May 7, 2010: Eating My Heart Out, Or At Least A Sheep's Heart Out

Today was my last day in Edinburgh, and also my last day in Scotland.

The plan today was to finish up some last minute souvenir shopping, go on my final tour bus ride, and try to view as many museums and art galleries as possible all before 5 PM (A.K.A. when Scotland shuts down).

My first goal was to purchase a specific item that could only be acquired at a specific location (and also apparently a secret location), some ways from where I was staying. This of course involved taking the bus all by myself for the first time since coming to Scotland. Fortunately, like most major cities (outside of Alberta) Edinburgh's bus system is excellent, and so I had no problem finding any number of buses that would take me to my intended destination. To be 100% honest though, I shouldn't say I had "no problems", since I cheated and asked the woman at the front desk of my hostel to look up the buses for me.

After a successful shopping trip I boarded the fourth of the four major bus tours of the city centre. "Why are there four tours?" I hear you ask. Well, one of them goes to the sea to take visitors to the Royal Yacht Britannia, one of them concentrates more on the New Town, north of the poop swamp, and the other two take more or less the same route, but one is run by a live tour guide, while the other tour is given by a recording in multiple languages, and has a "Spooky Stories" option for children. Today I used the "live guide" version of the latter two options, but I had trouble hearing over all of the Swedish, German and French tourists who talked the whole time. I wasn't too bothered though, as by this time I had heard most of the stories two or three times already.

After the tour I went to The Museum on the Mound, which is another name for the museum inside the headquarters of the Bank of Scotland. (It seems to be a trend in my travels that I must visit the National Bank's museum in each country I visit.) From The Museum on the Mound I went to the National Museum of Scotland. I had wanted to visit the Royal Museum of Scotland too, but it was closed at the moment and undergoing a 47 Million GBP renovation. (The Royal Museum holds artifacts from around the world, while the National Museum mainly contains artifacts relating to the history of Scotland). I had also hoped to visit the Royal Art Gallery, but it took me 3.5 hours moving quickly to not even finish the National Museum (I only got to the sixth of seven floors before the museum closed).

(At the top: the earliest complete surviving Scottish Firearm - the Breadalbane gun from 1599. To put things in perspective, the small gun on the white background is at least 12 inches long.)

(The Scottish version of the guillotine, The Maiden.)

(In the 18th Century some men attempted to go to University to train to become midwives. Naturally they weren't trusted, and so they sat in this booth called a Sedan Chair to give them respect since the luxury of being carried around on poles by others was typically reserved only for kings.)

(A horse drawn hearse.)

(Hand operated vacuum cleaner. It's probably still more powerful and effective than the vacuum cleaner at the climbing gym [inside joke].)

After a full day of sight seeing, I stopped in to my favourite pub on the High Street (Royal Mile) to have one last meal of Haggis, 'Neeps, and Tatties (sheep's innards cooked in sheep's stomach, with turnips and potatoes), and of course some Irn Bru with which to wash it down.

While I had meant to type all of this down on Friday when it happened and post it soon afterwards, my hostel had a massive party and so I couldn't access the "Wi-Fi room", hence the late update.

(Misc. picture: Edinburgh one-ups the tiny openings to garbage cans in Seoul, by completely boarding off the opening to this garbage can on the Royal Mile.)

April 27, 2010: Wet Hiking In The Highlands

Day 2 in Scotland, and my first full day here. I woke up at roughly 6:30 this morning, because my body hadn't fully adjusted to the time difference. Regardless, I felt no drowsiness so I got to work completing yesterday's monster blog post and editing all the videos, etc.

At 10:30 I had to leave my room so that the staff could clean it, and since it turns out "free Wi-Fi", as advertised on the website, really means "pay to use Wi-Fi", I set out on a trek to find a cafe in town that supposedly offered wireless Internet. My first goal though was to find a shop that served breakfast.

(I live in one of those white buildings on the left, and my room overlooks the sea, literally a stone's throw away.)

(A different look at the lovely white shops along the sea front. My hostel is two white buildings to the left of the brown buildings.)

(The Caledonian Hotel, not where I stayed, but definitely the best looking building in Ullapool.)

Just down the street from my hostel I found a cafe/restaurant called The Frigate advertising a "Frigate's Cooked Breakfast" option on the menu. For 7.50 GBP (about $11.50, or less than my hamburger at the airport in Calgary cost) I was served on a plate the size of a pizza pan, bacon, eggs, sausage, fried tomatoes, fried mushrooms, black pudding (cooked pig or cow's blood that has congealed), toast, potato scones, and baked beans. The restaurant also threw in a large pot of tea for free. Then, after finishing everything and feeling full and completely satisfied (if not a little sick), I continued on with my Wi-Fi mission.

After using about as much free Wi-Fi at the Ceilidh cafe as I figured a 1.90 GBP bottle of lemonade earned me (and probably a lot more), I decided to stop in at the rather charming Ullapool museum. Built out of an old church, the museum still has the original pulpit from which the priest would have given his sermons. There weren't many artifacts in the museum, but there was a tremendous amount of information about the Highland Clearings of the 18th Century, and genealogical information about the people who lived in this area at the time. The person working at the museum was also more than helpful, and even gave me some information regarding the person to whom I should speak to find out about my own Scottish ancestry.

(The excellent Ullapool museum, in the old church.)

(The original pulpit.)

Since my hostel closes during the day from noon until 5 PM, I decided to go for a drive north of the town to explore the "Rock Route", an area of land where, in 1888, James Horne and Ben Peach first discovered how mountains are formed. I hiked a complete circuit of Knockan Crag, turned back and ran around it the other direction all in an hour, and then continued on to The Bone Caves to see the area where Horne and Peach found a fossilized lynx and polar bear skull.

(The view looking out from Knockan Crag. The visibility was poor today because of the dark clouds and thick mists.)

(A couple of photographs I took on my way up to The Bone Caves of which I am especially proud.)

The route up to The Bone Caves was much much longer than the Knockan Crag circuit, and by the time I got back to my car it was 7:30 PM, and I was absolutely soaking wet - it had been raining all day - and rather hungry since I hadn't eaten since breakfast. Actually, a lot of my discomfort came as a result of blazing my own trail straight up the wrong mountain to see what were not The Bone Caves, but rather were the home of a peregrine falcon and her offspring. The falcon was none to happy to have me intrude on her nesting area, and she made quite the display of displeasure. I figured I'd best get out the vicinity before I lost my eye balls. It was at this point I realized that the mountain is much steeper going down than it is going up, and so I had to zig-zag back down the mountain, using the local flora for extra traction/safety, which also soaked my shoes and pant legs considerably.

(The famous Bone Caves.)

(Not only did I have to watch out for angry falcons, but the slugs were out in full force because of the rain.)

(A shot of my car for the week at entrance to The Bone Caves trail.)

(Another shot of my Astra 1.8 SRI in front of the dock in Ullapool.)

When I did get back to the town at 8:15 PM I was starving. For dinner I went back to The Frigate and ordered a haggis and mushroom pizza. Haggis, a traditional Scottish food, is made by cooking sheep's heart, liver and lungs inside of the stomach. It tastes surprisingly good on pizza, and while I normally only eat pepperoni pizza back in Canada, I always try to sample some of the local cuisine when I'm in a new country so I figured I couldn't come all the way to Scotland and waste the opportunity to eat some sheep's innards.

Tomorrow I will attempt to find a swinging bridge over a waterfall, but for now I sleep.