Hello everyone! Sorry it has been so long (about a month? maybe more) since I've updated my blog. I've gone on a couple of adventures since then, and it's going to be hard to remember it all, but I'll do my best. I think the last time I wrote any stories was about a week before my spring break. During that week I had 3 papers due, so I didn't do much except work on writing. The education system is a bit different here, and our grades generally depend solely on one paper and one final exam (each worth 50% of our grade), so it was important to try to do well on these papers. I am almost done with classes for the semester (only one day left) so next up I'll have finals to study for. We get the entire month of May for taking finals, but mine are done May 22, so I'll have about a week in Scotland to hang out before I head over to Europe to start my summer travels on the mainland! I will be sure to write about that as I go along so that you can hear about all the cool places I've been. As of right now I think I will be going to the Czech Republic, Croatia, Italy, Spain, and Greece. If any of you have done traveling in Europe and have suggestions of places to go, I would love to hear them. I am traveling for about 7 weeks, so there is room to fit more countries or more places in my schedule right now if you have any must see places I need to know about.
After I turned in my papers I hopped over to Ireland for my spring break. One of my good friends from UPS was studying in Dublin this semester, so I went to stay with her for a week. I only ended up spending about 3 days in Dublin because we did some traveling around the country on the days she didn't have class. The first weekend I was there we took a trip up to Belfast, in Northern Ireland. We went on a day coach tour of Northern Ireland and got to see some pretty cool stuff. My two favorites were the Carrick-a-rede rope bridge and the Giants Causeway. The Carrick-a-rede rope bridge was a bridge some fishermen build to try to get to this little island because it was too dangerous to take a boat there. It is a safe bridge, but it is very small and doesn't look that well supported. I did not end up walking across it, but I got some good pictures of it. The water and the hills around the bridge were very nice. I've put up pictures of all these things, so please look at the ones I've posted, they are quite gorgeous. The Giants Causeway is a place on the coast of Northern Ireland with a bunch of naturally occurring rocks that look like remnants of very large stones. The story is that they are the ruins of the bridge the giants built over to Scotland. A couple other things we saw on that day trip were the Carrickfergus castle, the carnlough harbor, and the Dunluce castle.
After Northern Ireland we went back to Dublin for Monday-Wednesday, then on Thursday we left and took a trip down to southern Ireland to a place called the Dingle Peninsula. It is an absolutely gorgeous place with the most vibrant green colors I have ever seen. Also, since it was spring, there were baby lambs everywhere, which were just adorable. We stayed in a small fishing town called Dingle and had fun walking around the streets and looking at all the shops. On Friday we got back on the buses and headed to Galway, on the west coast of Ireland. From Galway we took a ferry over the the largest of the Aran Islands and spent a day walking around the island. Karinne and I found a beautiful beach and got some good hiking done that day. On Sunday we took another day coach trip out of Galway to go see the Cliffs of Moher. They are the largest cliffs in Western Europe, and also, incidentally the place that they filmed the cliffs of insanity for the Princess Bride (for all you fans out there, I know I'm one). The cliffs are breathtaking, and quite beautiful. Sunday night we went back to Dublin and on Monday morning I got on my plane back to Scotland. Needless to say, it was a very memorable spring break for me.
Since I've gotten back to Scotland I've been enjoying my flat mates, the beautiful Stirling campus, and I've had some visitors. Last weekend I went on another Arcadia trip that took us to Abotsford house (Sir Walter Scott's house), Melrose Abbey (beautiful ruins of an old Abbey), and Floors Castle (a very large house near the English-Scot border. I've put up pictures of these. I think my favorite of the day was Melrose Abbey, it was stunning. The Abostford house was quite pretty too; there were some nice gardens attached to the house.
I feel like I've written a lot, and I don't want you to get bored, so I'll stop there, but I promise it won't be another month before I write again. I hope you are all doing well and enjoying the spring. Much love from Scotland.
|
