Well we've just spent the last week recuperating from the flu that we caught up in Edinburgh, Scotland. We're still fairly crook, but we'll survive (hopefully!).
New Years on the other hand, didn't survive. We caught the High speed train up to Edinburgh on the 30th December, and we had the option between a 4 and a half hour train trip, or about an 8 hour bus ride - it didn't take a rocket scientist to work out what we would pick....
The scenery in the train on the way up was stunning - the UK really is quite a picturesque place. The coast of Scotland up near Edinburgh was breathtaking. It was quite difficult to get pictures of it out of the train, but here are a couple of our efforts....
We arrived in Edinburgh Waverly station at about 3pm and went to our hotel room, unpacked a few things and went out for a bit of a look around - it looked like this was going to shape up to be a great few days.
Damo outside the train station
Scott Monument with fair attractions nearby
Later on that evening we went back to the hotel room and got ready to go out to the nightclub that had been organised by our tour group - it was called Espionage, and it was 5 stories high (well actually, 5 stories below ground....) We'd had a few drinks in the hotel room before we left, and Damo was carrying a traveller in his jacket pocket - he'd been in the club a grand total of about 5 seconds when Nic went to the bathroom, Damo cracked the tinnie precisely at the moment that a bar staff walked past, grabbed it out of his hand, and kicked him out.... Ripper - this was shaping up to be a great night - luckily we were'nt staying too far away, so we went back to the hotel and Damo got changed and we went back to the club and we got in fine... Damo is keeping up fine tradition - he's now broken the law not only in England, but Scotland also..... Idiot....
Woke up the next day (New Year's Eve day) and went to a place called Jonglese for the PP travel countdown of the Australia/Kiwi New Years eves. This was at about 10am local time, so we went along (feeling a bit shabby from the night before) and had a few bevvies to toast in the New Year back home with you all - so even if we couldn't be there to celebrate with ya's all, we were definitely there in spirit (well, cider as I think the case was.....)
Nikki and Damo having 10am boozing celebrations with you all back home...
It was after this we decided to go for a bite to eat at the Slug & Lettuce not far away from the place where we were having a bevvie or two - we ended up settling in for the afternoon, and as it turned out, so did the weather - it was about 1 degree celcius, absolutely pissing down, and blowing about 120 km/h.
Damo's bite to eat..... (and he ate every last mouthful....)
After this we headed off to try and find an off licence to buy some tinnies for the street party, but we'd already been warned that Hogmanay may be cancelled because of the particularly bad weather, but while we were walking around trying to find an off-licence, we began to understand why it would be cancelled - the rain was coming down horizontally, and it stung when it hit your face. It was blowing over port-a-loo's and there was a tv-camera stand that blew over just near us, and as soon as we saw that happen, we knew there would be absolutely no way that Hogmanay was going to go ahead. We went back to the hotel and came up with a plan - it was a crap one however.
We decided to go to the 'Walkabout' and spend our NYE celebration there - that was interesting.... We've been to 3 Walkabouts so far, 2 on big nights out, and both times it has been an eye-popping experience, to say the least.
Unfortunately Damo had come down with the beginnings of the flu on New Year's Eve at about 3pm and by the time the night came around, he wasn't up for the gigantic night as expected, and only ended up having perhaps half a dozen beers or so. We did stay out until closing time of the pub still (which was about 2.30 or so), so we still had a pretty good time, but it certainly fizzled about as much as the Hogmanay fireworks.....
Anyway, we woke up early-ish the next day to go to Sterling Castle which was about an hour and a half bus trip away from Edinburgh.
What can we say - it was an old castle - there's not much more to it than that..... and I'm sure there'll be plenty more of them along the way on our visits around Europe. It was however better than staying sick in bed, which probably would've been the alternative.
Damo in front of Stirling Castle
The view of the Scottish Highlands from Sterling Castle
Anyway, we were supposed to go out to another nightclub this night when we got back from the castle, but we were partied-out phil, so we decided to catch up with a couple of people from London that we knew were going to be in Edinburgh, so we rang them, and they were feeling similar, so we ended up catching up with them for a bit of a quiet dinner at a pub, and hung with them for the night, and then headed back to the hotel.
Hogmanay certainly wasn't what we were expecting, but it definitely was an experience anyway.
Hope everybody else had a sensational NYE. Saw some of the superhero piccies from the Hendry bash - looked great - wish we could've been there.
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