Alnwick - May 18th

Written May 18th:

Last night was great! Sarah and I spent the evening with some girls we have been getting to know named Laura, Peggy, and Ellie. We sat in the cozy hotel lounge swapping stories about JMU and dentistry (of all things!..) getting to know each other even better over drinks. It was an evening of relaxation.. which continued on into my room where I got a queen sized bed to myself. Best night of sleep I’ve had on the trip yet! Too bad we were only there one night…

This morning, we woke up early and hit the breakfast bar which was also fabulous. We tucked some fruit in our bags and headed out to meet our bus which took us to the train station. We are quite the site to see when we travel!.. There are 23 of us walking in line through train stations, city blocks, etc,.. and more than half of the girls over-packed (I’m not in that bunch for once!). We arrived at Alnwick shortly before eleven and had to carry all our luggage up and down a flight of stairs to get to the other side of the station. Joanne was in obvious pain, as she had knee surgery earlier in the semester. She decided to stay behind at the train station with the luggage instead of putting herself through more walking and pain. It’s a little disappointing to be sure, but she seemed to enjoy the time to herself and was in good spirits when we returned.

Returned from where?.. you might ask?.. Returned from the Alnwick castle!.. also known as Hogwarts to those who are fans of the Harry Potter books/films. We took a bus to the town of Alnwick and walked from there to the castle. Once we figured out booking and tickets, we had awhile to wait for our tour. Most of the girls went to the cafe, but I just ate some left over breakfast and began to look around and check out the gift shop. The castle was gorgeous and I couldn’t stop to eat,.. I had to walk around and take some pictures and get a sneak peak at the gift shop. A really friendly lady named Sue helped me out and showed me around a bit, pointing out the spot where ‘Harry learned to fly!’ I also swung by a tent where there were several owls and hawks out and I talked to some of the guys who were running that. Once our tour started, we were given a lot more information about both the long histories of the castle and the interesting tidbits about the Harry Potter and other films. The site was used in not only the Harry Potter series, but also some others. He gave us some really cool tid-bits about the scenes. For those Harry Potter fans,.. we were able to see the film location for scenes from the Hogwarts courtyard, entrance, the area that they learned ‘how to fly,’ where Hagrid dragged the Christmas tree, the womping willow (though there was no tree b/c most of it was computer animated), the flying car scene over the castle wall, the hole in the holly bush where Neville landed, the location of Hagrid’s hut and the beginning of the forbidden forest. Pretty fun stuff!

Another fun thing that happened to me today started at the beginning of the tour. As I walked over to the tour’s starting point from the owls, a scraggly-hippie-looking fellow not much older than myself began to make small talk with me. From the looks of it, he seemed to be traveling by himself. The third word out of his mouth caught my attention though because he had that aussie “oy” sound in it! It raised my suspicion, so I asked him where he was from and he replied Australia! After talking for awhile, I discovered that he grew up very near Adelaide, the city in Australia I studied in for a semester. Sure enough, he was doing a world tour, and had been on it for almost a year. He spent time in the states and was now working in Scotland, taking weekend trips. It was fun to hear about his travels in the US and elsewhere and talk about all things Adelaide and where I had been. He ended up hanging out with me during the tour and afterwards we went around the inside and taking pictures. The best part was hearing the occasional phrases that were very Australian like “good-on-ya” or veeery Adelaide like “heaps!.” It was a refreshing conversation and always interesting to hear about somebody’s travels from around the world.

We got back on the bus and then the train and headed for our hostel in Edinburgh. Once again, we had our procession of 21 (Joanne and Deb took a taxi) marching like ants through the busy streets of the city! We were quite a site and did turn a few heads and make a few laugh. We settled in at the hostel which is pretty nice compared to some. The best part is the free internet!.. though it has been rather finicky and I think I may not be able to post this until tomorrow because of that. There are eight girls in my room and we’re sharing two toilets/showers.

After we were settled, I headed out to dinner with Sarah, Ellie, Amanda, Lindsey, Peggy, and Amber. We found this great Italian place and it was delicious! I had mozzarella-tomato salad with a stuffed pasta dish that had ricotta cheese and spinach. Then I split a toffee ice cream Sundae that was also delicious!.. keep in mind though it was a little after 8 o’clock when we ate dinner! We’re finally beginning to join the rest of the UK, as the restaurants are usually pretty empty around 6 o’clock.

Anyway, now I’m back at the hostel and heading to bed. Tomorrow we start late (Praise God!) and are just doing a bus tour around town. It should be a pretty relaxed day.

Hope you all are well! Miss you

Hugs and Kisses from Scotland,
Bethany