Edinburgh, etc.

Although my dad was here for only a few days, we still "had time" to travel. And since all of my friends told me great things about Edinburgh, I thought this was the place to go. With less than a week before he came, I booked train tickets and a hotel and the day after he arrived we were off to the land of the Scots (aka Scotland).

NOTE: the day before we went, we went to Maze Grill (a Gordon Ramsey restaurant) and it was a great dinner. I just thought I should make some sort of mention of such a great dinner.

After a little runaround about passports and train stations, we made it on to the train on time and found two seats next to each other. I was reading for one of my classes while my father was working on a Christmas present. I would say it was a pretty productive train ride. Once we got to the hotel, which was a stone throws away from the train station, and checked in, we decided to get some food. We decided to walk to Old Town which was across the valley for lunch.

Here is the Scottish memorial, which was right across the street from our hotel. There was also a Ferris wheel right next to it since they were setting up for their Winter wonder Land, a carnival thing for Christmas. London's is in Hyde Park.

Castle of Edinburgh, which ended up visiting the next day.

Here is the street we ate lunch at.

After eating a good meal at the Arcade Bar we decided to take a Bus tour of the town to see which things we should visit the next day. Little did we know that the temperature would get very cold and uncomfortable.

Me enjoying the bus ride. Also, my dad took his very Nikon so most of the really good pictures are on there.

Here is a picture of the Castle from our Bus tour.

Once we got off the terribly cold bus tour and defrosted in our room, we made a pit stop at H&M so my dad who did not compensate for the cold weather could make some much necessary purchases to make up for his lack of layers. After the pit stop, we walked across to the Old Town again for dinner. We ended up getting dinner at this really good Italian restaurant. Afterwards we back to the pub where we went for lunch for some drinks (some aged Scottish whiskey and pints). Sticking to tradition, we played Rummy 500 where he beat me multiple times. Once I got tired of losing we went back to the hotel for some rest.

After waking up at 10am the next morning and getting breakfast at this chocolate shop, we headed off to the castle.

Here is the castle from the end of the Royal Mile.

My dad in front of the Castle.

View from the base of the Castle.

After waiting for about a half an hour for tickets, we made our journey to the top. Here a some of the pictures that we took:

View from one side of the Castle.

View from the steep climb up.

Me trying to pick up a huge cannon ball (unsuccessful).

War Memorial (I think).

View from outside one of the canons near the top.

A lion in front of the memorial.

After making our way down from the Castle and getting some souvenirs, we ate at this place called Deacon Brodie's, which is named after the inspiration for Dr. Jekyll. Here is the wiki link: Deacon Brodie. Lunch was done and so was our short trip.

Once getting our luggage and getting to our train, I finished my reading and we had a little rematch of Rummy 500 (I won both games). Although short, Edinburgh was a great and beautiful.

The next day we went to the Tower of London and then ended up doing a bus tour of London since it was raining. I didn't take any pictures with my camera so it will not be too exciting, therefore I will keep it short and sweet.

Lunch @ Harrods: Great!
Dinner @ the Sports bar: Great!
Watching the Eagles at the sports bar with my dad while having a drink: Great!
Watching the Eagles suck: Terrible!
Spending time with my dad for a few short days in London & Edinburgh: Priceless...

Straphangers and Tubes

Two days before my Dad came, Rachel and I decided to do something that we always wanted to do, go to the London Transport Museum. Being Urban Studies majors, with an interest in city planning, a museum like this was a great experience. Here are some photos from our trip:

The first public transport systems in London were these carriages pulled by horses. This is one of the earliest "double deckers."

At the start of "our trip through time," they gave us a "ticket" which we "had" to get it stamped at these "stations."

Me hanging onto a straphanger (the offical name of those things that hang down from buses, trains, etc.) in a old tube car.

Some cool map showing the Piccadilly line, northern and Bakerloo (I think).

A sweet tube advertisement that I will probably get a poster of.

Attempting to drive a underground train (its harder than it looks!).

Well, that was a quick summary of our URBS museum trip. Next, Edinburgh!

Arsenal

Last Tuesday, me and two other Penn people (Dale and Tiger) went to our first official football game, Arsenal vs. Wigen Athletic. It was really cool and fun, even though our seats were the third from last row of the stadium. The stadium was beautiful and only a few years old. Here are some of the pictures from the night:

Here is the outside of the new stadium where Arsenal plays (obvi).

Here is Dale with his Arsenal scarf. BTW, we all ended up getting different ones as souvenirs.

The two teams lining up before they shook hands.

Right after the second goal.

A sweet picture of the roof/rest of the stadium.

