Scotland is for Lovers (Part 1)

What can I say, Its a Friday morning and I'm headed off to from what I hear is one of the most unique and beautiful parts of the UK. Scotland, oh how I had dreamed of it in my younger days talking to members who had been there from PV. I had a mission though, to play one round of golf and to have a really nice Scotch whiskey. Anyways, this is all going through my mind as our coach leaves from Harlaxton at about 7:45AM. I'm in this coach, looking at the English countryside for a total of three hours when the vehicle suddenly stops moving. I'm not sure what to think, when you've dreamed about a place for so long, it is really hard to realize that you are actually living a dream. I get out of the coach to see this small little wall that separates the border of England from Scotland, and almost with tears in my eyes take my first breath outside. It's hard to explain what it is like when you are looking at the blue flag with the white X. All I know is that a huge smile came over my face, and I kept saying to those around me, "We're in freaking Scotland!!!" for at least an hour and a half.

The rest of the landscape had changed dramatically. When in England we are passing hills and villages that are a bit steeper than the East Middlands where Harlaxton College is, but as we hit Scotland everything was different. We started seeing extreme rock formations, more sheep, more creeks and brooks, and more natural scenery. This was where God intended the birthplace of Scotch and Golf to occur. The differences though subtle to the naked American gaze, were completely evident in the landscaping. We drove for 2 more hours from bays, ocean, and mountains on the left and right of our coach, and valleys, livestock, and golf courses to the right. I was in my dream, and unable to understand why I was so fortunate to be experiencing just the scenery of this untaimed and different UK country.

Eventually, we pull into our stop in Scotland. Edinburgh (Ed-in-bur-ough), what can you say about a city that was built around a bay, mountain, volcano, and hills. It was magnificent gorgeous, old-school, and I was in awe while waiting to get to the Royal British Hotel. Once we got to the hotel I threw my bags into the room where Matt Thompson, Stedman Carmony, and myself would retire on our nights. My normal tour group was not with me this trip, they were in Rome. So politely I decided to tag along with my roomate Matt and a girl Fran. Little did I know that these two people would become great friends and instrumental in the next two weeks.

We walked out of our hotel which was on Prince's Street and began our look at Edinburgh. It was 55 degrees outside with sun dripping over the hills and mountains. We're walking through the city and see a building that at the time we thought was Edinburgh Castle (the thing to see in the city). It ends up after climbing up 10 stories of steps that we had not located the correct castle. So in our tired rage we made our way back to the city. See, the thing about Edinburgh is that the city is extremely hilly and full of elevation. Roads may look like the lead somewhere, but at one point or another you may realize that you are 100 ft. below your landmark. In a frantic look for the castle and the "Scotch Whiskey Distillery" we ended up taking the wrong road, "Not the Royal Mile" and looking up at the castle via its cliffs. It was intimidating, our tour was to start no later than 5:15 and we were looking up at the castle at 4:00... Thus our dillema.

Anyways, we end up walking around the castle and finding a parking garage with steps that said, "Castle Parking." In an Amazing Race sort of run, we end up on the Royal Mile right next to the Scotch Distillery Heritage Museum. The tour was amazing, 7 quid for enterance, a sample glass of scotch, and an hour long tour. We had a blast, and afterwards went to the scotch bar and I ordered a 21 year old Glenlivet. (Yes mom, I did drink a scotch that was older than me). It was amazing, tasty, and with over 500 different varieties of Scotch to choose from with my order I had definitely picked the best one for me. (I'm thinking that I may be teaching Dad about the ins-and outs of Scotch tasting when I get back).

After browsing the scotches for a half an hour Matt and I found this little Medievil warriors shop, where you could buy Roman Helmets, and swords.... That was a good idea, after a glass and a half of Scotch us deciding to get pictures of us in warrior stances and helmets. We're really just lucky to be alive, but it was amazing and a blast. Fran couldn't help from laughing at us and as she put it, "we were like kids in a toy shop."

Hunger was beginning to get the best of us at about 8PM, and we were thrown off by the light up in Scotland in the summer. The sun didn't set all weekend until 11:30 PM, so we hurried our way to the hotel and then went in search of food. We ended up finding a nice pub/restaurant and ordered some haggis and chicken. Fran and Matt were convinced that a bottle of red wine was in-order for us. So, I got to pick out the wine, which became a common theme for the rest of the trip. (Fran if you're reading this, I hope you are a vino now) Dinner was delicious, and the conversations even more palletable.

At about 10PM we ended up making our way back to the hotel to meet up with the group of Harlaxton students in the hotel. We made our way out to experience the Edinburgh night life, ending up at this pub called "The Establishment." I got Johhny Cougar to get played by the pub band and we ended up buying rounds of pints while enjoying the music. It was going well, 12AM and the pub was closing. We had met some 4 gentlemen who are in the Royal British Navy. The Welshman and 3 Englishmen were the most pro-US Brits I had ever met. They bought round after round and we all had ourselves some great times. After the pub, we went to this club that was a rennovated old Catholic Church called "Faith." Weird that a Satanist was in there trying to convert all of us to be dumb and worship Lucifer. So behind his back I gave him a little blessing and prayed for his conversion... (shh, he doesn't know that). We had a good time, I talked to a Canadian or as I now affectionately refer to them as (Kanucks), and an Indian guy. It was fun, until at about 3AM when I realized that I had a tee time at 8:00AM in the morning. Basically, I rushed back to the hotel, went to sleep and prayed to dear God that I would be ready to play in the morning. (I had a little too much fun in Scotland). The Scots are just a race of people who make you want to have more fun than you are supposed to. That was basically the lesson of the day. Oh well, golf tommorow I thought, time to live the dream.