Edinburgh, Scotland

Denysha, Eliana & I went to Edinburgh for the weekend. We got flew into and landed on Saturday at around 10pm. As soon we landed....crap....we realized none of us had money to use for this trip. Ok, we'll work with it...right? College kids have no money, right? We'll be fine. Right.
So we shuttled to the center of town to grab another shuttle to our hostel. Little did we know when we reserved at the Globetrotter Inn that it is a 30min. drive from City Centre. Slightly inconvenient, but we were rolling with it.

The hostel itself was nice. It sat right on the water with a grassy knoll in the back. There was a bar lounge, a laundry room, a computer room with movie theatre, a gym/spa, mess hall (free breakfast!), etc. And the dorms had cute little nooked bunkbeds. The bathrooms were big communals.

When we got there, our hostel was teeming with old (& very drunk) British men. They were loud, sociable, and ready to amuse (which they did oh so well). We were encountered by one on the shuttle who talked about how much he didn't like Tony Blair but woah that chic was gorgeous over there.
Keep in mind that none of us were used to listening to Scottish accents, which are very different from the English accents we've grown accostomed. So, understanding what was going on and what people were talking about was (though very nice to listen to) extremely hard.
We went into the bar for pints of water. Sat there for a while, listening to the 80s rock in the background, exhausted. Eliana went up early to bed. Then, Denysha's afro became the main topic of the men around us. They started approaching us like we were the only women in the bar. Oh wait, we were. One was nice enough to explain that it was a party where one of them, "the groom", was left by "the bride". Oh, good. We went to bed quickly after that.

Sunday, we headed out to explore the wonders of Edinburgh. In other words, we didn't know what on earth we were going to do.
The city is beautiful; it is surrounded by water and mountains, and in the center of the city is a large hill/mountain with a massive medieval castle covering it (Edinburgh Castle). The buildings were tightly packed on the hills. Nice green and gardens everywhere. Buildings battled between Greek, Roman, Gothic, Baroque, and medieval architecture.
We started climbing a hill towards the castle. I really wanted to go into the castle. The castle's entrance was 10 pounds. Agh, no, thanks.
We started to mosey down the Royal Mile (a mile-long road between the old castle and new Holyrood Palace....completely littered with stores, pubs, and other assorted fancifuls). We were trying to find free things to do, and there wasn't much.
We ended up at the bottom of the Royal Mile, and looked up. A mountainish hill you can climb on an open trail?! Oh, I was excited. The girls, however, were not. But, wrongly assuming it was Calton Hill, I made them walk up the hill. It was quite steep for a leisurely stroll. And, me being deathly afraid of heights, VERY dangerous. The girls were troopers for most of it. It was a breathtaking view of the city and surroundings.
Afterwards, we hit up a small cafe for a cheap lunch outside. To our surprise, we found ourselves in front of a place of Clairvoyant Cleansing! This interested us quite, and proceeded in. Eliana became annerved, and began to freak out about the whole situation. Denysha & I, having been in these places before, were happy. And besides, the atmosphere was positive, light, and airy. Nothing bad going on, here. We were in a room full of people reading tarot cards, giving reiki massages, and other joyous things. Eliana couldn't have stuck out more. Being so uptight about it all, women came to her asking if she wanted "help". Being unable to sit still, she kept blowing them off. Denysha & I just laughed and chilled.
After a while, we upped and left. We found a postcard ad for some sort of spiritual festival, Beltane, that night on Calton Hill, which we found out was actually a smaller hill on the other side of the city. Of all we knew, it was just a bunch of people playing with fire and talking about the earth. Why not?
We quickly hit up the National Museum of Scotland. We didn't end up staying too long, and we found ourselves sitting and talking in St.Gile's Cathedral for over an hour. That's one ugly cathedral.
Then we discovered the Real Mary King's Close, and opted to pay for this one tour. Basically, a few hundred years ago, Edinburgh's Chamber of Commerce decided to knock down a few of the tight neighborhoods in order to build a gov. building. But they left ruins undernearth. And these ruins were haunted with old people from the plague, as well as others. But we didn't know that until we took the tour. The tour was very informative, but also scary. It was extremely strange because you could see the old buildings and the dramatic slope of the earth. And it was DARK. And creepy. We wimpered the entire time.
After running out of that tour as soon as it finished, we ate some cheap kebabs at a hole in the wall. Some Scottish man talked to us about what to do around here for youth. Then we started to walk to Calton Hill for Beltane.

Beltane, where do I start? Well, this event is ENORMOUS, especially with all of the college students. We walked about 20 minutes to get to the back of the entrance line. People were dressed up, not dressed up, drinking, eating, painted in weird colors. Oh god, what have we gotten ourselves into?
So we walk up the hill to find a mass of people in front of the Greek monument. And the crowd was growing. Men in black capes and painted red were walking in a pack to one side. Were we in some sacrificial ceremony?? I asked someone, who said basically it was just a big party where people drink and some theatre kids dance around half naked to celebrate the beginning of May. Right, we knew that. But my Lord, did they put on a show. Drummers dressed in black, torches lit, lighting wooden structures on fire, blue men dancing, white painted women dancing. The crowd was very aggressive, and several times we all got swept up a bit or completely stuck (literally, physically). A procession. Drums. Tribal cries. It was sensory overload.
Though it was kind of fun, we ran out of that place 3 hours or so into it. We had to catch our shuttle, anyways (which, Eliana would like to let everyone know, she fell on her face while running to catch it).

Monday was a lot more low-key. It was Bank Holiday, so not as much was left open. We groggily ate breakfast (cereal, OJ, & toast for all). I went to the book swap in the hostel and picked up "The Alchemist". It was raining. We had to check out and carry our bags all day. We got to town with nothing to do. So, we walked. We first hit up the National Gallery and the Portrait Gallery. But we weren't much for museums, so we walked about a mile on the opposite side of the city to the college area, The Meadows. It was, all grass. That's it. So we chilled out for a while there. Then we walked over to Jimmy Chung's Chinese Buffet (I didn't explain, but, this restaurant was the meeting point for the shuttle, and became the topic of quite a many conversations). It was Chinese food, American style. Very very bad for you. But good.
Shuttled back to the airport 2 hours before flight, and read.
I finished the book. It was very good.

For the girls' defenses, I made them walk A LOT. Sometimes they were not very happy with me because of how much I wanted to walk, and uphill mostly. But they still did it mostly. Thanks, girls.