I just remembered...

...this is out of nowhere, but I'm afraid if I don't write it down I'll forget.

So as this blog would indicate I traveled a lot while I was in the UK. Whether it was day trips, adventures around town, or going between Wales, Ireland, etc - I was all over the place. Traveling always made me really nervous. Rarely did I have it all figured out before I left. I would just know the destination and have a vague idea of how to get there. It makes sense, I think, that that kind of traveling would make a person nervous. Needless to say, I was nervous a lot in the UK. I think this is the first time I've admitted that. Anywho.

When I got nervous there was one record I'd always put on to calm me down. Here I am, months after the UK, studying for an African American Women's history class and my iTunes is on shuffle. Of course, the song that starts the CD I used to calm myself down is the first thing that pops up. Beach Houses "Teen Dream" got me through a lot of shaky times over there and now it makes me burst out into tears while I sit on my floor studying.

All I can remember while listening to this CD are the nice times that came after me being nervous. I remember sitting with Andy on the bus for day trips around Scotland with my stomach churning, but ending up at Hospitalfield House where I had one of my most memorable experiences ever. I remember flying with Callie to Ireland at 7am and having no idea what to expect, except knowing that I'd have to navigate from Dublin to Galway and find a hostel that we didn't even really have an address for. In Ireland I met friends I still keep in touch with from as far away as Australia and grew a lot in general. I remember taking trains with Ellie all over the place and tricking myself into thinking my nerves were just motion sickness, but ending up in Oxford, Wales, England, or Scotland for countless perfect memories.

It's amazing the memories that a few songs can trigger. I can literally remember the patterns on the seats of the bus we took to StonyPath.


Beach House - Zebra; Silver Soul; Norway;

It will be completed!

As one could imagine, when I got home the last thing on my mind was keeping up with my blog. That being said I have so much more I want to add to this thing. One day once school starts I'll procrastinate on something and finish up here what I started.

Hospitalfield House Weekend

I really want to write a big post for this but as of now all I can do is think abut packing for Ireland! How about this - guess what the pictures are of and when I get back on Saturday I'll write explainations!

It's a week later than I promised, but now I have time to think and thus time to write: (though keep in mind my backspace key, 'o' key, and the most recently my 'y' key are getting stuck -- so this is truely an effort. One that I'm glad to do though!)

So, essentially I stayed in a castle this weekend. A CASTLE. Brick walls, wooden floors, ghosts, et al. Literally the moment I got out of the van Willie (the 'owner' but more overseer of the castle) whipped his van behind ours and parked, letting out the most adorable weimaraner puppy my eyes have ever seen. Immediately me and Luna started a lavish affair that included long times spent in my lap, longer times spent outside playing, and sneaking her into my room every now and then.





The next few pictures are shots from outside of the house. I could go into the history of the castle because it's quite interesting, but a lot to type so instead I'll post a link to it's website: http://www.hospitalfield.org.uk/

One other cool comment about this place though is that it's meant to be a space where artists do residences so a ton of artists frm all over the UK and beyond have spent time in the same place all of us did getting inspired, like we did.



This is the backyard of the castle. The house to the left is where Willie lives (can you believe his life?) and that's Andy in the corner. That's the North Sea back there too.


After seeing the ocean I said that only thing that'd make this place better is a tree with a swing. Zoe went off exploring and less than 5 minutes later came back running saying she'd found a tree swing. It then became clear to me that this place is perfect.


That night we went to a small pub in town and were greeted by this band. 3 women and 4 men made it up. Each girl had a violin and 3 of the guys played accordion, the last played piano. Needless to say it was great.


When we got back that night we realized that Luna was not the only dog there. This is Toby. He is not as adorable as Luna, but older so by default cute.


These are some shots of the inside of the house. It was amazing.






This tapestry room is where I spent a lottt of time reading and etc.


this is the ceiling of the tapestry room.


Everything about this place was ornate right down to the toilet paper rolls. FALCON toilet paper rolls.


This is the main hallway. I was on the top level. The ceiling in the main stairwell was a massive sunlight - you can imagine how beautiful it was.


