Adventure in Aberdeen

Status: Currently enjoying Bach's cello and violin concertos

WARNING: Long post ahead. Must cover 4 Scottish days of fun

Friday
Flew into Aberdeen at 11am. A taxi ride from the airport to Heather's flat was enough to show me that this was going to be a love-at-first sight kind of thing. I loved the architecture and I loved the greenness of everything. And Aberdeen is such a charming city

Anywho, explored a bit of the city and ended up in Blackfriars Pub. Heather wouldn't let me order anything but haggis and neeps (neeps are turnips, it turns out). Now, I have no idea what haggis is made out of, I just remember thinking it was made of something odd and nasty. Well, if it is, it sure didn't taste like it. It was quite good, actually. And I got to have my first sticky toffee pudding experience. It was love at first lick. Now I'm addicted

Found a graveyard on the way back. What was so fun about this one was that there were people there, reading their papers and eating their lunches. It was like it was a park. Heather told me this was because the Scots like to be reminded of death and that life is painful and it might someday end. This made me laugh

We toured around the University of Aberdeen. Gorgeous campus and I felt as if I were touring a castle. I can't imagine ever getting used to that if I were taking classes there


The haggis and neeps filled me up and stuck to me, so dinner was not necessary.


Saturday
We took a train to Stonehaven, which is a cute little town near Aberdeen. Everyone there has a cute dog. There are no ugly dogs in this town. It's against the law.



Heather said the weather was fantastic for what we were going to do...but it was rainy and windy and cold.
But what better way to view the ruins of an ancient castle than in the true Scottish rain and wind and cold? We hiked up to Donnottar Castle.


Bit of history on Dunnottar, in case you're not familiar. It is most famous for holding out against Oliver Cromwell's army for 8 months in order to protect Scotland's honours, the Scottish Crown Jewels (which now reside in Edinburgh Castle). William Wallace, Mary Queen of Scots, the Marquis of Montrose and the future King Charles II all hung out there at different points in history.

It was quite a hike up there. My new Pumas were broken in for sure. Took about an hour to walk the mile and a half because we stopped every few feet so I could snap a ton of pictures that all looked exactly the same, but that's okay. The view was breathtaking.



And as we were coming down the stairs of the castle, we heard bagpipes. We looked up the hill and a bride was walking down the stairs toward the castle and the Scottish men were piping her down. She was one brave lady in her white dress and Crosstrainers because it was mighty muddy. But those pictures will be beautiful. Apparently it only costs 400 quid to have a wedding at the castle. Granted, they can't close the facilities down to the public, but you can invite as many people as you want and they'll provide tables and chairs. In the summer, it's popular to get married under the smithy arch. It's nice that they give you tables and chairs, but I'm wondering how the caterers get there. Do you fly them in? Because they certainly can't make that hike with their pots and pans and expensive foods.

This was one of the most amazing experiences. Heather told me that it's one of the prime places she takes people when they come to visit her. I think this was her sixth time. But how could you ever be bored with all of this:




It rained for most of the hike there and for some of the time we were in the castle, but that's okay. The sun came out as we hiked back, so I got to see the castle in all states of weather. It was epic no matter what the weather.

Sunday
We got ourselves up early again for the Tartan Day parade. Even Heather, who has lived in Aberdeen for about 2 years, was uncertain as to what Tartan Day was supposed to be celebrating. I think it's a celebration of Scotland - history, heritage, people, kilts, whiskey, death - itself. All I know is there were bagpipes and men in their tartans (kilts et al dictated by clan).

Later that night, we did some serious pub-hopping.
-Dinner at Slains Castle, which is a bar that is decked out like it's October 31st. Their drink menu consists of the Seven Deadly Sins (mixed drinks) and the Seven Heavenly Virtues (shooters). If you drink all seven of one of those, you get a T-shirt, but I wouldn't reccomend you try. Some are fruity drinks and some have cream in them...good luck holding it all down


-Sticky toffee pudding and drinks at Illicit Stills

-Pints and live, Scottish folk music at Prince of Wales. These little old men gather there every Sunday to play their accoridans, fiddles, guitars and pipe whistles just for the fun of it. It ranged from drinking songs to folk stories. I can't begin to tell you how much of an honor it was to see and hear.

-Drinks, live music, and Scottish men at O'Donoghues. Glen, lovely Scottish guy, sung songs by pretty much anyone - Simon & Garfunkel, Snow Patrol, The Cranberries, Coldplay, Dave Matthews, Damien Rice, Jack Johnson. The list goes on. Glen was lovely and very cute. Yay for Glen

Rachel, Hanna and I were kind of cornered/bothered/honored to have met an old Scot named Peter (or I guess his father used to call him Big Bastard. I'm not sure if this is true, but that's what he said). He had long white hair and was dressed in about three different tartans. When Rachel told him he was representing three clans, he scuffed and began his complaining. After buying us all a dram, he complained about his idiot friends he was with (who we met later and I loved), how everyone nowadays is boring, how he hates Tartan Day (seemed disrespectful to him in some way or another), how his family has been cursed with idiot relatives since 1753, and how hard it is to express the beauty of a woman in english as he is only fluent in Gaelic. Odd man. And very very drunk.

After Peter went out to get more whiskey for himself (as the bartender would not let him buy any more in the bar), we hung around his friends. They were loud and drunk and way too much fun. Us three ladies all had nicknames by the end of the night: Miss America (me), Miss Atlantic (Rachel) and Miss Australia (Hanna).
It was a fun night

Monday
Was another early morning. Heather had to work at 11am and still had things left to show me. We started out with a long hike along the Balgownie River and over the Brig of Balgownie, one of the oldest, if not THE oldest, remaining bridges in Europe and the very same bridge that William Wallace once crossed


We looped around and hit the gardens around Aberdeen


And then onto the Cathedral Church of St. Machar, where I found yet another cemetery.



Beautiful ocean, beautiful river, beautiful flowers, beautiful graveyard. I
Rachel took me out to lunch because she's a gigantic sweetheart and then I hopped on a bus, hopped on a plane, hopped on a train, hopped on the Tube, and walked my butt home.

So, as you can see, I did nothing this last weekend. Boring as usual

And now I must work on my film review and make sure my script is ready to film in about two days. Yay

Pip pip, cherrio and all that rot!