Scotland this weekend was one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. We started trying to snap pictures from the coach windows even before we had made it into Scotland. The sky was a perfectly clear blue, and the sun shone down on the most beautiful rolling mountains, some covered with lush green grass and spotted with sheep, and some with a fresh blanket of snow on top. One thing about the roads in the United Kingdom that I sometimes love, and sometimes hate is that instead of slicing through the landscape with dynamite like we do in the states, the roads move with the land. So, instead of having plain rock surrounding you because you're going through a mountain that someone has blasted apart, you're on top of the mountain, looking down on God's glorious creation. The pictures that I'll put on do nothing to demonstrate how beautiful of a place it truly is.

Anyway, moving on to what we actually did in Edinburgh... On Friday we pulled in and were finally released from our 6 hour coach ride (during which we ate lunch on a pathway over the interstate...). Anna, Shaylin, Eileen, and I set out for Edinburgh Castle (we're all about the castles over here). We wandered around the castle for a while, took lots of pictures (because we thought the view was absolutely beautiful) and got to see the Scottish Crown Jewels and the Stone of Destiny (which was really cool). To think that the crown and scepter laying before us had been used in the coronations of Scottish Kings and Queens for 500 years… wow. After the castle we headed back to the hotel to freshen up for dinner, and then struck out to look for a good, authentic, Scottish place to eat. Edinburgh was hoppin' for dinner though, and we had to try several places before finally deciding on "Auld Hundred's". On the menu, we found normal dishes like chicken, and fish, and shrimp (prawns), yet we also found the stereotypical Scottish "gross-out" food: Haggis (sheep's intestines). You know what we did? We ordered it. You know how it tasted? DELICIOUS. It was deep fried (which instantly makes every dish better) and when dipped in the mysterious horseradish sauce , it was even tastier. Also on the menu were Neeps and Tatties (hence the title of the blog) which are turnips and potatoes, respectively. After dinner we returned to the hotel, hung out a little, went exploring for a pub like The Rocket from London, failed epically, and called it a night.

Saturday, we woke up early for breakfast, then went out to tackle Arthur's Seat, an extinct volcano whose peak rises about 1,000 feet above the city of Edinburgh. We decided when we first got to Edinburgh that we wanted to climb it, but the closer we got to it the higher it seemed. We pressed on, however. I'm not sure how or why, but we took what was probably the steepest, longest, and hardest route to get to the top. It was totally worth it though. We stopped at all the plateaus along the way to take pictures and just bask in God's beauty and majesty. There is no way that my words can describe what I saw, so I'll leave it to the following pictures.