Scotland Part 2 and Double Pub time

January 6, 2013

Greetings!  My name is Mark Tomshack, I’m a senior Biochemistry/Biology major.  I’m super excited to be here in England.  Our plays have been great, the city is amazing, and the accents are even better!  Also I absolutely love art majors, and wish I could be one.  Anyways about the trip:

I woke up this morning and this is what was in front of me:

A giant castle on a hill! 

Then, in the other direction:

This is Edinburgh, capitol of Scotland, and an amazing city.  I had spent the night here at a local hostel.  My room was no bigger than a queen size bed, but what did I care, I was in Scotland!  Unfortunately for the first time in like 2 years I’m starting to get sick, but I didn’t let that stop me.  I had breakfast at the hostel, and then set out for the journey home (sort of) to London.  I walked down the royal mile, the street leading up to the castle, on my way to the train station.  This street is a bunch of shops, since its Scotland almost every single store sells kilts and cashmere, and every building is old.  Here’s a picture of the Royal Mile as seen down the barrel of a cannon from the castle ramparts:

Finally Kendra and I, who came with me on this trip, reached the train station.  The train ride itself was great, while it was five hours long, seeing the countryside along the way was fantastic.  There is seriously a castle in every single town here; it gets a little ridiculous coming from the US where there are no castles.  When we got back to London we headed for our hotel and a couple of people were leaving to head to a nearby pub, I decided to join them.  The pub couldn’t have been any more British.  It was a small cramped space, everyone was crowded in, and we were watching a football game(soccer for our American followers).  Later in that night we headed to another pub for dinner where I had the biggest burger I have ever had in my life.  This has been a busy, busy weekend of travel and sightseeing, but well worth it. I’ll leave you with one final picture of Scotland…enjoy!