Another.

The three of us.

So Arsenal ended up winning the game 3-nil. On the tube ride back everyone was singing. Good times.

This weekend my father is coming to visit and we are going to Edinburgh, look out for a post sometime next week.

Ye Auld Dub

On the same day that my mom left, me and Sami went on our own little trip to our neighbor next door, Ireland. After talking with our friends that already went, we heard that Dublin didn't seem too special, but we were still determined to make it great trip. Once we got to our hostel, we decided to go explore the city centre and see what the town truly had to offer. Here is Sami near the river Liffey:
After checking out the O'Connell Bridge and O'Connell Street, we headed to our first Irish pub, where I tried some famous Irish Whiskey:

After a drink or two, we left and we went down to Trinity College (1592) via the Ha'Penny Bridge. Although it was dark by this point, the campus was still pretty. Here are a few that I took on the last day during the daytime:
Another shot:Later that night, we headed down to the Temple Bar area, the nightlife area of Dublin. It was pretty fun, nothing special though. Actually, the only thing special was the price. It turns out that Dublin is a VERY expensive city, the same as London pretty much, maybe even more.

The next day we went down to the shopping district around O'Connell Bridge and made a few purchases; Sami got boots and I got a nice sweater. After our shopping, we did a little sight seeing on our way to the Guinness Store House.

Here is Dublin Castle (1204).

The Spire (2003).

Christ's Church (1171).

After a lot of walking we made it to the Guinness Store House:

Once inside, we learned about how to make beer and why Guinness is so special. And at the end we both enjoyed a complimentary pint that we pulled from the tap ourselves:

Here is Sami with her's.

Also, at the end of the "tour" we saw the 9000 (nine thousand!!) year lease that Arthur Guinness has at St. James' Gate in Dublin. Only 8751 years to go!

The next day, we didn't have too much time before we had to go back to the airport for our flight so we decided to check out Trinity College in the daytime, get lunch near Grafton Street and check out St. Stephen's Green (1663). The park was very pretty. Here are some pictures:

After picking up our luggage from the Hostel, we caught the bus back to the airport. Luckily we got the front row seats on the top of the double decker. This is the last image that I have of Dub:
Well, I think I got you guys all caught up now with three blogs in the last three hours. Anyway, the next few weeks I have a lot of school to catch up on so I don't know how many more blogs I will be doing, since I will not be traveling that much. Although, now that I think about it, I am going an Arsenal Game Tuesday, so I will try to do one on that at some point during the week. Hope you enjoyed!

The City of (Brotherly) Love

So on one of my days during my Reading Week, my mother and I went on a day trip (escorted) to Paris. And oh what a day it was. First, it started early. I woke up at 5:00 to get to my moms hotel where we would be picked up to go to the train station to catch the train to Gard du Nord through the chunnel. After a little delay we finally arrived.

Along with 9 other tourist of our tour we met up with Sami our tour guide at the front of "Gare du Nord." And while taking us to our tour bus we walked by the famous metro sign:

Once we got on the bus, we headed through the opera district and "la place de Louis XIV," which was recently renamed. Next, we headed down the Champs-Elysees towards the Arc de Triumph.

Another picture:

Staying on the bus, we continued with our tour and made our first official stop at the Eiffel Tower.

Continuing, we went on to the second-level.


Here is a view of Sacre-Coeur from the Tower:
And the Invades:
After having the best-most-boring lunch ever (Jambon et fromage [Ham and Cheese]), we went on a boat tour down the river Seine. Here is the Musee d'Orsay:
And Notre Dame:
A shot from behind, note the flying buttresses:
Once we finished withe boat tour, we had the opportunity to tour the Cathedral up close:
Although, it doesn't look overwhelming large from the outside, once you step in Notre Dame, you just feel so insignificant. Taking over 250 years to build, the cathedral is truly a work of art and structural engineering. A shot from inside:
Me and my mom thought that this was weird:
Here is a beheaded St. Denis:
After finishing the tour of Notre Dame and getting a true crepe (avec sucre), we headed over to the Louvre, which unfortunately closed on Tuesdays. Although I did get a few good shots, including this one:
After wishing we could be inside, Sami took us to the Opera District (A pied) for dinner. Here is what it looked like on the way to the area:
Eating metres away from the Opera House, a bunch of us enjoyed a classic french meal. My mom even got escargot. Here is proof:
After dinner and before Sami took us back to the bus to go back to the train station, he took us to a department store which was already for Noel. Here is the outside:
And the inside:
I would say that this pretty much out does Wanamaker's. After that, our trip to Paris was pretty much over. It was a great, long day.