From England to Austria

So I have had a little bit of a break from writing my blog, apologies to those who have visited and read the same thing over and over.

We dropped off the boat and headed to the war memorial (the great escape from Dunkirk) and then onto to an abandoned town called Doel. (a tip from the duckfarmer (Peter) in Sweden)
It was very interesting, to see what happens to a town when a nuclear power station gets built in/right near the town that you live in. It was deserted, a whole town - complete with infrastructure that would come with a town. There was pedestrian crossings, street lights, all the road markings, phone boxes etc - all smashed or graffitied in some way. The houses were all boarded up, but we walked into a few of them that were already broken into. It actually looked like the house that we had fixed up a little. We then moved on to go back to boxmeer.

Boxmeer - staying at bongo's. He cooked us a dish called boerenkool, sausage and Kale (a vegetable that is apparently one of the healthiest going around). The next few days were recovery days, I went for the odd run (maybe 2-3) and we watched the boxmeer guys lose their game again. Bongo broke his foot - which resulted in him being bedridden for the next week and a half. We watched movies, I wrote a job application, and basically did nothing - it was really nice. We left on the friday to go to austria - to go snowboarding! With high expectations we headed off (8 hours drive - but really not that long considering the drives that we have done so far) we arrived at our accommodation at about 5pm, made a uick stop at the supermarket and then went to bed. I can't be bothered writing about the actual skiing conditions because it will take too long now. But it was good enough.

Will update later.

Hiking up Mount Snowdon

Today 11/11/11 was an early getup and leave via a traditional english breakfast - Seemed very similar to the traditional scottish breakfast really... But it was still good, a small scare because I left my camera on the stairs where I had to move to get the wifi - luckily a good Samaritan handed my camera to the owners of the B+B and I got it back in the morning. So a stroke of good fortune in the morning. We then were to go to Mount Snowdon. We hadn't looked at where we were going, so we took off in the general direction - found it after I found a old window (on my computer) open of where the mountain pass was.

We arrived after about 40 minutes of driving, stopped in the car park of Pen-y- Pass . There are about 4 or 5 paths up to the summit, we chose the shortest and fastest route. The weather whilst not raining, it was cloudy, windy and cold. Andrew didn't come - and wanted to stay in the car for 5 hours.... Fine. Doesn't like hiking. Mark and I set off the mildly steep path the went past two lakes before it started to incline, and our nice gravel path turned into a steeped rocky path. Eventually we climbed far enough for the path to turn into more of a steep climb rather than a walk. The track wasn't the easiest to follow but wasn't that bad. The mist that we were climbing towards got a little thicker, and the wind was strong as we got higher. It was mountain conditions - but the mountain was only 1100m high! We reached the summit, trekking the last 15 minutes through heavy fog and fierce winds. It was fulfilling reaching the top after about a 1.50 minute hike. Half of that time was steep uphill. On the downside it was terrible weather with mist and fog - as you will see from the pictures! We then got down in about 1.30 minutes. The drive from the mountain to Tunbridge wells was ok - I started reading 'Tomorrow when the war began' (book 1) and the drive went fast. We arrived to see Kwko our host from Tunbridge Wells we stayed with last time. As what happened last time, we had a huge meal prepared for us, and drinks to be. We were pretty tired, so we chatted for a bit and then went to bed.

In summary - my leg is obviously better now, there is no way it would have got through yesterday if it wasn't, also the hike was really nice to go on. One of the longer hikes we have done - nice to get out and bash out some energy on a good walk.

(photos will come - but not on the boat cause internet is waaaay to slow)

Edinburgh

2 nothing days - but not bad ones!

Today (2 days ago) was our drive day from Broadford, Ilse of sky to York. It was 8 hours of driving with a stop off at the Ben Nevis distillery for andrew to buy his dad a gift. We didn't do anything really.

We arrived to our B+B place with no breakfast (it was a cheap deal we got) and had a great dinner at a carvery, new to them myself, you could order a meat that was carved for you, then all you can eat seasoned vegies! They were delicious! mmm My plate was pretty full!! Bam.

The next morning I got up early and went for a jog - my leg feeling a fair bit better, so off I went albeit a little slower and carefuler (is that a word) then normal. About 7kms. We then went into the city of York,parking at the train museum carpark, having a walk around the city, saw the walls (York still has medieval walls surrounding the city (or the existing city) which I enjoyed seeing. So we took a short walk on top of the walls, bought some food at the market there -york had a nice feel to it, quiet, clean and peaceful. I don't know if that was just my perception, or we got york on a good day but I found it to be pleasant the time we were there. We then went to the train museum, which was interesting - but not as good as I thought it would be. I wanted there to be more things about modern trains, and not things that I already knew. The flying scotsman exhibit was excellent though. - tour in the 80's to australia. - been there!

Andrew wanted to go to the Manchester united ground and see the stadium tour, mark and I didn't so we went to maccas for free internet and to book our accommodation for the evening. We stayed there while andrew had his tour, then we drove to Wales - IIandudno or something like that. Tomorrow we are going to Snowdonia.

Short blog - but we didn't really do anything.

