Escocia: Extremely Cold.

Ok, picking right back up where I left off, I flew from Hamburg to Glasgow on Monday, arriving in Glasgow International Airport at around 6 pm. There was a jewelery ad in the baggage claim that had a picture of earrings and said, "It's not like you came for the weather." That was to be my first omen. The second omen was when I walked outside. I headed towards the "bus" sign, hoping to find my way to Central Station, and as soon as I walked outside a bus pulled up that said Buchanan Bus Station, via Central Station. I got on, paid, and sat nervously watching through the window so I would be able to tell when we were actually at Central Station. Oddly enough, I didn't already know what it looked like, and this proved to be entirely fruitless. I ended up asking the people in front of me where we were at every stop until they told me Central. It's a good thing someone knew what was going on. I then sat in the freezing cold train station wrapped in as much clothing as I could bear until Cara arrived, and Terry Feeley came to pick us up!
Now. For those of you who don't know the Feeley's, they may in fact be one of the best families I have ever met. Terry drove us to their home in Bearsden, a suburb in north Glasgow (which is eerily lit with green spotlights at night), where Eva had a hot dinner waiting for us. YES. We had butternut squash soup followed by pasta and delicious bread and then rhubarb apple pie and tea for dessert. I knew then that the trip wouldn't be anything short of magical. They pulled out dozens of brochures on Glasgow, Edinburgh, the highlands, Loch Ness, Loch Lomond, and Stirling Castle, and helped us begin to plan the week. Cara and I each had our own room, with what was the greatest continental quilt I have ever encountered in my life on my bed. It seemed to just bounce all of my body heat right back at me - I want to buy one. Except it's not cold enough to really merit one, but it was so great.
The next morning we decided to conquer Glasgow, and Eva drove us into town and helped us get set up on one of those double-decker bus tours. It started off well enough, but we soon realized that 4 degree weather (Celsius, remember) combined with the wind on top of a bus was not a good combination. We didn't move, but we realized we had made a horrible mistake. We saw about half of the tour, marking places we wanted to go back, and then got off at the University of Glasgow. We stopped to go to the bathroom and try to regain feeling in our limbs, then went up to the Hunterian Museum, which is the collection of stuff William Hunter gathered throughout his life. It was really cool, and very crazy. There was one part where he had preserved the bodies of disfigured animals - so weird. There were conjoined twin baby deer, and squirrel things with eight legs, and other weird things like that. From there we went to the Hunterian Gallery, which is the art part, and I made up for the fact that I was missing art history by seeing lots and lots of James Whistler. From there we got back on the bus and saw the second half of the tour, then got off and had lunch at Cafe Gondolfi, a recommendation that came courtesy of Cara's "Top 10: Escocia" travel book. From there we went to the cathedral, the necropolis, and then a medieval house that was built in 1471! It is the oldest house in Glasgow. The cathedral has the tomb of St. Mungo, Glasgow's patron saint, in the bottom. It was all really cool, although the necropolis wasn't as old as I was hoping - they were all from the 1850s. After that we got some tea and found out that all museums close at 5 pm in Glasgow, so we were stuck. We met Francis and Terry at Terry's building, and Francis gave us her keys so we could go home, where we vegged out and watched the Simpsons on their couch for... far too long.
The next day, we took the train to Stirling Castle, which was built in the TWELFTH century. Definitely old enough for me. There are lots of additions from other eras, but still. It was gorgeous and the town of Stirling was really cute too. We found this basement part sort of by accident and it seemed like it could have been a prison, or a tomb, or something. SO COOL. Also, all I could think of the entire time was either Monty Python or Black Adder. That continued through most of the trip. Then we went back to town, had lunch at Martin's cafe, and Terry drove us out to the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond. We drove around to several parts before heading to Lomond Shores, where there is a mall, and we had a cup of coffee. We had to head home though, because Eva had bought HAGGIS for us for dinner! We had haggis with mashed potatoes and turnips (tatties and neeps), and I was shocked to find that it was actually delicious. I just don't want to think about what's actually in it: "sheep's 'pluck' (heart, liver and lungs), minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally boiled in the animal's stomach." BLEH. But it was delicious! Kind of like hot dogs that way. For dessert we had sticky toffee pudding with cream and more tea. I could get used to life at the Feeley's house.
