Looking for Loch Ness

Note: It is pronounced Eden "borough" not Edin "burg." This is a mistake I am continually making about every five minutes as I write from my friend Ben (otherwise known as Angel Delight...a lovely British type of sticky sweet pudding) 's sofa as I await the arrival of my other Green Tortoise friends for our reunion party.

If winter in September, a sky that jumps between sunny and depressing and light persistent drizzle tickle your fancy, than by god mate England is the place for you. I took off from Grenoble at about 5.45 in the morning on Thursday...my flight that I had previously purchased the week prior was cancelled at 9.45pm the night before I was supposed to leave on my jaunt to jolly ole' England...and bused it up to the train station where it would be a 3hr TGV ride to Paris, a metro ride across Paris, a Chunnel train over to London, a walk up to Euston station and then another train (that was then delayed, cancelled, changed and then delayed again) and I finally arrived to AD's house in Carlisle England. I really don't think there is anything I can't handle these days.

Ben and I promptly hugged it out at the train station and then headed to the local Curry buffet where there was not only five different kinds of curry to choose from, tandoori wings, vegetarian samosas and a proper pint of beer. Needless to say I was a very happy panda. Ben and I headed off to the local pub and then back home where I had a delightful 11 hour sleep:)

The next morning Ben and I decided the best course for the day would be to head up to Scotland for the afternoon, because, well, because why not? We looked up trains that were all booked, so we hoped into the car and started our jaunt up the highway and many country roads. The green up here and the light, is just simply amazing, I found myself staring across rolling green foothills in patches of different color, shadows casting down from the sun's reflections on the clouds, and wanting to take a stroll up the hill as I was somehow magically transported to the lands of all my favorite period movies and novels. All I needed was a bonnet and horse to complete the scenario. Unfortunately I ran into a bit of trouble because my French bank card had been frozen (due to the massive amounts of spending and money withdraws in the previous days no doubt) and my poor bastard of an American visa didn't seem to be any good because I didn't have an oh so special european microchip in it (this must be what people without the microchip passports feel like when they get denied access to travel these days).

We finally made it up to Edinburgh (note, when mapquesting something in England, just add an automatic hour to the trip, highways in this country suck...however it does make for nice scenic driving with the windows down and the heater blasting...since it's already winter here by the way, I'm freezing...whilst singing loudly to broadway showtunes and the moon casts down on you:) (The showtunes were necessary after the Ghost Tour that we took down in the vaults of Edinburgh under the city where they used to hide the bodies they snatched from graves to give to the medical school...creepy).

Ben and I purveyed our surroundings and decided the best course of action (after I had sent my obligatory postcard to my sweetie pie) was to buy tickets to the Ghost Tour and then eat at the "Baked Potato Shoppe." This being a vegetarian only shop, I opted for a baked potato drowned in English baked beans and shredded cheddar cheese, of course first after having heaped several slices of thick butter onto a golden salted potato. I also opted for a samosa stuffed with Haggis (mmmm) are you salivating yet?

We wandered up to the castle, which was situated on top of the tall mountain, making it look almost as though the mountain had sprouted a castle rather than it having been built there. Dating all the way back to Medieval times, there's just nothing better than walking around the grounds imagining yourself as a medieval soldier being shot at from the towers. The fact that I can reach out and touch things that are damn near a millennium old is a pretty powerful feeling. Staring at the crown jewels, the crown of which is rumored to have been made from the melted gold of Robert the Bruce's crown (dating back to the 1300's), diamonds the size of your head and sword and scepter that were handled by the kings of old as they anointed all the crowned leaders of Scotland over the last several hundred years, it's just, well there's just no words for it, when your'e standing there looking at history. Wow. just wow.

We took part in a lot of the street performances, men dressed as vikings, local bag pipers...I had so many great videos of all of this, but alas my camera ate them all...including my favorite video of me rolling steam roller style down the hill in the princess gardens just outside the castle. It was such a perfect hill for it, I couldn't resist laying down and giggling all the way down the hill, I also felt the urge to yell out "AS YOU WISHHHHHHHHH!!!" It was a truly great day:). Finished off by our Ghost tour of old Edinburgh, which is said to be one the places in the world with the highest level of paranormal activity. We started off at the Mercat Cross, the oldest point in the city where all royal declarations used to be made from, and still are actually, also the site where all public torture was carried out. I naturally volunteered Ben to be made a public example of for the demonstration of public torture, so he was given 39 lashings, nailed to the Mercat Cross by his ears, then deafened by being ripped off the Mercat Cross (leaving said ear still nailed up there) and then later on he was suffocated to death before his body was sold to the local medical school...they got good use out of him:) Heard all kinds of great stories about torture, ghouls and ghosts, and Finally toured the vaults below the city (where I only screamed once:).

Today we're sitting around waiting for the rest of our Green Tortoise friends to join us for our mini reunion (as not everyone can make it this year due to scheduling conflicts) and relaxing under an overcasty sky. Heading back down to France on Monday and my first day of work will be on Wednesday, be thinking good thoughts for me!

I love you, I miss you.

Sarah

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