Politics, Pints & Poppyseeds

So here we are, flying from Edinburgh to London.  It’s been three (I think??!) days since I last posted and there’s been some interesting stuff happening, so this could be a long one. Bear with me.   

We made it to Belfast on the train from Dublin, we promptly got a car from the airport and then drove north to the Antrim Coast.  We stopped at a little restaurant in Ballymena, The Big House.  It had tasty food, but the name left a little to be desired since we just left a Penn State victory two days prior.  

We made it to our B&B in Ballycastle on the northern coast of Ireland around 9 PM.  Just in time for our host to open the door, show us our room and hit the hay. Still recovering from the debauchery that was our stay in Dublin.  We woke to another fantastic breakfast.  You know, this is something that I could really get used to, stay at a place and in the morning they serve you a great sit down breakfast as part of your stay.  I’ll take it!

So, first things first, Northern Ireland feels a bit like southern Ireland, but with a distinctive British flavo(u)r to it.  Red phone booths, red mail boxes, and across the street an “Integrated Primary School”.  So we asked our host what that meant.  Well, here’s where things started to get a little interesting for us from a political stand point.  An Integrated school means that both Catholic (Irish) and Protestant (English) children go to school in the same building.  Something that happened in the 1960’s between white and black Americans was happening right across the road from us in Northern Ireland.  It was quite interesting to hear our host describe what was happening, and his thoughts on it.  He was obviously Protestant (British) because he let a couple little things slip showing his colors, referring to the “ballywho” that the Catholics cause, etc.  It was really fascinating to hear something that is so foreign to us, causing such a stir in these towns. I mean in the US, we’re pretty open to any religion, let alone religious persecution, at least in the current day in age. 

Enough politics, off to be tourists… We headed to town to mail back some trinkets and things that we no longer needed with us.  My stripped overalls, a sweatshirt, and some tour books etc.  Ahhh…. The currency exchange rears it’s ugly head…. Any thoughts on how much it cost us to mail some stuff back from Ballycastle, Northern Ireland to Palos Verdes Estates, California?  Leave your guesses in the comments… I’ll let you know when we’ve seen sufficient guesses…

Continuing on… we wanted to go and walk the Carrick-a-Rede.  It was pretty fun, about a ½ mile walk to the bridge.  We got there to find a film crew filming something at the bridge.  So we crossed and watched these two guys cross the bridge while the crew was filming.  We walked out and looked at the view, Amazing!

In the meantime, one of the guys walked over near us so I decided to ask him what they were filming.  I guess it’s some show for Sky Sports where they travel around Britain in a Fish and Chips van.  So, while I’m talking to him, Sarah walks up and his partner walks over and we just start talking about our trip, and their trip.  We go to take a picture with them and turn around to see the crew filming.  The assistant producer comes over and asks us to sign a waiver, and we’re talking to her about the show.  Turns out we were talking to Freddie Flintoff, one of the most famous Cricketers ever.  And he’s the one touring all over the place.  Who knew?  So, all our followers in the UK will have to let us know if you see us on “Flintoff’s Fishshack” come the new year.  Check out Sarah's next post for pictures of them together.  

On the road again…. To Giant’s Causeway.  What an amazing site!  You walk down the hill and you round the corner to this windy shore line that is just crazy looking.  8-10ft waves were crashing over the rocks, and the causeway itself looks a bit like a ruptured tile floor, or a super-sized one of those pin toys that you pressed your face into to leave an impression as a kid.  Just unbelievable, so stand there and look out over the ocean and see the islands out there, while standing on the very unique place in the world.  It’s a little hard to describe in words. 

