Here I am in Edinburgh, Scotland. It's almost 10am, just chillin' in our hostel lounge drinking free tea and watching some peeps play pool. How wonderful my life is? Now that i'm so "experienced" I can't belive how much I love hostels, I really am going to miss them. Everyone is just so friendly and we all automoatically have so much in common, it's wonderful. As I sit here in the fresh sun of the morning, I am so thankful. Yesterday was a beautifully sunny day, and every local we talked to mentioned at least once that we picked the right day to come since this sunshine is pretty rare. How does this happen almost every trip?!?!?!? I love sunshine so much:)

The sunset on the train to Edinburgh

I arrived with my friend Jenna by train at 8:30pm Friday night. The train ride from Grantham was a little over 3 hours including train switches, so not bad at all! It was great, especially with my laptop (this is the first trip I have had it on, it's pretty nice!) becuase I could watch movies and get WIFI on the train. I don't really know what we were thinking when we booked a train that late, becuase once we found our hostel from the train station, we just felt like crashing. The hostel was called High Street Hostel and it is one of the top three in Edinburgh. It was super cute, they always look right out of a movie. WIth lots of stuff hanging on the wall and hippie paintings. But usually they're pretty clean, organized and have lots of convienences. We were lucky enough to get a two person room on the top floor. It was a shoebox, but so cute! Stone walls and a bunk bed. We watched a movie on the little twin bunk, and slept probably the most we have since being here, it was great.

Our baby room in the hostel the first night

Since the hostel is one of the best, it was only available for the one night, so we had a second hostel booked for the second night. It's also one of the top hostels, called Castle Rock hostel. So in the morning at about 9am we walked the Royal Mile (the main street in Edinburgh-absolutley amazing!) to our hostel, it was very close and easy to find. It was even cooler! A huge lounge and murals everywhere, fireplace etc. It's hard to explain without being here...but it's great. We couldnt' check in until 2pm, but they let you leave your luggage in a room, and I could put my laptop behind the desk for safety. After we check in and everything, we walked around a bit and found a farmers market a little ways down the street. After a bit, we came back to the hostel to meet a free walking tour at 10:30am. It turned out to be a super long tour but it was great! They talked about lots of interesting stuff, like how much the scots hate the english (i'm not considered english right? ha), how the term "shit-faced" came from people stumbling drunk on the streets and getting literal crap dumped on them from peoples windows at certain times each night, and lots more...Once we were done with that at about 4, we walked to Arthurs Seat. Edinburgh is built on what's called a 'crag and tail'. It's basically like a tall mountain cliff, and then a long hilly mass that's behind it. So the Edinburgh castle is built on one of the crags for protection, and then the main city drag called "old town" (where the royal mile is) is built on the 'tail'. There is another one of these a little walk from the Royal Mile, and it's called Aruthurs seat. It's a great place becuase you can see the entire city and the coast. It was a little hike, but it was gorgeous! And it was such a pretty day, there were lots of people and it was just wonderful. We sat up there for a bit and looked pensive:) After the climb down, we headed back to the Royal Mile and down to our hostel. We had previously picked out a pub that looked good to eat there, so once we checked into our new room (girls dorm of 12 people, not too bad...), we ran to feed the hunger growls. It was a short walk, and a very cute little pub. For students, two meals for £8 (so about $6 each) and drinks for £2. I got fish n' chips, which was AMAZING, and a cider. It was a fantastic, filling meal. After that we hung out in the hostel, had some tea in the lounge etc and relaxed. The Market in Edinburgh

Second hostel

Downtown...the buildings were so beautiful and the streets were some of the coolest I've seen yet

On the tour, she showed us the "trick steps", which were a type of midevil security system. There was a staircase, and then one step that was extra tall so the person entering who didn't know it was there would trip on it and make lots of noise

Greyfriars grave...which was a real person that had a Disney movie based off of him. He had a dog that, when he died, laid on his grave for years and years until the dog finally died. Below is the dog Bobbys grave.

Beautiful day

Aurthur's seat

View from Aurthur's Seat

Being pensive...

Sunday was..EASTER! We weren't really sure what to expect, but it turns out Edinburgh does NOT shut down for easter like a city would in the states, everything was open and as usual. First, we checked out of our room at 9am, but we were still allowed to keep all our crap in the luggage room, and hang out as long as we wanted. I had searched for a non-denominatinal church that we could go to for an Easter service, and found one that started at 11am, so we had some time to burn before that. We just sat around in the lobby, which was always bumpin, had a few cups and tea and hung out. We eventually found the church (we knew the general location, and apaprently had passed it literally three times on the main street whilst searching for it...ha). It was pretty similar to any church service I've been too, a tad more boreing but that could have just been the message:). The pastor who started the service was actually American, which I was secretly bummed about since we came to hear some Scottish! But the main message was given by a Scott, so I was content! After church we headed back to the hostel again where a cookout was going on. The hostels in Edinburgh are full of young people that are basically just livng there for as long as they feel like it. A lot of people I talked to said that they had come here just for the weekend, and just never left. Truly living out of a backpack, and basically had stories that seem like they would come from a movie...world travelers living one paycheck at a time and meeting people along the way. How much courage would that take! Talking to them makes me just want to be brave and do something crazy like move to Scotland, but then I remember that these people are possibly so different from me in certain ways. This amazing carefree lifestyle they live may be possible, becuase they dont' have the amazing family I do, or they don't crave learning and going to school like me...So even though it seems like they have the ultimate adventure, I know that this whole experience is a content amount of adventure for, becuase I have so many amazing things waiting for me at home:).
Saw this on our way to church ha

Happy Easter Scotland!

Where JK wrote Harry Potter!!!!!

Yeah, that's me in front of it, WITH my HP book:)

BUT...anyway...the burgers were amazing, and it was so cute to just sit on this deck and chat with people (the sunshine didn't hurt either...for the SECOND day in a row! when the locals told us the first day that we should be thankful because it wouldn't be like this for awhile...WRONG!:):):). Next we checked out a free museum, which was very cool, huge oil paintings, so amazing...then we went to a coffee shop to read and drink some warm goodness...we sat outside, until it got a little cloudy. Then we stopped in some shops, went back to the hostel, hung out in the lounge, got subway for dinner, went to the train, three hours back to Grantham...and TADA! We were home again!


It was a great last trip before the big one in...hmm...TEN DAYS! ITALY HERE I COME! yay:)


Signing off for now,
with appreciation for life,
and excitment to return back to the real of it.