Cheerio!
Here are some of my pictures form Scotland so far. I am having a great time. I took some pictures of Dalkeith city (where we are staying) but haven't uploaded them yet. Last week we had class a lot so we did not do as much touring as we would have liked to. This week we are touring a lot though (Glasgow, Stirling, Newlochness, Endinburgh, and going into various Castles!). I cannot believe I will be on my way home one week from today...its just a crazy feeling. I am having a blast over here and I love the people I am with. We are like a big family over here.
I have to run, enjoy the pictures!!!!

xoxoxo

At the Scotland Border The wall in the background is what separated the new town from the old town (the rich from the poor) this wall dates back to the AD's!

IN SCOTLAND!

June 19th, 2009






IRN BRU
June 19th, 2009

This is a soda they make over in the UK. It tastes like bubblegum, I haven't had it since I first tried it....and probably wont again. It is very popular over here though...they even make it in Diet! ha. I would compare it to what Mountain Dew is like to us in the states.









The Scotch Whisky Experience
June 25th, 2009
This room had 3,384 bottles of whisky in it. They were collected over a 35 year time span by Claive Vidiz. The room has the worlds largest whisky selection ever. We sampled some of the whiskys and got to see where they came from in Scotland. The room was just revealed this past May.

We also learned about the making process of scotch whisky, and experienced the different aromas of Scotlands whiskies (Fruity, Sweet, or Smoky).

Though I am not a fan of whisky (at all), seeing how it is made was neat becasue like they say, "Whisky and Scotland go together, one must reinforce the other".....
This was a true Scotland experience!

Touring Edinburgh, Scotland
June 25th, 2009

I see men playing the bagpipes everywhere!

In the city....

The Edinburgh Castle is behind me.


The Highlands
June 27th, 2009

Some of the group that went on the trip.
Adam, Haley, myself, Mike, Ben, Jake
(left to right)

Haley, Katie and I in The Highlands

SO Beautiful! This picture looks fake.

It was extremely foggy on our ride up. It looked like the mountains were smoking.

Loch Ness June 27th, 2009

London, Cambridge, York and last but not least Scotland!

Greetings Everyone!!!!!

I arrived. I am safe, and I finally have a internet connection that works 24/7. I do not like being disconnected from the world completely. I have realized that I rely on technology way to much. But I am surviving, of course :) Anyways.... about my trip so far.

WOW! We have been here for 2 weeks already! I cannot believe how much I have seen while over here.

Thursday June 11th:

We met in one of the parking lots on campus for our departure. Jeremy, my mom, and Terry were there to send me off. I was packed, and excited to go (and so far I haven't noticed that I missed anything to pack!...this is a good sign). Unfortunately we drove to Chicago in style....a big yellow school bus- it was horrible. It reminded me of going on a field trip when I was in elementary school.

Jeremy, myself, Mom and Terry

Scotland group 2009. Here we are strangers.

Here we are best friends...
Day 3! :-)

Procedure and result at the airport was what I had expected. When we were unloading the school bus, I had joked to a guy that he had brought 2 suitcases and that I did not have to because I packed smart. Well....10 minutes later at check out I found myself putting some of my belongings into one of his bags because I was 7lbs over (*only!). We litteraraly had to sit on his suitcase to zip it shut. Once we got to our gate, my anxiety was high...I hate plane rides--and of course our plane got delayed 3 different times (only an hour time span) but because of bad weather, this made me nervous.
Even better....once we finally boarded.... I got onto the plane I found that I was in the last row on the largest plane I have ever been on....45C. Take off felt like I was on a steep roller coaster (something like the plane ride we had to Reno mom...haha yikes!)

Friday June 12th:
(**Happy Birthday Grandma Bette)

We arrived in London, England at 7:02 AM (this would be 1:02 AM your time), I survived the plane ride. I found that I got more sleep than I thought on the plane because I was not tired one bit. The rush and excitement of being in London probably had something to do with it as well though :). After riding the Picadilly Tube Line to our exit I was happy!!..I was sick of haling my luggage through the London airport and around the city...but what did I come to? This horrid staircase! This was my first picture taken in London....if you know me well enough you should know my what my attitude was once I got to the top of this fabulous winding staircase with a 51.5 lb suitcase, a backpack on, and carrying a purse that was over stuffed:

STEPS.

The KENT HOTEL.

The girls room. Once we checked into our 6 person room (horrid!) we were to report straight to the lobby for a tour of London...NO NAPS!

Our tour of London lasted all day. We begain with Buckingham Palace, I was so excited!!! I was wishing my Mom was with me at this point because I know how badly she wants to go there some day. We even got to see the changing of the guards, I was amazed by the amount of people that were there to see this event take place (because this is an everyday thing).

This happens once a day at 12:00. Soldiers from the Grenadiers, Coldstreams, Scots, Irish or Welsh Guards regiments, normally guard the palaces in London...and it takes them 12 hours to prepare the horse, the soldiers clothing ext.

By this point on the trip I had made a group of friends. We had only been with each other for 24 hours straight, yet I felt like I had known them for years. It has been very comforting to meet people that I have so much in common, while I am miles and miles away from home. By now you could say we are basically best friends....we have spent the last 2 weeks with each other non stop.

