Wonderful Weekend in "Edinburg-ah" (as the locals say it)

I can't believe that it was exactly one week ago that my overnight bus from London's Victoria Station was leaving for Edinburgh. Partially because I am shocked that I waited so long to blog about it (the homework finally kicked in) and partially because I am amazed at how quickly time passes here in London. Spring break is only two weeks away...the semester is flying by! My friends and I agree that there is definitely some sort of crazy London time warp that makes us feel like we have been here forever, but, at the same time, that time is passing in the blink of an eye. Our two days in Edinburgh felt like a minute, but we managed to cram an awful lot into that minute.
Since we are poor college students, we opted to take the overnight bus to Edinburgh on Friday night. At 21 pounds, the price was right, and it also allowed us some extra time in London on Friday afternoon to explore some more. So Megan, Kelly, Dan M, and I went to Harrods. Dan didn't make it for too long in this wonderful, frightfully expensive, and luxurious department store. Naturally, the food section was my favorite (I think I have a problem that needs to be addressed...) and we all bought wonderful desserts. I opted for a glittering Oreo cupcake that was delicious! We wandered around the rest of the store for awhile, coming upon a jewelery section so full of diamonds that it hurt my eyes to look in the room, more purses and handbags than I have ever seen in one place, and the best room, the dresses. Rack after rack of beautiful, colorful, and sparkly dresses by designers whose names I had only read in People Magazine. I should note that Dan was long gone by that point. Apparently he didn't enjoy the sparkles as much as we did and headed back to the London Centre to get work done.
After Harrods, we had a few hours to kill before taking the Tube to the bus station. We had some wine and Strongbow (my favorite cider so far) in the hopes of it lulling us to sleep on the bus. And let me tell you, it was successful, because I was conked out for most of that bus ride. Which was wonderful, because we had a full day ahead of us when we arrived in Edinburgh around 8 on Saturday morning.
After a little bit of wandering down the wrong road, we made our way through a silent city to our hostel, Budget Backpackers on the Royal Mile, the same road as Edinburgh Castle. We couldn't have asked for a better location, and the hostel was clean, safe, and had relatively comfy beds, so we were happy. The crazy neon decorations were just an added bonus.
After freshening up and dropping off our backpacks, Megan, Kelly, Kaitlin, and I set off to find The Elephant House, the coffee shop were JK Rowling started writing the Harry Potter series, on a napkin as she enjoyed her morning coffee. Luckily for us, Edinburgh is a relatively small city that is really easy to navigate and, less than five minutes later, these four American girls stood transfixed in front of "The Birthplace of Harry Potter." Once I lifted my jaw up off the ground and pinched myself, I was able to walk inside and enjoy a delicious cup of hot chocolate and naturally, we all took photos pretending to write on a napkin. And then it was off to Edinburgh Castle, which was absolutely amazing! Luckily we had bought tickets online, because the queue at the ticket office was ridiculously long. The views of the city from the castle were spectacular...my camera really didn't do it justice, but I'll include some photos anyway. The castle is set on an enormous hill overlooking the city in one direction and the giant cliff, Arthur's Seat, in the other. And it was a sunny morning in Edinburgh, which made it even more perfect. I just wanted to stand and drink it all in and never forget what it looked like. Besides the wonderful views, there were plenty of other things to see at the castle: the Scottish War Memorial, exhibits on Scottish history and weapons, the Crown Jewels, dungeons, and prisons. They were even giving away free alcohol samples in some of the gift shops, Scottish whiskey, liqueur, and raspberry vodka. I tried the raspberry and some sort of Scottish something that wasn't whiskey but apparently was similar to Bailey's (according to Kelly, haha). Whatever it was, it definitely warmed me up after walking around in the cold. There was also some William Wallace whiskey, which I thought about purchasing for a few Braveheart fans that I know, haha.
Judging from the exhibits, the Scottish people seem very proud and patriotic. It actually made me wish that I had some Scottish heritage, as weird as that sounds. I wanted to be able to look through the tartan and family crest displays for the Sullivan or Mellon pattern, but I suppose I can save stuff like that for my visit to Ireland.