Isle of Sky

We left via our massive breakfast and then went towards the Isle of sky - We changed our plans again a little bit, because upon further research I found that the scenery was much different and better compared with Ben Nevis. So we have another revised plan. Anyway, we went down to the golf course that was near our hotel, but there was nobody there - which was a disappointment as we were looking forward to it. Oh well, we then ventured onto our hostel (about 2 hours away) in Broadford, Scotland. We checked in, and then ventured on the scenic road from Broadford to Elgol a place down on the coast. The drive was very scenic. I would say much more scenic then the north of the Isle. On the way we saw this old man on the side of the road that wanted a ride. We picked him up and got treated to a very talkative Scottish old man that asked us a bunch of questions and answered our also very amusingly. His accent was crazy! He almost demanded that he take this photo for us. I have a video of him also - that is amsuing. We were running low on fuel... so we had to turn around and come back, but the views were pretty cool. My camera worked overtime.

That night we went to the rather large supermarket, Tarks cooked us dinner which was good, and then bed - rather early.

Today - caught up already!

 We had horrid night sleep - the bed mattresses were springy but when you can feel the springs it is not such a good idea, also the single be is slightly too small for us, so curled up is not a great sleeping position.  We have had some bad sleeping nights, but you always feel a bit ripped when you are paying for it. But the place itself is not so bad. Anyway, feeling a little bit tired - the others' more than me I feel - been used to getting little sleep the last few months - 1 night isn't going to changed anything, we headed off to past Portree and walked up to see the Old Man of Storr.

Old man of storr

View from Quiraing

Kilt Rock

The hike took about 1 hour each way plus about 15-20 minutes stuffing around at the top. You could easily spend another hour or two by walking amongst the hills, but as the daylight disappears early, we had to keep moving. I might add that the weather has been sublime. Clear skies - you would never know from the pictures that we are in the middle of november! We then went on to see Kilt Rock, a waterfall that flows into the see - again, views were amazing.
We then went up to see Quiraing - which has a bunch of land slipped cliffs and pinnacles all covered in green grass - well almost. Andrew at this point decided that he didn't want to get out of the car, got grumpy and slept in the car. It was a pity in a way, cause it was almost my favourite time in the last 4 days. But oh well - I don't car (I mean care) haha. We walked along the escarpment and we were treated to a great views the whole time - it was quite busy, at least for november. We then drove along the coast - the boys were quite tired so our driving was sort of useless as mark was falling asleep and andrew didn't care.  Saying that, it all turned out well, because the mountains had died down so to speak, and the harbors around the smalls towns were not as impressive as the ones further south. So we turned for home after having a kick of the footy - which revitalised them again.. Bought some food at the supermmarkter again - wrote my blog, dinner and then ate. It is so strange to adapt your body - cause it goes dark at 4pm... So you are thinking - yes it is time for dinner. But... no it isn't.. it's only 5.10... then 5.25...
Anyway - tomorrow we are going to York. 8 hours drive

Cairngorm mountains and Loch Ness

2 days ago.....

Train on the right - 1/2 way up the mountain.

We awoke and headed down to breakfast (which was provided) and boy was it something. Full Scottish breakfast, black pudding, sausages, eggs, toast, yogurt, cereal, bacon and brewed coffee.. well.. it was such a nice surprise. So we stocked up on our fuel reserves as we were heading to climb a mountain. My hamstring was not really good enough to be doing that, but you don't let things like that bother you too much. We drove to the foot of the mountains where there is a funicular railway (one that has 2 cars and relies on a cable kinda) which costs 10 pounds to get to the top and down again (for anyone who is interested) we were always going to walk up it though. The deceiving thing about mountains (or hills) in Scotland is that although they are small in number ( I think they are around 1000m), they still take a fair bit of effort to walk up them. It only took us 2 hours, but we were sweating and quite hot when we arrived at the top - even though the temperature was about 3 degrees plus a good deal of wind chill. We climbed up the ski run, past the railway station and to the top of the mountain - pausing halfway up to take a picture of the lake that we had taken about 50 minutes before from the shoreline.

The guys bought a few souvenirs from the shop at the top, but I didn't want any of the stuff there. We then headed back down the 'windy path' which was nice, (I was going slowly due to my leg - but only as a precaution really, I didn't want to do anything before we go snowboarding in Austria in a few weeks)

The lake from the above picture

We were going to go golfing after that - but we ended up running out of time (well daylight really) and the Australia Vs England rugby game was on. So we went back and watched that game - which was interesting hearing the English commentary (so so so bias!!!) A dinner of Chinese which was great (and cheap) and to bed.