The story is that Finn McCool (the Irish Giant) and the Scottish giant were going to fight, so Finn was going to sneak up on him.  He built the causeway to sneak up on the Scottish Giant.  When he did, he peered over the mountain to see how large the Scottish Giant was and got scared for the fight and ran home.  The Scottish giant saw the causeway and came over to Ireland for the fight.  Finn and his wife decided that Finn would dress up as their newborn baby.  When the Scot came barging into their house looking for the fight, Finn’s wife told him that Finn was out on working the farm, but he was welcome to come in and see their newborn.  The Scottish giant saw the size of Finn, thought he was the newborn and then became so frightened of the size of Finn that he ran all the way back to Scotland on the causeway, destroying it as he went.  You can believe that, or that it’s remnants of volcanic activity that created the Irish isles, choice is yours, I know what I think ;).

Driving around the country side in Northern Ireland is beautiful.  It’s quite amazing that it’s the same island, as it’s pretty different.  But, we get back to Belfast, fill up the rental car with gas.  All of you in the States can stop complaining about the price of gas.  Just stop!!!  It was 1.31 GBP per Liter.  Or 4 liters per gallon * 2$ per 1 GBP = $10.48/Gallon.  Fill your Hummers with that.

Anyway, we jumped on the plane and headed to Scotland.  It was prop plane and took about 30 minutes.  So we landed and we were lucky enough to have some friends come pick us up and take us to their house.  It was awesome to see some friends and catch up with them.  One of my personal favorites is the home cooked meal that we had.  After a week on the road, a home cooked meal tasted fantastic and catching up with friends in their home was awesome. 

From there, we woke up in the morning and caught the bus to the city.  It was really fun to catch the bus with the commuters.  We got into the city and walked up the Royal Mile to the Edinburgh castle.  What a crazy place.  First of all it’s a beautiful castle overlooking the city  It’s been there forever and it has quite an intricate history.  They fired off the 1 o’clock gun, that let’s everyone in town set their watches.   

And we took a tour learning about all the ins and outs of the castle.  Then we saw the crown jewels and learned their history. And then the Scottish war memorial. What a truly fascinating place.  Then we went out onto the Royal Mile and walked around in all the touristy shops.  Why the Royal Mile?  Well, the castle is at one end, and the Royal Palace and Parliament are at the other.  And it’s near a mile long, the Scots sure are clever with their naming.  PS - There are plenty of unicorns everywhere, you're right Croney!!

We spent most of the afternoon looking for the tartan or plaid that represented some of Sarah’s family.  The Burns Check it’s called, and it’s technically not a tartan.  And it’s not a very popular pattern either.  We found it very few and far between shops.  

Then we went to meet up with Jen at her shortbread shop, Pinnies & Poppyseeds, right off the Royal Mile.  The shortbread is amazing so if you find yourself in Edinburgh, make sure to stop in.  She closed up and we went to get drinks like the locals do.  

Walking through town, we started to notice all these Scottish flags with “YES” written on them. 

Well, here’s our second political lesson.  There is a Scottish Referendum coming up for vote in the middle of Sept for Scottish Independence.  They are voting to become a free and independent country for the first time in almost 700 years.  The country is split, apparently fairly evenly.  So this should be really interesting.  It could potentially turn into something similar to Northern Ireland, where some are loyal to the British, and some support the independent state.  Really an interesting time to be there, with lots of talk about this whole thing. 

The city itself is pretty crazy.  So they never tore down old parts of the city, they simply built on top of it, for centuries.  And I kept finding myself looking in amazement at these buildings that you see on the front side are only 2 stories, but the back side are almost 8 stories high.  So, when you walk down the royal mile, you are on top of about 6-8 stories of buildings.  You go through this little hallway, called a close and you come out to these stairways that lead you through all these older buildings.  It’s kind of crazy to look at from a distance. Just massive bridges going into this stack of buildings on top of each other.  

From the Front:

 From the Back:

We then said goodbye to our friends, and set off to a new place.  London, the biggest metropolis on our journey.  Already had some great Lebanese food for dinner.  Can’t wait to get into the office in London tomorrow and have some semblance of normalcy.  It will be great to see our friends from Dublin again, and to finally meet a lot of people that I have only known through email.