History, Anyone?

The view of Edinburgh Castle from the street my B&B is on; there was a farmer's market today, where I bought lunch: fresh pressed Jonagold apple juice and a sausage roll - homemade and very fresh from a guy who loved to talk about his pigs while his wife served up the bacon and sausage rolls on very soft bread. Delicious.

I got up at 4:30 today to make my way back to the airport and catch my 6:50 flight to Edinburgh. I was a bit nervous about the bus coming on time, and whether or not Big Mama would make it on the plane despite her weight, but make it she did, with 2 lbs to spare. The 45 minute flight was like taking Southwest from Oakland to L.A., except when we were coming in to Edinburgh I saw small islands with old stone ruins on them rather than, um, smog and stuff.

Right away I loved it here, starting with the bus driver who helped me figure out not only where to get off the bus but where exactly to walk after, and waved at me as I waited to cross the street as he drove away. I arrived quickly at 2 Cambridge St, which is a lovely home with two rooms that Erlend and Helene rent out, and even though I was quite early, Erlend brought out a tea table, laid it with lace and china, made me a press pot of coffee, and asked about my travel plans. He and the other person staying here, a native Scot, seemed to know each other well, and at one point started discussing a finer point about the itinerary they were recommending to me, and as I tried to keep up I realized that they were referring to historical events from 600 AD as commonly and thoughtfully as if it were a recent election.

Walking up to the castle, there are lots of wildflowers growing in the crags of the rock

History does pervade the atmosphere here - and it twists things in an interesting way. For instance, I spied a little ancient-looking fountain, planted with flowers and mounted on a wall with a plaque at the top of the Royal Mile by the castle. On closer inspection, the plaque had witches on it in memory of the many who were burned at that spot quite a while back. Another moment - walking home along Grassmarket, a pleasant pedestrian street with lots of bars and people enjoying the sunny day, I read that it used to be the place for public executions, and that owners of houses with upper windows rented them out for the view.

A view down the Royal Mile - very crowded today, no shortage of tourist shops and buses, but still manages to be charming and full of interesting things to see

I happened into the Edinburgh Writers' Museum, full of things like Robert Burns' personal desk, Robert Louis Stevenson's dining table, and this sign. Love it- so clever, unless you're someone who DID live in the house and just was clumsy sometimes.

When I got tired, I bought some of the best fudge I'd ever had - peanut butter, of course - and found this little close just off the Royal Mile's craziness. Literally steps away, it was peaceful, mostly empty, and silent.

And, because I really did see so many of the Scottish stereotypes today (men in kilts, shortbread, lots of tartan and woolens on sale, even a woman walking a cute little Scottie dog), here's perhaps the ultimate:

Two scenes from the bottom of the Royal Mile - the very controversial, (and very expensive) new Scottish Parliament building, and just turning my head from where I took the parliament photo, a view of Arthur's Seat. A 45 min hike from where I was standing, it was dotted with people headed up to see the view of Edinburgh. I was too tired to take it on, at least for today.

After all the walking and wandering this morning, I headed back to my room for a nap - much needed, although jet lag is much better today. I decided to head to the "New" Town for dinner, but on the way took a short cut through a very atmospheric old graveyard,

and then eventually found a place for my companions and I to have a leisurely French meal:

Props to Loretta for letting me borrow her Kindle...now I can read War and Peace on the road, and Pierre Bezukhov et al can keep me company during single-traveler's dinner time!

I trekked back home, up across the hill and up to the Castle area, and stopped to take a picture of where I'd been a few hours earlier...so quiet and calm:

Here's a little video during the walk home...



More tomorrow - I'm excited for my friend Donica to arrive by train and continue the Scottish travels with me!

Dublin, briefly

My brain feels foggy, and has felt so all day. Despite the haze, I managed to get out for a bit of a walk earlier today and run a few errands. One errand was successful - adapter to charge my computer; the other was not. My glasses broke on the plane - one arm just fell right off. I can still use them, but I look ridiculous with them just propped on my nose and nothing on one side. I was directed by a nice lady at a pharmacy to a little store called Spec Savers, which I had high hopes for, but alas, a lady there looked at them sadly and said there was nothing she could do. So I'm trying to figure out where one buys superglue in Ireland, and hope that will fix the problem. Stay tuned for an exciting update on that.

Meanwhile, here was a very touristy Irish scene - notice good old Molly Malone there with weird, shy leprechaun in the background:

And here's a sign that made me think of my sister, who hates litterbugs:


On several buses, I also saw the phrase "BIN YOUR GUM, NOT €150", so apparently there's a real crackdown going on here, Singapore style. I made every effort to keep my gum safely in my mouth - so far so good. Another street sign in the "not-in-CA-anymore" genre: large posters all up and down the main street advertising a pro-life rally tomorrow, ending with "Keep Ireland Abortion-Free".

