Edinburgh

Interesting observations about London:
Everyone sure seems to be in a hurry. Maybe it's because we were there midweek and everyone was going to and from work, but it seemed that way even at night.
They don't seem to have trash bins in public areas. Even in the food court of a mall! In the Victoria train station where there are plenty of restaurant booths, etc., there's a sign saying not to litter but to give your trash to a cleaning attendant. That's fine if you can find one. I was tempted to leave garbage in a photo booth.

We took a sleeper car train to Edinburgh (pronounced Edinburra). It was a small cramped compartment, especially with all our luggage. At first I didn't think I'd be able to sleep with the strange motion but I soon dropped off. We got there around 7:30 am and made it to the hotel. It was a nice change of pace from London. Everyone seemed more relaxed here.

Sir Walter Scott's Monument




It was lovely. We decided to do a tour of Edinburgh Castle which was pretty cool. It's very old, having been built by William the Conqueror after his famous conquest. Greeting us on the way up to the castle was this William Wallace-type fellow. He was actually fairly entertaining. He wasn't officially part of the castle tour or anything, but he was raising money for leukemia so I tossed in a few coins.



Here's a few pics of the castle and grounds:


In the barrel of Mons Meg

Helping play the pipes!

Well, that's enough for now. Next stop: Dublin, Ireland!

London Part II

Right, we're in Sweden now, so time to catch up a bit...

Thursday night, we had a dinner-and-show deal to see the Lion King at the Lyceum, with dinner beforehand at a restaurant called Fire & Stone. They specialized (or specialised, as they spell it cross the pond) in exotic pizzas themed for different areas of the world. Pretty decent actually!



So the next day we had booked an Evan Evans bus tour to Salisbury (there's quite a lovely Gothic cathedral there (no, it doesn't wear black lipstick and mope around a lot)), Stonehenge, and Bath.
The trip started out great although the weather looked a bit worse. (The weather had been quite good actually.) Still, the cathedral was quite amazing.





Now they warned us not to be late to return to the bus for the next section of the tour because they only had a fixed time with the driver and it would mean they'd have to take time off of another event. Well, they were serious! We must have been 1 minute late, and as we came out of the cathedral, ZOOM! off goes the bus without us! Did they take a headcount or anything. Apparently not. So here we were, stuck in Salisbury!
We wound up having to catch another local bus from Salisbury to Stonehenge, in the desperate hope of catching up with our bus there. It was a tour bus so it wasn't cheap, 22 pounds I think. Meanwhile it was raining fairly well. OK, so we wait for the bus...catch it... get to Stonehenge and see our original bus pull away just as we pull in. I jump out, bang on the side of the original bus as it's pulling away, but to no avail.
There's another bus from the same Evan Evans tour company that's there that agrees to take us on but it's leaving in a few minutes. I run around the monument taking pictures quickly, but didn't dare take too long about it. Figure I may as well get at least something out of this disaster.




We then took the other Evan Evans tour bus to Bath and finally caught up with our original tour. They seemed entirely unapologetic about it, implying it was our own fault for being late. The other tour bus driver didn't even seem to believe us that they wouldn't wait for missing people. Anyway, we didn't really feel up to going to see the Roman baths themselves by this time and were fairly hungry, so we grabbed something to eat. Alas, we had to take it to go because there wasn't enough time and we sure didn't dare risk them leaving without us this time, because they wanted us to rejoin our original bus.

As a bit of a protest, we brought our hot food on board the bus and ate it on the way back once we hit some evening London traffic, against their rules. But hey, what were they going to do at that point. I enjoyed some slightly cold fish and chips, and Aprille had her curry. No one said anything and we staggered back to our hotel.


Arr, Roaming Pirate doesn't recommend Evan Evans Tours!

London

Finally got some Wi-fi and some time to post!

So after an uncomfortable red-eye to London (the flight was fine, but sitting for 10 1/2 hrs on even the most comfortable plane is, well, not comfortable), we took the Tube (or the Underground, the subway system) to our easyHotel in the Victoria area on St. Patrick's Day. Easyhotels are very small, inexpensive hotels that are very orange inside with only the most rudimentary amenities, but we figured we could save a few pounds this way and we would be out and about town most of the time anyway. It wasn't too bad really.

Here's the Roaming Pirate in front of the London Eye, a giant ferris wheel that rotates at a nice leisurely pace and gives a lovely view of all of London. And here he is from atop it looking down at Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament across the Thames.








Here's a night view of the Cannon Street Station Bridge.



The next day we explored the Tower of London. The Pirate loved this!














I'll post more later, even though by now we're in Dublin, Ireland. Stay tuned!

The Roaming... Pirate?

The Roaming Pirate (special thanks to Kay) practices for his trip to Europe. (Background by Apple iMac)

Please don't sue me, Travelocity.

We're taking a whirlwind tour of Europe (well, a bit of it anyway) for two weeks, leaving Tuesday evening, and arriving on St. Patty's Day afternoon in London. A couple days there, then to Edinburgh, Scotland for a couple more, then over to Dublin, Ireland, and to Frankfurt, Germany. My grandparents are from Aschaffenburg, a small town just outside there, and there's even a street named after it. Finally, on to Copenhagen and over to Malmo, Sweden to visit my wife's sister and her husband.
We'll either lose weight from all the walking around, or gain it from eating out a lot. Wish us luck, and if you have any advice, we're all ears!

Coming Soon!