On Thursday we took the train to Edinburgh, where we saw the Edinburgh Castle, the Royal Mile, the National Gallery, and the Royal Museum of Scotland, and we may have climbed Arthur's Seat, or we may have climbed something similar but smaller? Either way, we got an incredible view of Edinburgh until I fell in mud on the way down - so cute. Cara got a good picture. The castle was amazing, but a little more kitsch than Stirling, because it had a bunch of fake recreations - things like mannequins in the rooms and recordings of them talking. The prison was REALLY cool though, and they had three of the original doors, which prisoners had carved their name, the date (1770s!), and sometimes their ship or something else into. Those were really cool. The National Gallery was so so amazing - I could have spent twice as much time in it than we did, but I think Cara was ready to go? And we hit the Royal Museum only an hour before closing, so I missed a ton of cool stuff. But I did see some canister that historians actually know belonged to Bonnie Prince Charlie. How they find out that stuff, I'll never know. For lunch, I had steak and ale pie with mashed potatoes and an incredible beer (I think it was Belhaven Burns Ale... not sure but by god I will find out) and Cara had fish and chips. Delicious. We took the train back into town, but the train to Bearsden was severely delayed, so Terry came out and picked us up! Basically they just took such wonderful care of us all the time. We had a delicious dinner again that night, of minestrone soup, a Tuscan salad, and orange chicken. (Sorry I'm talking more about the food than the sights, but my GOD the food was good) Also, John's daughter Roisin (pronounced Rosh-een) was staying with them that night, and she is almost two and the CUTEST CHILD ALIVE. She kept saying "I see you girls!" when she looked through her little binoculars at Cara or I. So cute I didn't even know what to do with her.
Friday we took a bus tour of the Highlands - it was a small tour, limited to 16 people but there were only 6 of us plus the driver and his wife. It was really cool, and we got to see some incredible views (don't get your hopes up - my camera battery died back in Berlin. I have NO photos of Scotland. I'll get what I can from Cara, but we... have very different photo taking styles?) that we wouldn't have seen any other way, unless we had rented a car. We also saw the sight of the Glencoe Massacre, Loch Ness, and the tallest mountain in the United Kingdom. It was a gorgeous day, so we had magnificent views, and even drove through the snow in one particularly high part of the Highlands. That night the Feeley's were at a wedding reception, and we heated up some delicious leftovers and watched more tv before going to bed.
Saturday, we went back to Glasgow to finish what we had missed on Tuesday, and saw Pollok Park, which is a huge gorgeous park that used to belong to some rich family until they gave it to the city of Glasgow. When they donated it, the city put up the Burrell Collection, another art gallery that was incredible and I could've spent days in, and turned the home into the Pollok House, which has mostly original decorations and tons of art. They were incredible. The park also has lots of Highland cows roaming around, and there's a river that runs behind the gardens of the house, and there are Clydesdales somewhere - but we couldn't find them. It was amazing. From there we went back into the center of town and had lunch, and walked out to the Kelvingrove Art Gallery, a HUGE collection of art and artifacts and tons of other things - again with only an hour to cover it. We literally ran through it, so I "saw" everything but didn't get to enjoy it as much as I would have liked. Also, an interesting fact I noticed is that the museums we went to in both Edinburgh and Glasgow are set up for children to enjoy them as well. There are lots of interactive exhibits, even about things that don't normally cater to children, say, French impressionist exhibits. ALSO the best thing EVER is that all the museums in Glasgow are free. The castles are spendy, though. That night we ordered in some amazing curries and watched The X Factor with Eva and Francis, which is the UK version of American Idol. It was AWESOME, and they get way better sets than American Idol. PLUS they get back up dancers! Hello!
We got to linger in bed on Saturday morning, then had porridge with Roisin before she, Eva, and Frances dropped us at the train station to head back to the airport.
So that was Scotland... I probably left out some details, but you get the jist I'm sure, since that was plenty long. To sum up: it was freezing and I rarely felt my toes between leaving the house in the morning and getting into bed that night, the Feeleys are SO INCREDIBLY NICE, and it's much easier to get around when the spoken language is your native language - even if the accents are tough sometimes.
More pictures are up in Photobucket! Not of Scotland, but there are about 270 of the two and a half days in Berlin. Just think what I could've done with six days in Scotland. Sad.