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I got into Edinburgh in the early afternoon, and met up with Sarah, who had gotten in earlier that day.  We stopped at Caledonian Backpackers, dropped off my stuff, met up with Todd & Molly, and then walked around Royal Mile.

Edinburgh is A pretty great city to visit.  I’m not sure I would want to live there, because it’s very tourist-oriented, but it’s full of gorgeous streets full of gorgeous buildings, with loads of good restaurants and pubs.  It’s a pretty friendly place in general.

We had a few beers at a pub while waiting for Mike to get in, and I had some haggis fritters.  The texture of the haggis seemed just a touch odd, but other than that is was actually pretty good.

After that, we headed out to another pub to meet up with Mike for dinner.  He finally arrived, sporting a pretty shaggy head of hair, but looking good, nonetheless.  We had a great dinner, and then stopped by one more pub on the way home, where we met a couple of Scotts, one who was taking the other out for a stag party in a dress and lime green wig.

We finally parted ways to head home (they stayed in a really nice hotel, I stayed in the backpacker’s), and I was lulled to sleep by the occasional sound of random drunken Scotts shouting incomprehensible things into the night.

In the morning, I had breakfast at the backpacker’s and then met up with the rest of the party and had coffee while they ate (their fancy hotel didn’t include breakfast–go figure…).  It was a nice morning, and we ate right in the middle of Royal Mile.

We split up, and Mike, Sarah, and I walked through the rest of the Royal Mile, saw the impressive Scottish Parliament building, and then decided to hike up Aurthur’s Seat.  Well, we decided to walk up to the top of a little hill, and then there was another, so we climbed that, too, and on and on for a good long while, until we found ourselves with nowhere higher to climb.  If you’re ever in Edinburgh, you have got to do the hike.  The view from the top, along with the incredible winds that you really have to lean into are stunning.

After we climbed down, we checked out the outside of the castle, but decided against paying however many pounds to go inside.  We stopped in a new shop that had a bunch of medieval swords and armor and such, where we found the same weapons expert explaining things to customers that Mike had found at the old weapons shop across the street a year ago (the old shop has apparently now closed down).

After that, we basically had to make our way to the airport, where Ryan Air charged me an insane 20 pounds for checking my bag…

Up next, Dublin.

Sorry I haven’t updated this for a while, I’ve been really busy (which is a good thing :) and the internet has either been hard to come by or reallllllly slow…

I tried uploading more photos earlier today, but that was a no-go.  Maybe better luck later or in Windohoek.

I’m going to start putting up my notes from the various places, and hope to catch up with myself before I start driving around the vast nothingness of Namibia, where there will certainly be no internet.

I’m here at Aberdeen Airport, just barely got here in time, it seemed, but now I have just a minute before my flight to London, and then after that I have a couple of hours to change gates and check my bag for my flight to Johannesburg.

I’m staying at a place called Bob’s Bunkhouse and they’re picking me up from the airport, so things should be pretty smooth sailing getting started here.

I posted a ton of pics from London, Edinburgh, Dublin, Howth, and Stonehaven on my Flickr page, though it’s just a straight dump, so there’s a bunch of not-so-good ones in there.

Thanks so much to Mike and Sarah for being awesome hosts and showing us around, and thanks to Molly and Todd for being great travel partners.  What a great start to my trip.

Just got into Dublin.  It’s pretty late here (1:15am), so we just parted ways and we’re meeting up tomorrow morning.

The last two days were in Edinburgh, Scotland, and were great.  It is absolutley gorgeous there, and we climbed a big hill on the outside of town and you could see for miles.  The wind up there was so strong you could lean into it over the edge of the cliff.  It was pretty exhilarating, and I think we worked off at least most of the pints we drank celebrating Mike’s Birthday.  London has to be seen, but for my money, Edinburgh is much better.

We only have one full day in Dublin, so tomorrow I think we’re going to do some sort of walking tour in the morning and then make sure to get to the Guinness storehouse at St James Gate by 5pm (can’t wait for that), and then I imagine we’ll head back to the Temple Bar area (where I’m staying) to have some drinks before we call it a night.

The next day we head back to Aberdeen and spend two nights there.  We’ll be at Mike and Sarah’s, so I should be able to get some pics up online and make another post then before I head down to Africa.

Old and Expensive.

I’m definitely glad I stopped and spent a night here, and my experience was probably at least a little bit tainted by the horrible jet lag, but that’s most of what I got.

Buildings like the Parliment and Westminster Abbey are just stunning in their intricacy and mostly the whole town has a cool look and feel.  There are some strange exceptions, like the Convention Center, which is a garrish modern building that is in the middle of it all and even butts up against a building from the same style as the rest of the city.  Whoever is responsible for that needs to be locked up.

On a side note, after walking around London all day I had an intense craving for a fast food burger, so I stopped in Burger King for probably the first fast food in a year or so.  Oh, and a Whopper value meal was £5 (almost $10)…

Hostel was OK, not great, but not terrible, and probably a good deal for what I paid.  Decent free breakfast, which was nice.

Today I have a short flight up to Edinburgh to meet Mike & Sarah and friends, and after a night there we head to Dublin, which I’m really excited about.  Tonight is Mike’s birthday, so I’m also excited about that.

So, I’m definitely glad I got to see London, but I have to say that I won’t be upset if it’s not on any itiniteraries soon.  Or at least that I don’t need to do it jetlagged again ;)

In London, safe and sound.

Flight was kind of crappy, not so much because of the airline but because it’s just a crappy flight time, leaving around dinner and landing 5 hours later at breakfast time…

Been wondering around London for a few hours until I can check in at my hostel and take a nap.

There’s a huge festival going on this weekend called the Notting Hill Carnival, and I hear it’s a good time, so looking forward to checking that out tonight.

That’s all for now, I’m about to hit the next price point in this internet cafe so I’m going to head out.

It’s about 5pm EST, and I’m on the BoltBus on my way to NYC.

Tonight, I meet up with Jordan, Rory, Sarah, Jeff, Jason, Natasha, and maybe more. Rory and Jason have a comedy show that I will hopefully get to see at least part of, and then probably some beers.

Tomorrow, I get up, get some breakfast, maybe try to get into the statue of liberty (it was closed last time I was here), and then head to JFK for an overnight flight to London.

I’m on my own in London for a day, and then Monday I fly up to meet Mike & Sarah and friends in Edinburgh. We’re there overnight, and then off to Dublin for two nights, before heading back to Aberdeed to stay at Mike & Sarah’s.

Finally, I head back to London to catch a flight to Johannesburg. I arrive in JHB on Sep 6th, and fly back to NYC on October 13th.

As for my time in Africa, I only have a rough idea that I will head southwest to Cape Town, then north through Namibia, then up through the Caprivi Strip towards Victoria Falls, and finally to Lake Malawi to chill out for a few days before catching a bus back down to Johannesburg. I’ll post more about each area as I get there.

For now, I need to sit back and let it hit me that I’m actually heading overseas for so long. This came up so fast—to the point where I was running to catch the bus to the metro station. I dont remember it being quite like this leading up to Thailand. But I can feel it in my stomach now, and once I get to NYC and have a few beers I think I’ll be ready for tomorrow.

I will try and continue updating this blog as I travel, but I’m not sure how often I’ll have Internet so I’m not sure what the frequency will be like. I will also post pictures to my flickr account (flickr.com/chadmoone) if I come across a fast connection, but again, not sure how often that will be.

Here goes nothing ;)

Here we go again.