Day 3 - Castle Trail

On Monday Dad and I went back to the airport to pick up the rental car for the rest of our trip. Overall, he did a great job of driving on the wrong side of the road, especially considering the van is a manual and Dad was having to shift with his left hand!

After we picked up the rest of the gang, we set out on part of the castle trail. We drove up to Oldmeldrum and saw the ruins of Tolquhon Castle. This castle was not supposed to be open, so we had only expected to see the outside, but the gate was open and the groundskeeper said to go on in, so we did.

After that we headed over to Huntly Castle, the one castle that we knew we would get to see inside. This was another ruin, but the outside was especially impressive. We also had a picnic lunch on the grounds. It was a bit chilly for those of us not quite acclimated to Scotland weather, but still a beautiful day to eat outside.

We also got to see the ruins of Kildrummy Castle, another one that wasn't supposed to be open but was. We had great luck with that yesterday. A highlight for me at Kildrummy was seeing the little lambs. This little guy almost came over to me before some people started making a lot of noise and scared him away.

From there we headed south over the mountains in the Cairgorm National Park. The view was gorgeous from the top of the mountains, though we did feel like we were on a roller coaster a few times. At one point we had to stop to let the sheep cross the road, because they sure weren't stopping for us! I enjoyed the ride - I'm not sure if the rest did.

Then we went to the best castle we saw - Balmoral. This is the Queen's residence when she's in Scotland, and it was by no means a ruin. It was gorgeous! Unfortunately we couldn't drive the car back to the estate, and the castle is quite far from the main road, so Papa didn't walk back there with us. He would have loved this castle though. On the walk back, Mom started a snowball fight with the snow remnants on the side of the trail.

Finally, we turned toward home. The sun was going down fast, but we did pull in to see the outside of Drum Castle. It wasn't the most exciting castle, but it made a total of FIVE castles in one day!

Overall, we had a great day of traveling. We spent a while in the van, but also got to see a LOT of sights, including part of the Scottish highlands.

Day 2 - Campus Tour

We started today off a little bit lazily. Okay - we were a lot lazy. Dad and I woke up around 9:15, and immediately called the airline to find out when the bags would be delivered - sometime between 11:00 and 1:00. Mom and Papa got up around 10:00, and Ben slept till 11! At around 12:30 the bags were delivered, finally! Everyone was so glad to have clean clothes.

After lunch, we finally left the apartment around 2:00, walked down to Union Street and caught the bus to the University of Aberdeen campus. I was glad to finally be able to show them Kings College, and I even got to take everyone up to my office to show them where I spend most of my days. I think they really enjoyed seeing the campus.

We also walked over to St. Machar's Cathedral, the oldest cathedral in Aberdeen, then rode the double-decker bus up to my own flat so I could show them my "hole in the wall." Mom's words when she saw my room were "my poor daughter!" It's not all that bad, but I will say this - my new two-bedroom apartment in Ft. Worth will feel like the lap of luxury when I get back! Here's a picture of all four of them in my tiny bedroom, one on the top deck of the bus, and a new one of St. Machar's (see my old post for lots of pictures of this cathedral, inside and out).

Finally, we ate dinner at a pub called The Illicit Still. It's got great atmosphere, and is really neat inside, but the food was only so-so. Oh well - now we can say we've eaten at a pub. We even watched a rugby match on TV while we were eating. A very Scottish experience...

One other thing - European Daylight Savings was last night, so it doesn't get light quite so early in the mornings, and it stays light much later in the evenings. It was still light when we finished walking home at 7:30 tonight (late night out, I know!). I think I'm going to like Daylight Savings here. Though from what I've heard, in the late spring and summer it stays light until around 2:00 am, so that might get a little old!

Well, tomorrow we're picking up the rental car and taking in some of the Castle Trail. I'm sure I'll have a lot of pics to post tomorrow night. For now, I think we're all about done in - they're still jet-lagging, and I don't know what my excuse is!

Day 1 - They're Here!

Well, they made it! My family is here. After a long flight to London, a 6-hour layover, and an hour and a half flight to Aberdeen, they made it. Unfortunately, their bags didn't make the transfer from London, so right now they have no clothes except the ones on their backs! Hopefully we'll hear from the airline that their bags are in Aberdeen soon.

