We Ate Jam and Bread for Dinner

Castle Campbell

Upon returning from Belfast, Brendan and I had some time to spend in Edinburgh as our dear parents traversed the seas of Scotland in pursuit of the finest whiskey. So we switched into frugal mode, something I was already well versed in from living in a country whose currency was stronger than my own. I introduced my brother to the wonders of the local bakery, Peckham’s, which he quickly came to love. It’s a classy place, with all types of spirits, locally made ciders, and freshly baked loaves of bread. And tiny jars of jam, which we bought along with the bread and that was... most of our meals, actually.

We made a quick trip to the Royal Veterinary School for Brendan’s sake, but it wasn’t terribly impressive. In fact, it seemed that the best part of the trip was this addition to my album of humorous signs:

The best choice we made of the whole visit was to go to a little place called Castle Campbell. I found it in my Historic Scotland member handbook, which said that it was located outside Stirling and was only accessible through a forest glen. I saw the words ‘strong footwear required’ and I was determined to go. We had to take two buses to get there, and there was a bit too much time waiting in each station due to unlucky timing. At one point I even turned to my brother and told him ‘I really appreciate you riding buses and waiting in stations with me all day’. But no amount of unfortunate timing mattered once we stepped into the tiny town of Dollar, which had maybe one rotary. As we walked through the town towards the castle, we enjoyed many a friendly greeting from various elderly people who seemed to be the only residents of the town.

We passed through a narrow opening in a stone wall, followed a path through a lovely park along a babbling brook and, of course, a golf course, and then all at once it was there. A hidden, isolated paradise of green. The forest glen amazed me and my brother both, and I cannot really describe how incredible it was to be there without a care in the world, enjoying the country for its beauty after the rocky semester of rainy weather and depersonalized education. We spent the majority of our time in the glen, actually, and when the castle peeked over one of the cliffs it came as a surprise to us.
We finally did venture to the crumbling structure, and we were greeted by two kindred employees and a virtually empty place to explore. And explore we did. The castle amazed me, but the gardens were even better. Flowers of so many shapes and kinds, from rhododendrons to roses to tiny intricate ones I didn’t know the name of. I took many a picture of everything, and I was saddened to leave.
The next day, Brendan and I got up early and finished packing the rest of my room, and I happily left those freshman dorms forever. We headed over to the bus station, running a bit with all of my semester’s worth of luggage, and made our way to Glasgow on an intercity bus. This was my first visit to Glasgow, and it was a strange experience, because we had one goal: make it to the Botanic Gardens to meet our parents, since they were flying into Glasgow from Islay (the isle of Laphroaig). We boarded a bus, thinking that we would just know when we were in the gardens, as they are rather self-explanatory. Luckily, we had asked the driver, and he called out the stop on a seemingly random street, which the gardens were hidden behind. We camped out on a bench with all of our things, only to find that these gardens were the playground of the local boarding school, so my brother and I took turns walking through the greenhouses as the unlucky one stayed behind to watch the bags and get giggled at by much too young schoolgirls and being glared at by much too wealthy schoolboys.

Our parents came at last to the rescue, and we quickly boarded our rental car and headed north, to the lochs!

A Brotherly Visit

Whew. Almost didn't post for an entire month. Good thing I'm more on top of it than that... by a couple of days. Posting in quick succession now the rest of my adventures, which were numerous at the end. Enjoy, and thanks for continuing to come back!

Exams finished, and about a week of not a whole lot to do, my brother came to visit! He arrived into Edinburgh on a Friday, and our plans were already made for that weekend. We awoke on Saturday and headed straight back to the airport, but this time for a more local flight. We flew to Belfast, Northern Ireland on Saturday afternoon, a flight that ended up seeming shorter than the time we spent in the airports.

Upon arriving in the Belfast airport, we saw the best advertisement in the world. In a long stretch of tunnel to the street exit, both walls were covered in a continuous image of an apple orchard. Every few feet, there were little statements wishing you to enjoy this simple walk through the orchard, and relax just for now, and only at the end was there a small wooden table with a pint of Magners on it. Quite lovely really. And I drank Magners as much as possible just for that.

Didn't manage to get a picture of the wall, but this was at the end (and the only part of it online)

We took the bus into Belfast and found our youth hostel, tossing our things down and heading out into the city. We did a fair amount of walking, and I was the most impressed by the Queen’s University, but not too much else. That may have been influenced by the fact that it was drearily cloudy (but no real rain, as usual) as it had been in Edinburgh ALL week long, despite the fact that I finished exams right before that week. I know, right? This lack of being at the center of a world is irritating me. Anyway, I was pretty depressed by so much drear, but the sun did peek out a bit when we found the Botanic Gardens, which made me a bit cheerier. After a dinner at a restaurant a bit too nice for the clothes we were wearing, we went to bed for an interrupted night’s sleep due to our fellow hostel goers, and awoke early the next morn for our bus tour to Giant’s Causeway.

The weather for this day was still scattered and cloudy, but enough so to let the sun shine and dance among them, so I was contented. The bus took us to all manner of places on our way north, including a famous distillery where I bought a small book of Irish Songs, and a castle whose most important feature was its murderholes (according to our guide). We also passed very close by to County Antrim, where our great-great grandparents hailed from. I learned much more about this from my Grandma Peggy just recently, and I wish I had known all I do now when I was there, but I enjoyed the country all the same, which I hope showed them good respect. And I did wonder if they'd ever been to the Causeway...
A stranger natural phenomenon I am not sure I have seen. It looked like someone’s attempt at abstract art turned into solid geometrically shaped rocks. Brendan and I clambered over them excitedly, noticing the worn ones, the differently shaped ones, and then, in one area, the ones sheltering and harboring flowers. But then I discovered that one of the amazing parts of the Giant’s Causeway is the surrounding countryside, which was beautiful. It had that familiar rugged quality that Scotland did, and with the scattered clouds and teal sea lapping at the rocks, it was quite beautiful.

We made one more stop on our way back down to Belfast, which was at a well-known rope bridge. Now, Brendan and I were excited for this, because we both had unrealistic and different expectations. I expected it to be terribly dangerous, with two ropes on each side to hold onto, but differently spaced wooden planks to step across, kind of like the one in Shrek or countless other movies with great chasms and rope bridges. Brendan, on the other hand, thought it would be a bridge with two ropes on each side and one thick rope along the bottom to walk across. Sadly, we were both very disappointed by the actual thing. Not only was it a double reinforced bridge with what looked like traces of steel on it, it had solid wood planks without any spaces in them, and webbed rope all along the sides. AND it cost £5. I guess the days of needlessly endangering one’s life are over (editor’s note: or are they? stay tuned for the Ben Nevis post). So we passed on that one, with its long lines which reminded me a bit of a Dr. Seuss book.

The star-bellied Sneetches had stars upon thars.