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By keeganblogsfromabroad

This weekend I took a break from Edinburgh and headed north into the iconic Scottish Highlands and the Isle of Skye. As beautiful as they are rugged and misty, the mountains and lochs proved well worth the lengthy bus journey.  The trip was organized by the International Student's Center at the University of Edinburgh. About 200 students in four large tour buses embarked on the journey at about 8am on Saturday morning, later staggering to avoid flooding the way points with too many excited students at once. Rain was in the forecast but this being Scotland I expected nothing less.

The one thing I did not anticipate was the mud. Very few people did. The trip packing list, which called for "proper walking shoes for walking and hiking" did not reference the mud either. Now you may be thinking "its just a little mud, I'm sure it cant be that bad," and of course Edinburgh receives enough rain to be consistently muddy as well, but it is usually just a thin layer on top of solid ground. In the mountains of the highland things are just a wee bit different. The entire ground feels like a sponge and the vegetation on top doesn't do anything to change that impression. The mud is everywhere, on the path, next to it, under the vegetation just waiting for your foot to rip though.

...continue reading "No Country for White Shoes"

By keeganblogsfromabroad

It is hard to believe I've already been in Scotland for three weeks. Of those three this most recent one was definitely the nicest weather wise. I still had to take my jacket everywhere for risk of showers but the weather was gorgeous. 60s, sun, I almost (I stress the almost) felt like this wasn't the overcast and dreary land that I was warned about (but then again, I've got no complaints.) I live in a school flat near Bruntsfield which is a bit to the southwest of the George Square Campus where I have all of my classes.

My three quarters of a mile walk to classes runs past and through the meadows, a large park. Half, the Bruntsfield links, (which I can see from my window) offers free golf, and the other half is just open land for sports or barbecues. The walk this time of year is beautiful, some of the trees are beginning to change colors while the grass remains a beautiful verdant green. For the 11 minute hike I get to enjoy a warm sun and a stiff westerly breeze while I take in Edinburgh's impressive intermingling of new and old buildings. The trees do warn that it wont always be this pleasant though. As I walk though the center of the park I can't help but notice they all lean quite obviously and somewhat ominously away from the prevailing winds which makes me glad I've got a good jacket for when winter hits.

I've been getting to classes a consistent ten minutes early, which appears pretty standard for the University of Edinburgh. Students gather to wait around the doors for the lecture hall to empty of students from the preceding lecture and almost everyone enters at the same time. Classes are large by my standards, but, being in the honors program at GW has meant that I was lucky enough to avoid a lot of the large lectures that I would have ordinarily been subjected to.

...continue reading "Classes and Castles"

By keeganblogsfromabroad

As the United 757 I was riding on banked around a large and ominous looking cloud formation on descent into Edinburgh Airport I stared intently out my window. I hoped that at any moment my eyes would pierce the lower cloud layer and catch a glimpse of what awaited below. I had never been visited Scotland  before, or any part of the United Kingdom for that matter, and despite the vast amount of information available on the internet to help me prepare I was anxious. I felt prepared, or at least I had until the plane's wheels left the tarmac. Then I thought "wow, we're really doing this." Almost 7 hours after that moment I caught my first glimpse of Scotland off in the distance, verdant, hilly, and dotted with rays of sun. It was a huge relief. In the foreground ships lie at anchor in the ocean and as we dropped lower I spotted the iconic Fourth Rail Bridge. A few minutes later the plane made a smooth landing, slightly ahead of schedule, and my day went downhill from there.

...continue reading "Arrival in Edinburgh"