What is the worst part of taking a trip involving airports? Well of course, airports - or maybe the dude behind you that talks really loud for 4 hours of a 7 hour flight. The trip to Dublin/Scotland was well thought out and planned, but it is amazing what a thunderstorm can do to your plans. At 4:30pm when I checked my flight status from the office and realized it was already delayed, I knew that I was in trouble. I did start my Dan Brown book though that should last me the whole trip. Flash forward 2 hours to when they are calling my name telling me that I need to rebook and go home, my fears came true. I tried all of the usual tricks and options to try to get the trip started to no avail. It was too late at night and there is only one flight across the pond a day. No problem, I at least got to watch the finale of Deadliest Catch.
18 hours later, I find myself in the Columbus airport again and of course flight is delayed. Fortunately, it was only delayed 3 hours giving me enough time to make it to Philly. After an uneventful flight from Philly to Dublin, I arrive and proceed to wait in the DUB airport for 4 hours until my next flight (of course I missed my scheduled flight to EDI with Matthew). I found a cozy spot behind a cafe in the airport and fell asleep. I woke up to find a tall guy standing close to me looking at my stuff. Kinda weird and a bit uncomfortable, so I promptly grabbed my stuff and headed to the check in counter. Things are turning around. I check in, head to the gate and the plane is about 15 minutes delayed. No biggie. We board the plane and I am thinking my luck has changed to that of the Irish - check that - weird noises coming from engines and we are getting off the plane. By the way, the Dan Brown book was just finished and now feels like a huge paperweight. Time to pull out the iPod for Angry Birds. In classic low fare airline fashion, we hear announcements every 30 minutes that we are going to be boarding in 30 minutes - for 4 HOURS! Silver lining, we get a certificate for 5 Euros - which I find out can only be used at one place which had nothing for 5 euros except cheesy, garlic chips and drinks. iPod's now dead.
Finally make it to EDI and you get the highlights from Matthew's post. The city is amazing and the hotel was great too. When we got back to the hotel, I fell asleep sitting up.
The drive to St. Andrews was great. This was my first time driving, and boy it is weird. There is something that goes against everything you know when driving backwards. Do you get it the left or right lane to make a turn? Who has the right of way? No problem, just find someone and follow them. The golf tourney was great. The ultimate weather event. 9am: Raining and no wind, 11am: Sunny and slight wind, 12pm: Raining and windy, 1pm: Sunny and windy, 4pm: Wishing I had a sherpa, 9pm: climbing under a fence to try to take a shortcut to the parking lot.
The Highland Games were great and the drive there was an adventure. Lesson learned: when the roads are weird and you are driving on the wrong side of the road, sometimes a GPS doesn't matter because you will still have no idea where to turn. Scotland has plenty of one lane roads. Important note: go against your instinct and veer left if you come up on someone.
Dornoch was small and fun. The waitress couldn't stop telling us how great Glasgow was. We got a huge list of things to check out - it was gonna be cool. Back at the restaurant, we got the cullen skink soup - delicious. There was nothing to do, so after 2 bottles of wine at the restaurant, we decided to walk to the beach. After 10 minutes of walking and no beach in sight, we posed for a few pictures on the Royal Dornoch golf course and we headed back to the hotel for a drink. Scots must like their beer warm. Americans don't. Half a beer later, back to the room.
Next day was to Loch Ness - where we were on high alert for the monster and then the rest of the way to Glasgow. I was the navigator and was able to catch some sleep while Matthew was driving on the wrong side of the road with his arm out the window trying to take pictures of a hill or river or something. I wake up to find us parked off the side of a road with Matthew getting out to take pictures. I resumed navigator duty and we ended up stopping at a scenic overlook and taking an unplanned hike up a mountain. Awesome views.
Finally arrive in Glasgow and head out to one of the recommendations given to us by the waitress in Dornoch. The place ended up being a local place and was a lot of fun. This is the adventure that ends up with haggis, nips, and tatties. I will let Matthew explain. The next morning it is raining and we do the quick 30 minute tour of Glasgow and just want to leave. We head back to Edinburgh to catch the Roslyn Chapel and Edinburgh Castle before going back to airport.
Back to airport - and back to Dublin with no issues. Once in Dublin, we go to a burger place at midnight to grab some food and then hit a few pubs. The first was very cool with a band playing in hit. They serve free sandwiches, and this is the place that I have my Dublin Guinness. The next pub is the Temple Bar in Temple Bar. On the way there, a chick is getting arrested by the police and the crowd is yelling to let her go. She is screaming and thrashing around in the paddywagon, and for whatever reason after 5 minutes or so, the Guarda let her go. Yes, we are definitely not in the US. We stay at the Temple Bar until it closes and then head back to the hotel. Matthew has to leave in 4 hours.
My flight leaves a few hours later, so I did a hour or so of touring around Dublin before heading to the airport. Cool city - wishing that I had the full day there that I had planned on. Back to the airport - uneventful other than the guy I mentioned earlier that talked really loud for 4 hours about his 3 month backpacking trip across Ireland. Back to Columbus.
The trip overall was great. We had a great time and I would definitely do it again. It was great hanging out with Matthew and seeing some awesome places.
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