I Would Walk 500 Miles, But I Probably Wouldn’t Walk 500 More

Unlike the men who sang “I’m Gonna Be,” The Proclaimers, I would not like to walk 1000 miles, no matter who is at the end of them. I understand that traveling to new places and going to all the tourist attractions requires a lot of walking and, for the most part, I’m alright with that. This does not change the fact that I only have one pair of feet, and they get tired eventually. Compared to the ports I’ve visited so far on this trip, Scotland has actually involved the least amount of walking. So I don’t know why I got tired so much faster here than in Portugal and Spain. Maybe the walking all added up subconsciously and made me tire more quickly? Or, maybe it was the blister the size of Texas on the bottom of my right foot in between two toes. Either way, my aching feet annoyed me enough that at one point on day three of Scotland, in Edinburgh, I was about ready to cut off my own feet and chuck them down the Royal Mile. I’m sure my mother will be glad later on to hear that I did not have access to a bone saw on this trip. But all in all, walking around Greenock, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and bus and subway stations was not so terrible. I’m sure if I spent less time getting lost I would not have walked nearly so much. I would walk 500 more miles around Scotland (I’m sure I must have walked close to this amount in four days), but not if they were anything like what I’ve experienced during my time here. But I shouldn't get ahead of myself, this post is about the first day of my time in Scotland.
            One wonderful invention that should have been a breeze compared to the chaos of getting lost in Scotland is public transportation. That saying, “fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me,” pretty much perfectly describes my experience with transportation in Glasgow. The first day here, my friends and I caught a bus into Glasgow at the last second and then proceeded in getting lost on our way to the West End. Thankfully, a Scottish man handing out flyers asked if we needed help (I say thankfully, but while he was talking to us I kept flashing back to the movie Taken, where girls who talk to a stranger get stalked and kidnapped). Once we told him where we wanted to go, he realized he didn’t know how to get there and had to hail another guy and ask him if he knew. This second guy told us we had to take the subway and, after thanking them, we walked down into the subway station. But the fun didn't stop here. At the ticket kiosk it took us ten minutes to buy our tickets because my friend thought her credit card wasn’t working. It turns out she was putting it in wrong. After we got our tickets we were finally on our way to West End and ready to see some museums.
            We navigated our way to the Kelvingrove Museum with little difficulty and after two hours of perusing the art and getting lunch (fish and chips, of course), we tried our luck in going to the Hunterian Museum. We got lost. Again. Usually I’m great with directions, but something about Scotland has reduced me to wandering about like a lost puppy. My friend Sidney asked for directions and after turning around and heading back the way we came, we arrived at the Museum. I think everyone should go to Scotland just for this museum. Why? Jarred organs. You want a heart in a jar? On shelf three. Bone? Shelf two. A dissected testicle? Also on shelf two. Basically, this collection has almost every part of the human anatomy in a jar and this museum is probably the best place I’ve visited so far. Oh, there was also an impressive rock and mineral collection and ancient artifacts from all over the world but, because I’m fascinated with the gross and disturbing, it does not get any better than organs in jars. After seeing a collection that would have made Hannibal Lecter clap his hands with glee, we made our way back into Glasgow for some shopping before heading back to Greenock with no difficulty. Thus the first day ended and our feet only mildly aching. 
Emily gesturing to the Kelvingrove Museum

An amazing exhibit at the Kelvingrove 
Me being grossed out (not really) by the jarred organs at the Hunterian Museum

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tesco is like Narnia

Image
            I’m writing this on my last day in Scotland, a Tuesday if you’re curious, and my friend decided that we absolutely had to go to the Tesco in Greenock, just so she could say that she went to a supermarket that is so quintessentially British. At the beginning of our short excursion we did not have particularly high expectations of Tesco; we thought it would be just like any ordinary American supermarket but with different brands. Once we walked into Tesco though, we realized just how extraordinary it truly was. Tesco, as my friend Emily said, is like Narnia. You walk in curious, but not overly hopeful, only to be completely amazed by what you find inside. Those average, automatic doors hid a wonderland of aisles as far as the eye can see. There were groceries, a deli section, oh, and don’t let me forget the clothes that take up the entire second floor. One of the first things we saw was Tesco’s escalators (not the step kind, the gradual incline t...
Read more

The Russian Orthodox Thigh Master

Image
Be prepared for many pictures...              The third day of Russia was one of the longest, as it consisted of a tour of four of St. Petersburg’s churches: the Holy Trinity Cathedral (along with the Alexander Nevsky Abbey and a Cemetery), Our Savior of the Spilled Blood Church, St. Isaac’s Cathedral, and St. Vladamir’s Cathedral. If you have the chance to visit the Spilled Blood Church, I would advise you to take it! The inside is the most amazing thing. There are floor to ceiling mosaics that show important Biblical figures and famous parables and I wish I could have spent more time inside since I wanted to see each and every gold, mosaic-surrounded image. My other favorite of the day was St. Isaac’s Cathedral. For this church we had the option to either go inside the church or to go up to the colonnade—ascending 262 steps to get there! My friend Sidney and I chose this option, and you may think that 262 steps is no big deal. Let me tell you, i...
Read more

Burr(en) It’s Cold Out Here (Ireland Day 3, Part 2)

Image
           After the Cliffs of Moher Mist it was lunch time so we stopped at Fitzpatrick’s Bar, which is a pub with the most Irish name to ever be Irish. Here I had some amazing seafood chowder and had the chance to get out of the very traditional rainy weather for a while. The next stop was actually my favorite stop: Burren. This is an area by the Ireland coast against the Atlantic Ocean. It’s a huge limestone deposit that has crisscrossing cracks known as “grikes.” In these grikes it is possible to see arctic, Mediterranean, and alpine plants all growing together because of the odd environment. Since the area is full of cracks, walking around on the deposit is almost like playing hopscotch because you have to hop from stone to stone to avoid the cracks. It was amazing because the landscape was something so unlike anything I’d seen before, but, it was also the coldest stop we made. Rain was coming down and there was a chill that even my scarf and rain jac...
Read more