After giving them the grand tour of the flat (which took all of one minute!) we took a walk down to Union Street in city centre, to see the basic sights of the city - Marischal College, Castlegate, and the town hall. We took a brief look inside the kilt shop (which has a lot of touristy gifts but also makes kilts). While on our walk, we were typical Americans, and went into Burger King for a milkshake. I couldn't believe they were drinking ice cream, when it's cold outside! Mom kept saying how cold she was afterwards. Actually it's been a really nice day, not very cold at all!

Here are a few pictures of the first day of our visit. I'll post more pics of our explorations soon.

Anticipation

I don't really have much new to share, and I certainly don't have any pictures from the last few days - I've been very busy attending lectures from prospective NT faculty for the University of Aberdeen (which was quite an interesting experience), translating a French article about Revelation, and trying to get things ready for my family, who gets here TOMORROW!!! I am so excited! My parents, brother, and Papa are all coming for almost 2 weeks! We are going to have a great time, exploring Aberdeen and the coastal region to the north, taking a drive out to Loch Ness (hopefully I can get a picture of Nessie!), visiting St. Andrews and Edinburgh, and driving down to London for a few days in one of my absolutely favorite cities. Anyway, I just had to share my anticipation... I'll share pictures when I can.

Maybe Not

Last night before I went to bed I posted the "Signs of Spring" pictures. When I woke up this morning, it was snowing - huge flakes that were swirling around and around in the wind. The wind has since calmed down and the sun is out, but I guess Old Man Winter isn't finished with us yet.

Signs of Spring?

I had a different journey to campus today, since I'm staying at Jason and Erin's flat while they're in the States. So I had to walk to Union Street to catch a bus to campus. On the way, I passed by St. Mary's Catholic Cathedral. Take a look at these pictures. The first one is from my first day in town. The next two are from today. The trees are flowering, and it's so pretty!

So, it looks like Spring, right? Well, looks can be deceiving! Within the next 4 hours after taking these pictures, we had snow, ice, hail, rain, and bitter cold winds. Oh, and sunshine too. This weather is crazy! I guess Spring isn't ready to settle in quite yet. I hope it gets here soon though!

Just for mom

Well, Mom has urged me to make another post on my blog, so here it is. There's not really much to say, since I didn't really get to do any exploring this weekend. I have been down with a sinus infection, and my exploring buddies were all either sick, out of town, or packing to leave town, so I had a pretty quiet weekend. My flatmate Anna and I did venture down to the amusement area by the beach on saturday afternoon to go to the cinema. We saw Becoming Jane, about Jane Austen - it was pretty good. We had a little time to spare before the movie started, so we drove over to the harbor. Here are a few pics - nothing special, but I can't go very long without pulling out the camera. Saturday was actually a rather warm day, but when we were down by the water, there was a cold wind blowing so hard I thought it was going to blow me over into the water!

Yesterday I didn't do much of anything. Didn't go to chapel since I couldn't sing - I'm still pretty congested and coughing a lot. I did go down to the "hotspot" to get online for a little while. While I was down there it started hailing - not big hail, but tons of it, and it was really loud hitting the roof of the building. When I walked outside, it looked like the ground was covered in snow. So of course, out came the camera again. This is my apartment building in the hail.

Hopefully I'll have some more exciting news to write about soon. I know I will next week, because Mom, Dad, Papa and Ben arrive on Saturday! I can't wait! We're going to have so much fun exploring Scotland and London, and all the places in between. Hopefully I'll be able to find internet access periodically to update the blog. If not, I'll have plenty to write about when they leave!

Swans of Seaton

On Monday, my flatmate Judie and I walked to campus through Seaton Park. This park is supposed to be absolutely lovely during spring and summer. Unfortunately, it has become a den for druggies, so it's not safe to walk through the park alone or at night. Since we were together and in the bright mid-morning sun, we were quite safe. Anyway, not much is blooming in the park yet, but we walked down by the River Dee (one of two rivers in Aberdeen) and met two members of the swan family that lives in Seaton Park.