(Me (new haircut! ha), Tiffany, Haley and Katie)

In the park St. James park... this is the most Royal Park of all because the Palace of Westminister, the Tudor, St James Palace and Buckingham Palace all over look it.

I wont go indepth about our tour of London because it ended up lasting 10:00-4:00.... A 6 hour tour of London jet lagged, and not showered. I really wish they would have waited to give us this tour because by the end of it I was zoning out.

This is the Westminister School....the school of geniuses! It is the most expensive school for a child to attend in England.

These guys are good! I could never stand still for the amount of time that they do and not smile or TALK!

This one made eye contact with me! ha

BIG BEN!

The Tower Bridge of London

Tower Bridge

The business world of London.


More!

Museum of Great Britain history

The classic telephone booth downtown London

The beer is stronger here!...Just thought I should share that with you. We have found that out during our FREE-TIME! ;-). We took a break while we were shopping at the Portabella Market. (one of the first markets ever)

Monday June 15th:

We were headed to Cambridge, England bright and early in the morning. Cambridge was one of my favorite places on this trip. The city reminded me something like Madison, WI. The 3 days we were there it was beautiful outside, so I am sure that helped. We stayed in a really nice hotel (the water pressure was hard in the shower!!). At this point I still did not realize that I was only on day 4 of my trip because we had been go go go since we got to London. Here we got some free time, this was nice. As you may know...Fish and Chips is one of England's meal of choice...I had my first Fish and Chip dinner in Cambridge! It was extremely tasty!

We got a tour of the college campus (beautiful!). The population of students are able to attend there because they come from a wealthy family. It is expensive to attend Cambridge University and it is also very difficult academically. We actually found out that a few days prior to us being there Bill Gates had been there because he was given an honorary degree: Doctor of Law from the Cambridge University.

Mike, myself and Katie

We took a ride on the "put-put" boats. Someone pushed us around from the back of the boat using a large stick (he is standing in the background). It was great for site seeing....and I got some sun!

Katie and I

The University

Kings College (a school within the University) *the best of the best

Wednesday June 17th, 2009:

We left Cambridge early and headed to York.
The city has a rich heritage and provided the backdrop to major political event. It rained pretty much the whole time we were there, but we were still able to site see everything as planned.

Alec, Haley, myself, Katie, Tiffany, and V
Just about to head out for our 2-1/2 hour walking tour of York, England. In the pouring rain! The rain didn't even bother me because the city was so amazing.



Standing in the Old York City. The other side of this wall is the New City of York. These are referred to the Walls of York. These were go back all the way to the seventh century when the Romans first settled

York Minster Abbey Church of York. I walked up all 275 stairs to the TOP!

Inside York Minster. This place was beautiful! Some of the stained glass in the church dates back to the 12th century. It is amazing to walk around inside.

Westminster Abbey Church
Tiffany, Katie, myself and Haley

At the top of York Minster. (275 stairs up a winding staircase----definitely will get you dizzy going up and down)

John Keynes door to his house from back in the day.
He is a old FAMOUS British economist. This was exciting to see his house!

The Shambles. This is the oldest street in York.
The Latin word for this street is Flesshammel, it means to do with flesh. In 1872 it is said that there were 27 butchers on this street at once.... ironic.

It is around 8:30 PM....the sun is still shining bright as day. It never gets dark over here!!


We went on a walking tour of York with this guy at night. The tour is called "Ghost Stories of York". It was interesting walking around the city late at night as he told us ghost stories that have occurred in places.

Cliffords Hill. This is from the eighteen hundreds. A Jew massacre happened sometime during that time. There are some creepy stories to go along with that...but I'll save those.

At the Castle Museum in York. This museum was awesome. The castle museum has exhibits detailing the past 300 years of Yorkshire and English History. There are recreated rooms and whole streets. The museum also has a great collection of costumes showing what men, women and children wore in past decades and centuries.

**************
I am going to take a break from uploading and typing on here. I wish I would have had internet at the beginning of the trip. We are now in Scotland at the Dalkeith Castle .....kind of creepy. We got here last Friday afternoon and have been pretty busy since. Classes were rough this week---6 hours with 1 hour break for lunch of straight lecture. I am not used to having such long lectures. But they are interesting because we go site see what we talk about.

I cant believe I have alittle less than 2 weeks left here still. I will update you soon with Scotland pictures and stories :). This weekend is a free weekend for the students, so a group of us signed up for a bus tour. We are going to Glasgow, Loch Ness, and The Highlands tomorrow on a 12 hour bus tour...should be interesting! We have to leave the castle at 630AM to make it to town on time...I am excited though!! It is so strange to think it is 8pm here, but it is 2pm back at home.

Well I hope you enjoyed my blog...I hope it is not to lengthy. Im sure it is obivous...but I have tons and tons more pictures, it is hard to pick and choose which ones to share with you :). IF you are friends with me on Facebook there are many more uploaded on there!

I miss you all. I hear the weather is fabulous back at home and have heard some complaints about how hot it is. Well...just know that I am wearing jeans and sweatshirts everyday at some point! So enjoy the weather for me please :).

See you soon,
xoxox
Ashley