Scotland Adventure Begins (4/11-4/12/26)

Two weeks in Scotland is a lot to get caught up on, so I'm not really sure how I'm going to structure these posts. I guess we'll find out together, lol.

Jay scheduled us for an overnight flight from Denver to London, which is our preferred way of traveling across the pond. Usually, we can grab a bit of sleep (with the help of some alprazolam) on overnight flights. Additionally, taking a later flight meant that we weren't in a huge rush as we finished packing and getting the house and critters ready for our absence.

We gave ourselves plenty of time to get through security, and it was a good thing we did, because something in my bag triggered additional scrutiny. As the TSA lady was trying to pinpoint what it was on the x-ray, she gave me the best accidental compliment ever. I had a travel towel rolled up and stuffed into one of my exterior mesh pockets, and she asked about it, and asked why I had it. Asked if it was my workout towel. I laughed, and told her that it was for when we get into the Fairy Pools. She kept looking at the monitor and digging through my bag, trying to figure out what that dense object was. She didn't tear apart my bag, she only unzipped things to get access to the area that the screen was alerting to, taking care to not destroy my packing, which I appreciated, because I wasn't sure I'd be able to repack and get my backpack closed again.

As she was digging, she asked if I'd packed some protein powder or something. I had not, but I grinned big, because between asking about the workout towel and the protein powder, it dawned on me that she thought I looked like someone who worked out. I mean, I play circus twice a week, but I'm just now starting to see my shoulder/arm muscles developing, so it was nice for a stranger to look at me, size me up, and decide I was someone who worked out. It took the sting out of having my bag dug through.

She finally figured out what it was she was seeing on the screen, and zipped everything back up. She never said what it was that triggered the scrutiny, so when we got to the gate, I unzipped my bag and looked at what she'd been looking for. It was my shampoo bar from Swell Labs. I bought it, because their advertising said it was great for travel. Since it's not a soap-shaped shampoo bar, and had caps on both ends, I thought it'd be easy to transport, and I wouldn't have to worry about it getting soggy or gross. That damn shampoo bar became the bane of my existence. It might be great to travel with in your checked luggage, but in a carry-on it became a time-consuming pain in the ass at each and every security checkpoint we went through. Jay suggested I just toss the whole thing in the bin, but I paid $35 for that, I couldn't just toss it. Won't buy another one to travel with, though.

Luckily, we'd given ourselves enough time that it wasn't an issue being held up at security. Eventually we boarded our flight and headed off to our adventure!

Bright eyed, bushy tailed, and ready to GO!

The flight was okay. Despite pharmaceutical intervention, neither of us slept particularly well on the plane and were both a little groggy when we deplaned at London Heathrow. Our train to Edinburgh departed from King's Cross Station, so we had to navigate the train system from Heathrow to Paddington Station, then Paddington to King's Cross. It wasn't the easiest navigation, due to lack of clear instructions on our reservations and being tired from the flight. Luckily, we had scheduled our train to Edinburgh with more than enough time to make the trek.

Once we got to King's Cross, since we had a couple of hours to kill, I made Jay stand in line with me at Platform 9 3/4 to get our pictures taken.

Even though the photo crew there is a well-oiled machine, we still stood in line for almost an hour. I can't imagine the craziness that occurs during actual tourist season.

Finally, we managed to board the trail to Edinburgh. We dozed a bit here and there, and the four-ish hour trip passed pretty quickly. 

Starting to look a little worse for wear after our long
travel day.

We watched the scenery go by, in between catnaps.

The very first time I went to Scotland was over twenty years ago, with my ex-boyfriend's soccer team. My ex was a huge Newcastle fan, so when we realized that the train we were taking to Alnwick stopped in Newcastle, we decided to get off so he could visit St. James' Park and see where his favorite team played. 

I do not remember this view of Newcastle at all from my
previous trip.

However, I remember these signs very well.

Our plan had been to hop off, go see St. James' Park, buy some new soccer jerseys, then hop the next train to Alwick. We thought we'd be only an hour or so behind our friends. What my ex and I didn't realize was that the train only stopped in Newcastle twice a day: once in the morning, and once in the afternoon for commuters. Our late departure from Newcastle turned into quite an adventure, and the memory still brings a smile to my face. Jay, of course, has heard the story before, but he got to hear it again as we chugged through Newcastle.

We arrived in Edinburgh about 8:30 p.m. on April 12th, after leaving at 6:40 p.m. from Denver on April 11th. It sounds like a really, really long travel day, and it felt like it, but Edinburgh is 7 hours ahead of Denver, so in reality it was only about 18ish hours instead of 26ish.

I had watched a few reels from Keep Edinburgh Thriving, and in one of the videos Nashy talks about how so many tourists are unprepared for the stairs in Fleshmarket Close, right outside of Waverly Station. For some reason, I let that get into my head, but instead of being intimidated by the mere 122 stairs, I took it as a challenge.

Fleshmarket Close

It wasn't much of a challenge. After sitting for so long during travel, it felt good to climb those stairs. And, besides, it's not 122 in a row, there's a slope midway up. The slope was by far the worst part of the journey up to the Royal Mile.

When we approached Fleshmarket Close, we looked at each other and said that the stairs reminded us of the stairs in Lake Como, Italy that lead up to the Bellagio Hotel. Both sets of stairs had businesses along them on both sides.

Bellagio, Lake Como, Italy