I met a nice girl on the plane - Irish, returning home for the first time in a year and a half, lives in Vancouver. We sat next to each other and endured a family behind us that consisted of a constantly coughing, frustrated dad, an increasingly agitated mum, and a very naughty little girl named Erin who whined and cried whenever she was awake. There was a slightly older, well-behaved sister, but I don't even know her name since I didn't have as many opportunities to hear it urgently hissed. Not all Erin's are so lovely as yours truly, sad to say.

I shall close with a little video of O'Connell Street taken during my walk. This was taken before I got really sleepy and konked out in St. Stephen's Green, which is how I spent a few hours this afternoon. Tomorrow early I catch a plane to Edinburgh - more from there!

Layover

A few observations from today:

Some small children can in fact manage a cross-country air trip amazingly well, in fact so silently that I wondered if their parents had given them something.

In this age of many, many baggage number and weight restrictions I was shocked to stand behind an older couple checking in who had at least 8 bags in between them, including 2 golf bags.

Traveling teenagers are the same everywhere. For the girls: teeny tiny shorts, layered, lace-edged tank tops w/bra straps hanging out, flip flops. One had a little stereo meant to hold an i-pod that looked like a triangular pink and white purse. For the boys: board shorts, t-shirts with ironic sayings, ridiculous behavior to impress girls. Watching their antics here in the food court did not make me sigh wistfully and long for bygone days.

30 Rock is hilarious. On the plane, I watched some old episodes of The Office, pretty fun. But 30 Rock made me laugh out loud several times, which may have disturbed my sleeping older Vietnamese gentleman seatmate. Sissy and Pete have been telling me to watch for a few years. Gotta get the DVD's from Netflix when I get home.

Just a few more hours!

I'm still packing, because I'm an incredibly slow packer. But somehow or other, Big Mama and I will be on a plane tomorrow morning at 8 am. She has to be on the slim side this time, since my little flight from Dublin to Edinburgh has more restrictions on baggage weight...I'm trying to slim her down but when I'm not looking she just swallows up more and more stuff. Sigh.

Tomorrow will be a long day - first leg is SFO to Toronto, long layover there, then 8:40 pm their time I board the flight to Dublin, which will arrive at 8 am their time, by which time I'll be quite the worse for the wear, I suppose. But of course it's vacation, and it's long-awaited and much-needed, so I'll muddle through.

And, friends, I promise that this will be the most boring post of the trip - just wanted to get things started!

Back to rearranging and staring at my piles of stuff to pack-
E

If all goes according to plan...

...July will find me in Scotland and Ireland.

Hooray! It wasn't until I booked my (relatively less expensive than in the recent past) plane tickets that I realized afresh how much I love traveling, how much joy it brings me. Just having these books on my desk and looking through them when I have time makes me quite happy - sometimes I take them to bed at night even though I know I'll fall asleep within a minute or two and won't get much actual reading done.

It's been a rough year, work-wise, and it's amazing how changed I feel having something to look forward to. I feel fortunate to have the time and money to travel, now more than ever. And I look forward to blogging along the way. Meanwhile, I have to stop reading confirmation booking e-mails in an Irish accent to my friend at work - I think it might be a little annoying.

See you back here in a few months!

Just a few more thoughts...

Wow, can't believe I've been home for over a week. It's always strange and a little sad how fast vacation recedes into the past once you're home, knowwhatimean?

I wanted to close up this summer's blog with just a few random things that never made it in the other posts, so here we go:

*Friendliness of New Yorkers:
At various times as we traipsed through the streets/subways/taxis/buses, we were pleasantly surprised to find how friendly and downright kind various people were to us. I guess I'd just bought into the rude New Yorker hype, so I didn't expect it. Right on the first night, as we struggled with our suitcases and our map, trying to figure out how to get to the hotel from the subway stop, two guys stopped and asked if we needed help. They even offered to carry our luggage. One guy was sort of beefy with a tight black t-shirt that said "Personal Trainer". We said a sheepish "no, thanks", but now as I write this, I'm wondering why we did that. :)

Other friendly encounters included a few different folks who asked if we needed help when they saw us with our map out, and our pal Raul, who we met on the subway one night. He asked us which direction the train was going as he hopped on - luckily, I knew - and then went on to say that he worked at the MAC counter at Macy's and if we came by to see him, he'd make us look "fierce". (You gotta imagine him saying that with a soft voice and the complete NY accent, no r sound at all.) We declined, but I do wonder what we may have ended up looking like after paying him a visit.

*But, on the other hand:
One night we came back to the Pod quite hungry but not up for a dinner out, plus it was pretty late. Gretchen headed to the corner near us where there was a grocery store - I offered to go with but we decided it was perfectly safe. She went, she came back - with some delicious snacks and a story about a few 10 year old boys who were hanging out in front of the store. As she was walking out, one of them grabbed her butt (!) and then ran away. So young and yet so cheeky!

