bring on 2006

hey team, well i love new years celebrations, theres something about opening up a new year and starting again from scratch that really excites me. not sure what it is- but its just a buzz. i was looking for the best place to go to bring in the new year. everyone i talked to said edinburgh was the hot place to go. so scotland it was. managed to scramble 4 days off work, which was sweet- so i booked my flight up there, arrived at 10am up in edinburgh and caught a bus up to aberdeen, to meet up with one of my aussie mates and her cousin, and stayed with them in their great aunt and uncles house. they had a wicked house which backed onto a river and all this land, it was so cool, the air was fresh up there, not all smoggy like down south around london, it was beautiful. spent a couple of hours exploring aberdeen, walking around and taking in the sights, found some dodgey pet shops selling illegal (thats my take on it) reptiles and stuff. heaps of cool old gothic building and museums and that. nice littleish city.

on the 31st we went into edinburgh and started to explore the city, edinburgh is mint(my new word),such a beautiful city with the castle-kind of up on a little mountain thing, and then the valley beneath (which used to be a moat) has all the shops and houses and buildings surrounding the castle. really nice city. quality. so we just crusied around looking at the sights, checked out some old cemetries and climbed a random mountain, which we thought was arthurs seat, but turned out to be just a random mountain. it was quite steep and rather that climb up the obvious path, we just started walking straight up the grassy slope. going up wasnt a problem, but coming down i ended up sliding the whole way down, my jeans still have the grass stains as proof. we were going to check out the castle, but it cost £10, so we thought nah, but in hindsight we should have checked it out. we went into a little shop next to the castle and they we running heaps of different tours, and kate and i were keen to see loch ness and the highlands- and there turned out being a tour the next day and there was 2 seats left. is that a sign or what. so we snapped it up. just chilled for the rest of the arvo, ate a quality meal from sainsbury (kinda like a cheap woolies) and waited for the festival to start.

the street party kicked off about 9pm. you had to have a ticket to get in, otherwise it would have been packed out. there was 6 stages spread out over the streets all with different types of music playing. we were just chilling at one of the dj stages, met up with old mate andy. but about 11pm there was way to many people, it took about 30mins to get between stages and you seriously had to form a pack of people going the same direction and just charge through. it was a mission and got a bit tiring after a while, the the atmosphere was awesome. everyone was there for the same reason, the have a stack of fun and bring in the new year with new 100,000 mates. wicked. met heaps of cool people along the way. at midnight the fireworks erupted from the top of the castle on the mountain, so cool. it was wicked. there was a group of guys just yelling for ages, was heaps funny, for a few minutes everyone was equal, there were hugs and high fives flying around, hippies, dudes in suits, guys wearing kilts- everyone was having fun as one. you could feel the love. mint.

the only prob about edinburgh, was that it ended way to early, at about 1am, the lights went off and everyone started leaving. the crews came in and started dismantling the stages and cleaning the streets. whats going on. so we found a chill out club that was open till 5 in the morning (oh yeah, we didnt have a place to stay for the night) stayed there until it closed and the went to a 24 hour pizza place, bought a pizza and ate it really slowly, then about about 6am got kicked out and went down to the train station, where kates cousin and andy caught the first trains home, myself and kate waited and hour then went up and jumped on our highland tour. yes we were quite tired, as we didnt get any sleep the night before, so the bus ride itself is kinda a blur. but all the stops were mint. such beautiful scenery up there, and there was hardcore snow, like a foot deep in some places. the air was really fresh. and we saw some highland cows, which are cows with really long shaggy hair and big horns, they are cool as. so on our tour, we went to glencoe, inverness, a few random places in between. but the highlight was loch ness, ive always wanted to go there. we went to the urquart(?) castle and then for a boat cruise on the loch, no mosnter sightings but i was looking out for it. awesome, then jumped back on the bus and headed back to edinburgh. oh another highlight was seeing the smallest shop in the world, its literally just the size of a door and about 1.5m deep, its a real estate shop with 6 properites for sale, hopefully buisness booms in 2006 and he can afford a bigger place. got back to edinburgh about 9pm. found a hostel and crusied around edinburgh at night a bit more.

on the 2nd, kate caught the train back to london, and i caught a bus over to glasgow, to catch up with a mate, but this didnt work out as my friend was sick and in hospital. so ill have to get up there some other time for a reunion. staying in glasgow for a few hours then caught my 10pm overnight bus back to london. what a mission. eventually got back to the hotel at 11am. had to work an hour later. slept though my alarm. got woken up by the duty manager. fun times. i did make it to work a few mins late. and wasnt very productive, but i was proud that id managed to explore a quality chunk of scotland in 4 days. hardcore travel, little sleep, good mates. thats the way to travel. going to paris on monday, for another hectic 4 days travel adventure. cant wait. itll be mint.

white christmas...almost

hello team, well its been a while since my last entry, getting a tad lazy over the festive period, so im doing a bit of catchup today, well as you all should know december 25 is christmas day, and as i couldnt afford to fly my family over here (or even just myself home) i was invited up to middlesborough to join in with one of my mates families for the festivities. now i live about 4 hours away by car, it ended up taking about 6 and a half, because my car is special. but i eventually got there, i was aiming to get to church on chrissy eve- but my car was to slow. so i got there and we just chilled- cant really remember what we had for dinner, but i do remember the homemade banana chutney- awesome. it was mint.

christmas morning was cool, everyone was up and buzzing that christmas was finally here. woohoo. went downstairs to the chrissy tree and opened presents. i was really spoiled and got a great haul of pressies-including a sled, cambridge rugby jersey and giant europe map and some other nik naks like choccies, books etc. it was cool as, totally spoiled. thankyou everyone involved. then it was time to head off to church, and back home for lunch- englandites take their christmas lunch very seriously, they eat so much. i work in a gym and we have been flat out since new years with people trying to work off all the food and alcohol they have consumed over the festive period. ate so much food, but it was quality food, not like the stuff we get at the hotel, and was very cool, afterwards we played heaps of board games(i guess theres not much else you can do when its like -10 outside), not the hugest fan, but it turned out alright- bit of a laugh. and after my extensive research of questioning people at work, ive found out that playing board games on christmas and boxing day is quite common, tradition even.

boxing day we went for a hike up in the mountains, visited a monument for Captain cook (yes the dude who discovered australia) as his birthplace was nearby, there was heaps of people out enjoying the walk/hike, i believe that this is also sort of a tradition on boxing day for the locals, either way there where stacks of people out there, nice view of middlesborough(its not a pretty city but you can see it all- so that means you have a good view of it) and the sea also, cant remember what the mountain was called but it was nice being out there in the fresh air/freezing icy wind.

and that ended my quick christmas visit up north, visiting a warm and friendly family (thanks guys) i didnt get to see any snow fall on christmas day, it snowed 2 days after i left. but the next time it does now im fully equipt to make the most of it with my shiny black sled. and if i should sled so far and get lost ill have my europe map to guide me home. great presents. great christmas. well as good as it could have been without a bbq, the beach, 35degree weather and cricket on the tv. take it easy. andy