After the castle, it was time for some shopping on the Royal Mile, the road leading up to the Castle. There were lots of touristy shops and stores with cashmere and tartan. I honestly wasn't too impressed with it, because it seemed like a lot of the same store over and over, but we still had a good time looking at all the kilts and other Scottish clothing. We wandered down a close (Scottish for alley) off the Royal Mile and stumbled upon The Writer's Museum. It was such a great find--exhibits about Scotland's most famous authors and poets, including Sir Walter Scott. It was so great to spontaneously find something that turned out to be so interesting, it felt very European backpacker.
After fueling up on caffeine at a cute little cafe, we went to St. Giles' Cathedral, yet another beautiful European Cathedral. For dinner we found another beer and a burger deal, which always seems to perfectly fit our budgets and our stomachs. Dessert was the best part, which I am going to describe in detail. My apologies for the constant references to food; my semester abroad had been defined far too much by my food experiences, especially for someone who isn't in a country known for its food. But back to dessert. It's this place called Chocolate Soup, which has every kind of chocolate dessert imaginable: cakes, brownies, shakes, cupcakes, and even just shots of pure chocolate (a brilliant invention, in my opinion). I opted for the brownie explosion sundae, and it was a wonderful choice. Everyone else got some sort of shake, complete with lots of whipped cream, candy pieces, and chocolate drizzled on top. Basically it was a chocolate addict's dream. So my dream.
All that chocolate almost put us in a food coma, but we couldn't rest yet, because it was time for our Edinburgh Ghost Tour. Yes, I went on a Ghost Tour. Granted, lots of coercing and peer pressure was required to get me to agree to this venture, since I am a bit of a wimp/scared-y cat/wet blanket. But I absolutely LOVED the ghost tour! Our tour guide, Lizzie was just as hilarious as she was creepy, so it wasn't too scary, and we learned a lot about the history of Edinburgh. I could have done without some of the gorier details of the torturing and executions that used to take place, though. Lizzie definitely made the tour; some parts could have been corny but she was funny enough to pull it off. And she even took us into this underground part of the city where people used to live and is apparently the most haunted place in the UK, according to the BBC. No ghost sightings here though, although Kelly and I were gripping each other's hands in fright at some points.

On Sunday morning we got up for Mass at Saint Mary's Cathedral. Ironically enough, we knew most of the songs, but they didn't ask us to be the choir, for some reason. Then we headed back to The Elephant House for breakfast, just so we could go there one more time. Kaitlin was brave and tried haggis and blood pudding (google it if you don't know what it is...I can't bear to think about it). After breakfast it was time to work off all those calories, so we climbed the beautiful Calton Hill for more spectacular views of the city. It was definitely a workout, but so worth it to see the city and the castle from the other side. And we got to see and climb "the shame of Scotland," which is this replica of the Parthenon that was never finished because the city ran out of money. It's not exactly the easiest thing to climb, but teamwork got us all up and down from it, as I'm sure you can see from the photo to the left. After climbing down Calton Hill, we saw the Sir Walter Scott Memorial, the Scottish National Gallery (lots of beautiful paintings, but too many to remember any specifics), and my personal favorite, the Balmoral Hotel, where JK Rowling finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. It was basically a weekend meant for a Harry Potter nerd like myself.
Then it was off to the station for a five hour train back to London, during which, being typical girls, we chatted nonstop about the highlights of the weekend and reminisced a bit about Notre Dame. As much as we love it here and as amazing as it is to be in Europe, we all still miss our Home under the Dome. Which says a lot about what a special place ND is. But there's no way that I would trade this whole experience, which is still pretty surreal, even after over a month of being here, for anything. I kept walking around all weekend saying, "Guys, we're in Edinburgh!" as if that would make it more real, or something. I just want to embrace every day as an opportunity to learn a little more about the world and have some adventures along the way.