*Colorful subway characters:
We saw so many...a preacher who handed out lists of prophecy to all who would take them, a man who came into the car and started in on a diatribe against the city's plans to eradicate some low-income housing, a happy group of teenagers, one of whom was singing loudly, American-Idol style, and promised us all that we'd see her on the big screen someday. On a more serious note, we saw several very young families whose parenting attempts were painful to watch. We heard one frustrated subway rider yell to those pushing to get on at the station "Everybody back the f___ up so we can get the f___ off!" While I wouldn't say it that way, I identified with the sentiment.

*Overheard conversations:
In the Library Hotel elevator, two executive types headed up to a meeting in the penthouse suite were talking about Elmo, or rather the gentleman who plays him. Apparently he had done an appearance with their firm recently, and "spent the whole time in the corner talking on the phone to his agent!". Tsk tsk, Elmo, you have appearances to keep up...

On the train to D.C., I was jammed in with three other women in a set of four seats that faced each other...two of them were coming from a series of meetings, clearly they were Madison Ave. types, maybe brand managers or something similar. They proceeded to debrief their whole day, but in code, never mentioning the actual clients or the products very clearly. "Those were so adorable!" one would say, and the other would say "you mean the small ones for the big client or the other ones?", and it was all I could do to ask what was so adorable and when would they be at a store near me??? (The consumerism of NYC had rubbed off on me, clearly).

*Cab/Train friends:
When both of the advertising ladies got off the train, the other passenger in our foursome and I had a far-ranging and very enjoyable conversation about many things - books, her job at Yahoo working to create new revenue streams for newspapers, how she used to live in S.F., public education, and where to eat in Washington D.C. (The Tabard Inn brunch, which we LOVED, was her recommendation). But what's funny is that our conversation started with "Were you eavesdropping on those other two ladies too?" And of course we both were.

Then, G and I shared a cab with a young woman who was visiting her boyfriend for the weekend...we did chit chat and turns out she works for the National Book Foundation, doing outreach with the National Book Award nominees and winners. I mentioned that a college friend of mine had been nominated for his graphic novel a few years back but hadn't won...and she said, "Oh, Gene, I love Gene! I wanted him to win so badly!" I agreed, and marveled that sometimes it really does seem like a small small world.

Thanks for reading, blog faithful! Til next time!

Goodbye to G...

Yesterday we said our goodbyes to Gretchen, who headed home one day before us. But never fear, we got the animal print robe picture in before she left...and, bonus, we posed on the treadmill!

Also, the night before G left, we headed out with the rest of America, it seems, to watch The Dark Knight - somewhere at a mall in Virginia, for us. We got small drinks,

and actually all thought the movie was very good. Even, I will say, thought-provoking. As one Slate reviewer wrote, the screenwriter "does more nuanced thinking about the war on terror than we've seen from the Bush administration in seven years."

Yesterday after G left, Lo and I dragged ourselves out on the town for a few more sights. I've tried to keep the weather complaints to a minimum on the blog, because after all, I'm on vacation, how bad can it be? Let's just say, though...walking around = getting very sticky very quickly.

Nevertheless, we did a pretty complete Mall tour - a few more works of art at the National Gallery first. (I got really into trying to see Wayne Thiebaud's cake painting, but sadly it is not currently on display.) Then we headed down the mall for a quick break at the fountain in the sculpture garden,
and on to the National Museum of Natural History. Right next to the room with the Hope Diamond, Lo found a crystal ball and pretended to be Madame Trelawney, complete with the dire warnings to HP. The weird thing is actually what the flash did when I took the picture - it's really just a plain quartz orb, but look, magic...

Then I pretended to be a bug on the wall, and we heard a kid say to his parents that "this is the scariest museum I've ever been to!"

We eventually headed towards all the monuments and meandered through them all, WWII, Korean, Lincoln, and Vietnam.

view down the reflecting pool (above) from the spot where MLK spoke (below)

Reflection on the Vietnam memorial, dusk

Pretending to look cheery and non-sweaty in front of Mr. Lincoln (you can see his feet)

We had two great meals yesterday - brunch at The Tabard Inn, which was well worth the long wait. Best brunch I've had in a long time, right next door to our hotel (!), and recommended to me by a very nice woman I met on the train in from NYC. Excellent! Then, on the other end of the spectrum, Lo and I had dinner at a place called Moby Dick's House of Kabob. Sort of a hole in the wall, despite it's various locations and website, very authentic, and super delicious. We walked slowly home down M St., in the still-hot night, along the old brick sidewalks with dry lightning flashing in the dark skies above us. Last nights of vacation are always bittersweet.