They were paddling upstream, but not making any progress, basically just staying still. Judie wanted me to see them fly, so she ran toward the bank trying to scare them. It didn't work. They just looked at her, swam away from the bank, and came back as soon as she went away. Oh well. They are beautiful creatures. Next time I go into the park, I'll take some bread. Then maybe I can entice them to leave the frigid water for some different pictures.

Weekend in Banchory

This past weekend my friend Laurie (the other female NT PhD student here - from Seattle) invited me to visit her home in Banchory, a small village about an hour by bus from Aberdeen. I rode the bus down Friday evening, and met Laurie to go to a ceilidh (pronounced kay-lee), a Scottish dance that's sort of like square dancing. It was a lot of fun. Ceilidh's are popular events in Scotland, and this one was a fundraiser for youth mission trips this summer. I will admit - this was the only youth event I've ever been to that was BYOB! One of the trips is to Seattle, so there were American flags decorating the walls and some of the tables. (If you notice, the handpainted flag in the background of this picture has one too many red stripes. It caught my eye immediately, and Laurie noticed it as well. Too funny!)

The name of this ceilidh was "Any Excuse for a Ceilidh," and it was a very informal, family-oriented atmosphere, with little kids dancing with senior adults and the whole mix in between. A lot of the men were wearing kilts, and the featured instrument in the band was a fiddle. I danced several of the dances, though not well, I must say. But it was fun to try them. I sat out the most active dances, because of course I didn't know the steps. One of the coolest dances (which I was not about to try) was called a "helicopter". Two women and two men go into the middle of the circle. The women put their arms up over the shoulders of the men, and the men run around very quickly in a circle while the women's legs fly out from the motion (see below).

Anyway, my ceilidh pictures aren't the best, and definitely don't convey the atmosphere very well, but they're all I've got, so I'm posting them anyway. You'll notice in the picture of Laurie and me below that we're standing in front of Scotland, not America (by the way, that picture was taken around 1:00 am, after a lot of dancing, so that's why I look so rough).

So, I stayed at Laurie's cottage in Banchory friday night. We didn't get in from the dance until around 1:30 am. Saturday morning we got up and met a couple of her friends for what I understood would be a walk. It turned out to be a HIKE up to the top of a hill. I am so out of shape, so it was quite a stretch for me to make it to the top, but I did it. My face was so red and hot. But the weather was gorgeous - almost 60 degrees! That's unheard of in March in Aberdeen. The view from the top was quite lovely, very scenic, and thankfully the walk down was much easier.

Boy were my knees tired after that hike, and when I got up yesterday my legs and hips were so sore! I felt like an old lady trying to walk. But it was worth it - I had a blast out in the country for the weekend. Hopefully I'll be able to get back out there sometime, and go to another ceilidh. At least this time I' d be somewhat familiar with the dances. I still don't think I'd try the helicopter though!

United Nations UNO Tournament

In our flat we have our own version of the United Nations. We have Emma (Isle of Man), Eileen (Ireland), Judie (Scotland), Anna (England), June (China), and me (America - or Texas, as the others sometimes call me). Shortly after I moved in, Judie broke out the UNO cards, and the United Nations UNO Tournament was born. Almost every night at least 3 of us gather at the kitchen table for a couple of highly competitive rounds of UNO before bedtime. It brings back so many good memories from childhood, playing UNO with Aunt Alice, Granny, Nana, and the cousins, and it makes me laugh that we are so serious about this game now.

When we started out, I did America proud. I was in the lead for almost 2 weeks. Unfortunately, Scotland has now overtaken America, and I am desperately trying to play catch-up. I'm gaining on her though! Time is running low, I'm afraid, and Scotland is pulling out of the UN headquarters on Tuesday to move home for her last couple of student-teaching placements. It's too bad. I imagine the UNO tournament will continue in her absence though, as long as we can find another deck of cards.

Here are a couple of pictures of our tournament:

England in deep concentration planning her next move

Scotland in high spirits after a big win

Illegal consulations between the Irish contingencies (the head Ireland representative and a guest)

Friendly interactions among the various representatives (we are the UNITED nations, after all!)