Loch Ness - Just a lake

The next day yesterday - was Loch Ness day. To our surprise (although I don't know why) our car was covered in ice when we went out to get going... (Did I mention our magnificent breakfast again?) We did the old water trick and headed on our way to the Loch. We were still in good spirits (nothing like a few days before) and arrived about 11am. (we were staying in Grantown Scotland) For those people who were wondering where we stayed, it was the Ben Mohr Hotel - great place - I think made by the breakfast - shower took a while to get hot though if I was picking). Anyway, we went to the Loch Ness information center (6 pounds for a student he he) which was informative, a bunch of videos that goes from room to room telling you about the history of the 'monster' etc. It is actually a waste of time going there specifically. - it's just like any other lake - just with a kinda cool history about it. So we then went nearby to Dog falls - not that special, but it gave us a quick walk through the forest which was nice. We then drove about 1.30 hours back to Grantown, plus some dinner of Cheesecake and pie (the pie was the main course)

Edinburgh, St Andrews and the Cairngorm mountains

St andrews hole 18

This week has been an up and down week, but the next day we went to St.Andrews to see the golf course. We got up and headed out to St.Andrews and arrived at the city and went straight down to the golf course. It was pretty cool - the landscape and the countryside that is next to the golf course is amazing. We walked along the beach (Great beach at St andrews) then went to the British Golf Museum after taking some pictures of the Golf course. The golf museum contained lots of information about the history of golf, as well as old artifacts etc. It was not so bad - even though I'm not the biggest golf fan. This took up about 4 hours and as the sun sets now at about 4.00 it doesn't leave alot of time for things to be done. So we headed back from St Andrews to Stirling along the coastal road seeing a few things - but not a huge amount. That night we went out to dinner with Kerry and Martin and then he put on a film when he got home - not really talking to us much. It was a strange CS experience the whole time really. The day was weird because Andrew didn't get out of the car all day - just drive us around.
Anyway, the next day we went into the city of Edinburgh - firstly to see the Camera obscurer center. Which was a whole lot of paintings and camera illusions etc. It was very good - and well worth the price (9.95). Bought a few souvenirs and things and then went to the outside of the castle - we were trying to get in to see the Scottish war museum, but they wouldn't let us in without paying to get into the castle (which cost 14 pounds) so we opted out and then went up to see the national history museum of Scotland. It was HHUUUGGGESSSS. 7 floors, and with live T-Rex skeleton,   a huge stuffed animal exhibition, massive amounts of industry, politics etc. There was too much to see - so we briefly skimmed most things, read the interesting things, and then headed back to car car and walked up Arther seat. That gave us very good views of the city,(when we got there it was dark - stupid 4.30 darkness) although I struggled to walk up it with my hamstring still a little sore from soccer. We stayed and had dinner in the city - (tak harus menonton tv lagi)and then headed back about 8pm.  The next day we were leaving at about 10 after I tried to find the international rules on the TV but to no avail. We then headed to Grantown, (in the Cairngorm mountains) which is about a 4 hour drive. We didn't do much that day - just drive and then watch tv in our hotel room - lets say it was a rest day. The weather was remarkably good for northernish scotland.. Today was a good day, but I will write about that tomorrow.

The view at night from Arthur's seat

Stirling

The Wallace Memorial

From the top of the Wallace memorial

We arrived at our couchsurfers house (or flat) to meet Martin and his roommate Kerry. We went out for dinner and had some haggis balls as well as some chicken pasta thing that was pretty ordinary. The haggis was ok – nothing special. A walk home was a little difficult as I was still sore from the soccer I played on Saturday. I guess preseason really does work, cause you can’t play a hard running 90 minute game without more than 3 weeks of sporadic running. We slept on the floor of their living room which was pretty small – stark contrast to Ireland. Martin has a projector set up in the living room – which makes me think that is it very interesting to see what others’ have in their houses. Patrick had no TV, where Martin has a huge projector with speakers.. Each to their own I guess.

The next day we went to the Bannockburn heritage center, which was closed for winter – it’s not winter yet…!! Booo. It was supposed to tell us all about Scottish wars and independence… so there was 2 hours we just saved. We then went to the William Wallace memorial, to which I will describe in a little bit more detail.

The Wallace memorial has been the best part of Scotland so far. We arrived in the car park with easy to find car spaces J and bought our ticket into see the tower. The tower is about a ten minute walk which was annoying with my legs how they were, but it was really nothing. There was a courtesy bus going up but we only reaslied that halfway up. I got the audio guide (which was a little old but stlll worked fine) for 1 pound extra, and up the spiral staircase. The memorial is structured with rooms that are positioned on the way with information about wallace’s life and the battles that he was in, as well as why he is such an important figure in Scotish history. His sword was there, as well as another room full of famous Scotsman – each one that had contributed to society by inventing something, or writing famous poetry. The audio guide was invaluable in that room, as the info about the people was limited. The staircase continued up to 62m I think to which I was treated to the views of the whole valley and across to the mountains, which I had all to myself, as I went a little slower to listen to everything. The architecture is also much different to things we have seen in Europe, the top is designed in a much different way – from afar it looks like a ruin, but from close it is meticulously designed. It may have helped that it wasn’t busy, but I still would have liked it I think. There are some photos I will add if I remember.

The tunnel through to the other waterway at Falkirk

The wheel itself

Our next destination was to the water wheel in falkirk, this connects two streams together via a huge wheel (does the job of a loch). A boat drives into the bottom of the wheel or the lift) and it carries the boat up to a bridge (kinda) that is full of water so the boat can travel across the bridge and then through a tunnel - into the next canal. It is impressive. We then went home – had huge pizza’s and then went to bed after watching some UK comedy tv.