As if the location, dogs, and atmosphere weren't already amazing enough, there was a live-in chef that cooked us all our meals each day. Homemade meals. For lunch we usually had some sort of soup (tomato, pictured below is spinach and broccoli, etc etc) and a side. These were mini pizzas he made with a type of pesto sauce on top. For dinner it was always amazing. I remember vegetable curry stir fry, mock Shepperd's pie, and pictured below this one a vegetable patty with sauce and cooked half potatoes. After each dinner we also had dessert - and when I say dessert I'm talkin passion fruit parfait, gingerbread soaked in liquor with homemade ice cream and rhubard, and all the fixins etc etc. Amazing.





One night a few of us walked to the beach where we could stand in the North Sea. These girls are wonderfulll.


This is me and my GF's in the North Seaaaa


I love these ladiez. Callie and Rach playin in the sea. It was incredibly cold so taking off our shoes was something done after a few shots of tequila only.


The next day we went out of the town of Arbroath (I don't think I mentioned that's where the castle was) and out to these amazing cliffs. It was windy as all hell and that probably made it a safety hazard for us to be there, but it was beautiful.









Me, chilling on the cliffz.



The beach just under the cliffs.




The town of Arbroath.


Randomly placed picture of the back of the castle.


3 days well spent.

New Lanark and LIttle Sparta (Stonypath)

As I write this I'm exhausted so I'll just explain what each picture is and then later rewrite this post a bit to make it sound.. moooree...full of life?

Through one of our classes (the Scottish humanities one) our professor plans day trips for us. Earlier we went to hill house and loch lomond and this day we went to New Lanark and Little Sparta (aka Stonypath)

New Lanark used to be a water mill village or something like that, correct me if you know the proper terminology. Mostly it's just very old and very pretty and has a waterfall running through the middle of it. These are some of the houses people still live in there (for a hefty fee)


Walking up the mountain we saw all sorts of pretty sights on the way to the waterfall. Here's one really nice view.


I'm so used to hiking mountains and walking up the mountain on some sort of dirt path, this one varied between dirt, stairs, and bridges that took us over the water. This was the best part.



My camera didn't do the waterfall justice at all.


The next place we were going was pretty far out in the fields. Truth be told none of us had any idea where we were really going, but the scenery was pretty on the way.


Ellie was trying to also take pictures of the scenery, but Dashiell got a little in her way haha:


When we got there I felt like I'd just stepped in the middle of one of the most beautiful places I'd ever been. We walked up a driveway lined by sheep and cow fields (sans fence to separate us) and into an at least 2 acre sculpture garden.


Sheeps/cows everrrywhere!


After walking past all the animals I turned around to take a picture of where I'd just walked through. Matt, the sculpture teacher, is the guy in the picture.


Little Sparta!


Small accents were everywhere throughout the garden.




These rock sculptures were where we all relaxed most of the day. Off in the distance all you could see were rolling hills and animals. It was so amazing. Also, to top it off it was just under 65 deg that day.


For some reason all over Scotland when I've been in fields I've noticed that to get across a fence instead of opening a gate you usually walk over it by means of one of these little guys. Pretty cool eh?


I tried to take a picture of me with the scenery in the background


This is me and my darling Callie who is going to Ireland with me tomorrow


More tiny sculptures/etc around the park

It's been some time!

Since I haven't written in a while, I'm going to start earlier and work my way up to the past few days.

Dashiell, Andy and I have made it a bit of our own personal mission to walk most of the city and its limits. One night we found two massive light up bridges. One was red and one was blue.


(picture of the blue one from the red one - the red looked like a mini golden gate bridge)

We always have a lot of fun together. They are goobers but keep me constantly entertained.


Dashiell, Andy, Mitch, Emily and I also went on a an evening adventure to a street Dash/Andy/Emily found on a walk one night. It's called Hidden Lane or smething like that, and it RULES. I took my first trip on a Scotland subway too, that was okay in comparison.


This is the street, at night it's all lit up with christmas lights. Very small and quaint.


First we went to dinner at this place called Ketchup. It was the most AMAZING burger place I've ever been to. They had 6 different types of veggie burgers! If they had that many veg burgers can you imaaaagineee the selection of others? It was crazy.




Afterward we went across the street to a place called Vodka Wodka that has over 100 different types of vodka. Oddly enough the big thing here is white russians.



Here's the pretty street at night. We all agreed it was one of the best night we'd had here. Just sitting around as new friends drinking, eating burgers, and joking around.