie and banished her back to the Castle. Maggie climbed back on her horse and headed towards home. She got as far as this creek and cried her eye out (haha, get it!). Then Elvin came and asked her why she was crying. She explained her day.

"but don't you know the story of the old man and the old woman? don't you know the power of the Wee People and the magic of this creek?" Elvin asked. And he promised her that if she cried out that she believed and stuck her face in the water for 5 seconds she would be beautiful once again. So she got down on her knees and cried, "Elvin I believe!" and put her face in the water. She came out 10 times as lovely as before!! She headed towards home. Her fiancé came back to her a week later, apologizing, but like a good strong woman, she turned him away, knowing his love was weak. Her own father apologized for his rudeness and stupidity and Maggie lived a happy life.

We, of course, being the awesome tour group we were, reacted the whole scene. Lindsay, an American girl, played Maggie (Tony acted along with her). Then who could resist the possibility of magic water that makes you beautiful??? Steveo (the driver), another guy from the trip, Shawn and I all went down to the water's edge, cried out, "Elvin I believe!" and put our faces in the water. It was pretty refreshing actually, and really fun.

Next we went up to Kilt Rock- a cliff view of the water and surrounding mountains- AMAZING!!! This is also where Shawn and Tony played Sheep Shit Roulette. Just see the pictures for this one- it's worth it, haha.

We went up to one more cliff area where people had found dinosaur bones at some point. There were things you could read but I was really cold and didn't really want to stand there and read all about it. I went and took pictures instead. Shawn, breaking the rules, climbed over the fence and then went to stand next to the sign that said "Dangerous Cliff! Do Not Cross the Fence!", then went to peer over the edge. Rebel.

At this point the sun was setting and so we headed back south towards our hostel. Tony put in a movie about the Loch Ness that was informative but so boring that after another long day most of us dozed off. We ate dinner at the hostel again that night- pasta, no crazy dishes this time around. Then a bunch of us gathered in the bar area and watched the movie Stardust. Cheesy but cute and portions of it were filmed in Scotland.

That night we all went out to a local bar where an old man played the bagpipes for us. Then from there we headed to a "club". Shawn and I decided after being in said "club" for about 40 seconds that we weren't going to stay. Shawn, living in London for the past couple months, had pretty high standards for clubs. And anything that looks like a fishing bar a single strand of blinking Christmas lights across the ceiling as the "club lights" didn't sound to great to me either. So Shawn and I called it a night early and headed back to the hostel. Apparently the bar closed around 12:30 anyway. Some people went with Tony to a house party in town and apparently that was fun but Shawn and I didn't real mind missing out- we weren't hung over the next morning like half the tour, including Tony.

Sunday was our last day so we were back on our way at 8:30 again and we stopped to see some more castle ruins, then into a town where there had been lots of Nessy sitings. They had a large metal Nessy that we tried to climb on... and failed. But it was cool and apparently this place won the Loo of the Year Award, but I didn't go into the bathroom so I didn't see it. But there was an award framed in there and everything.

We moved on to a battle field and a thatched-roof house that was next to it. Tony told us which battle took place there but I don't remember.

Then we went to a place where people lived 9,000 years ago. They had build large round stone structures for worship. According to the researchers speculations, when members of the tribe died everyone would gather in these circular structures, pile the bones in the middle along with different herbs and elements. They would then smoke herbs and chant and burn the pile. Because of the structure of the place and the heat that would encompass the place, the pile of burning bones, herbs, etc. would separate and because of the sound waves of all those people chanting bouncing off the stones you could actually see the dust particles moving. Researchers speculate that these people believed the movement of the particles of bone, etc was the body's spirit moving on to another world.

This settlement is set right along magnetic tracks for the tectonic plates. There is is a large flat rock that you can, supposedly, stand with your back and palms against and you're supposed to feel something. I did not feel anything, nor did Shawn. However, he did take the opportunity, while my eyes were closed and I was concentrating on magnetic pulls, to throw a very distracting snow ball at me. In fact, the whole tour group then got in a snow ball fight. Very fun!

Two more stops!! (Are you sick of reading about my trip yet??)

The 2nd to last stop was at one last site of ruins. This one was really the best though because you could walk through them and climb on them! We went wandering through all the different parts and the Shawn and I climbed up on the old walls of what had to have been some sort of barn or house or something. It was pretty cool. We ran back to the bus- we were the last ones to get back to the bus since we'd been taking so much time climbing around- and Shawn decided to slide down the big hill the ruins were on. He ran, started sliding on his feet, then tumbled and slide the rest of the way down on his backside, getting his coat all muddy. But again, totally worth it! Adventure!!!! (I shuffled safely down- my socks had been soaking wet for 3 days... I really didn't need my whole body to be covered in snow. But it was still fun to watch).

And lastly we stopped in a little town and saw an old church. I climbed in a tree. We made snow angles. The Indian people made a snow man. It was good fun.

We then got back on the bus for the last time and headed towards Edinburgh. We needed to sign the Haggis Tours book with our clan name and thoughts on the tour so we came up with the name Clan Sexy-Ness. See, Tony, all weekend long, had been calling everything "sexy"- the Scottish people, the mountains, the lakes, the Loch Ness Monster herself. If it was Scottish, it was sexy. As it turned out later, Haggis tours even calls Scotland sexy in its paperwork! haha. So yeah, at one point Tony said, "that's where the word Sexyness comes from you know", referring of Nessy. So we named our clan Sexy-Ness and Tali drew our Clan picture (with a baby Awkward Turtle at the bottom!!) and we all signed the book with our praises for the tour we'd been given.

Finally we got back to Edinburgh, said final goodbyes to Steveo and Tony and the rest of the group and went to find me a hostel bed for the night. Shawn was taking a 10PM bus back to London that night. So we grabbed me a bed in a hostel and lucked out as we picked a hostel that serves free dinner on Sunday night to its guests. Shawn and I ate up and then Shawn went on his way and I journaled a little then passed out for the night.

In the morning I got up, checked out, grabbed a bagel and cream cheese and headed towards home. What an amazing weekend!!!!

I won't tell you what a pain in the ass it ended up being to get home... as it turned out, I accidentally bought my tickets for the wrong day- Sunday, not Monday. Long story short my train tickets ended up working out but I had to buy a new flight ticket back to Paris... more expensive than I would have liked, but honestly it hadn't been too expensive of a weekend so it wasn't too bad. I basically begged my way onto a train from Paris to Lyon and everything worked out just fine in the end.

I got back to Lyon feeling a little DSL as I looked back at the pictures of one of the most beautiful places I've ever been in the world!