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.

Hurling

We started yesterday (30th) earliness - with a little scare about daylight savings - luckily it was good for us and we gained an hour.

Heading off to a the Hurling Finals in Dublin, unfortunately we didn't get to watch a game at Croke Park but instead we went to the smaller concrete park 'Parnell Park' It was a long drive to the game (about 2.30 minutes) the boys got home late last night so I drove - much much easier to drive during the day.
Our first impressions of Hurling were that is was crazy with people throwing sticks and bodies around everywhere, but eventually it became less aggressive and almost boring with just the game to watch! The game was very interesting to see though, and I'm glad that we extended our stay by 2 days - I got to play soccer for a team there, and we got to see hurling.

That was pretty much our day. We saw two games of hurling, and then we drove home (getting home late at about 9pm) watched some tv, and went to bed after saying goodbye to John our host as he had to get up to go to work at 6am.

The next day (today the 1st, so I will have to write in the current tense) we went to the shipyard and pretty much breezed through customs - no passport checks or anything, I assume we will meet them on the other side. Hopefully we don't get a hard time coming out - cause it is just plain annoying. The ship again has wifi - but for some reason it doesn't want to load my email or skype very well. It is getting quite rough on this boat at the moment as the weather isn't so good, but it just adds to the fun.

Until later - and hello Scotland.

Glenariff park, Soccer and a night of boxing

In the morning we had a 7.15am wake up time to leave to go to Glenariff National park, which is a park near the east cost just south of waterfoot. A really beautiful place, with a 7km walk that follows the river along with a series of cool waterfalls. We were lucky there because the trees were dropping their leaves and the leaves displaying their classic autumn colours. Andrew slept in the car cause he was too tired to get out and walk.. I just don't understand why he keeps staying in the car. But - not my problem really. The was one of the better walks that we have been on, although we were pretty stuffed when we got back to the top. We then went the caves in cushandun (they have small unimpressive sea caves on the beach) and then onto Tor head via the small coastal road with amazing views of the coast (with not as many hedgerows as normal so we could see things more) Tor head was pretty remote, an old burnt out house with good views over to Scotland and along the coast - boy it was windy up there.

We then headed back to play soccer (well I did)- I played for draperstown - my couch surfing host John's team. I played fullback (or center half it is called in football/center back) with a few other boys that hadn't played much, which made it very hard going early on. The team we were playing was much better than us, and in the first 20 minutes we were down 4-0. We went on to lose 7-1... in a muddy but fun display of football. I would have posted some pictures, but the boys forgot to take them... grrrrrrrr.

Oh well, we then were going to a charity boxing match in another town over - so I drove over the mountains down the small lanes in the rain to this boxing match (it was a selection of just ordinary people that were boxing to raise money) One of John's friends was fighting there, so we watched him and left. It was interesting to see people who were not very good at boxing try it out. Having only watched boxing on tv. I guess it is just like watching anyone at a sport that they have no idea about.

We then went out to a live music venue after we got home - but it was terrible music (too loud and I didn't enjoy it, so I went back to the house to go to bed). It was a long day and I was stuffed.


Today we went to see a hurling game - will comment on it later.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow I get to play soccer for the team here! - Stay tuned!

Draperstown and the causeway

The day before yesterday evening, we met John after a few minutes tentatively waiting in his street not knowing what house he was in.We saw someone come out, I thought of going over and saying "John?" I didn't, but we did discuss the possibliities of the chances of his name being john - and teh awkwardness of the conversation that would follow.
Something like this"

Me: John?
John: - Yes....
Me: It's steve,
John: So.....
Me: From couchsurfing....
John: What.....
Awkwardness would have been overflowing... Luckily I stayed in the car and smsed john (who would arrive in the next couple of minutes.

Anyway, we have our first real irish accent host, which is nice for a change. We went and order pizza (not doing much help for my running!) and then went to meet his brothers at the sports bar. They were so funny, with thick irish accents, and irish humour it was such a fun time there listening to their stories.

We got hosted in a nice house with an upstairs guest room with 2 double beds and a single (yay - no mattresses for us) and got up the next morning refreshed (although I only had 6 hours sleep, which seems to be the norm nowdays)

That morning we headed off to the giants causeway, the coastline was really nice - although it was very similar to other coastlines that we had seen around 'the Ireland' as they say. The causeway itself was a bit of a let down for me. It was cool the way that it had been formed etc etc, but the whole tourist notion of it spoiled it a little. The tops of the rocks were worn where millions of people had stepped before I did, which is a bit of a shame, I have seen this at lots of places in Europe, the stairs at famous churches and tourist attractions such as Windsor castle, and the Tower of London. It also made it very slippery, the smoothed out top of stones so you had to be extra careful. We walked around the coast a little to see the organ (much the same as the organ pipe national park near calder park) just a little bigger. To reiterate - the coastline is very beautiful - countless shades of green and ragged cliffs which makes the walk that much better.
Our next stop and last for the day was the rope bridge (about 20 minutes drive east of the giants causeway) which was well, also not as cool as I thought it would be, mainly because of the 5.09 entry fee to cross the bridge - to which it didn't go anywhere!!! Again, you pay the money, but you always have the sense of that you are being ripped off cause if you don't see it they don't care, and we have traveled halfway across the world to see this....      It still was pretty good, but it wasn't the canyon swaying ropebridge I was hoping for.

We just made it back to the car and the heavens opened and it poured again - we had been lucky so far. It was about 4.30 at this time, and we had a hour trip home, and we ere going to  cook dinner that night.

We got to the supermarket - bought stuff for chicken casserole, and put some sun-dried tomatoes in it. When john got home he was going to soccer training - to which I kinda hinted if I could go, and he let me came along. So we took a walk to soccer training, which was very fun, the guys were nice and the ground was a hybrid - type of artificial/real grass pitch.

So after an hour and a bit of running around playing soccer, back to eat dinner then bed.

Organ pipes

Belfast tomorrow.