London-Edinburgh-York

I'm taking advantage of the free wifi on the national express service from Edinburgh to York. Apparently sunday is the day for rail repairs so our journey has been doubled in time because we took a bus from Edinburgh to Newcastle and are now on the train to York. It's a beautiful day, this whole week has been lovely with sun, blue skies, and gorgeous colors. I'm very ready to get to school though, unpack and really get this show on the road. I'll briefly recap the last couple days though, because I have about an hour left on the train.

My last night in London (thursday) took a totally unexpected turn when I decided to go to the Royal Court Theatre to see Nor or Later, a new play about election night in the US. It was totally not what i was expecting and focused on the presidential hopeful's son and his effect on the campaign. While waiting to get a ticket I headed down to the bar where I was pleasantly surprised to see a familiar face, no no not a person, a bottle of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. I didn't get one, but it was no more expensive than the other beers for sale. It was around £3.20 which equates to abot $6.50, it's funny because that's what we pay for a 6 pack back home! Anyways I met some people before the show, one happened to be a retired Sussex professor who had taught at UCSC for a year quite a while ago. I also met two business men from D.C. who were in London on business. We got to talking and they invited me to join them for dinner after the play. We went to this nice restaurant and had some really great conversation. One of the guys was an Irishmen and so that was quite fun talking to him. I ended up staying out quite late but it was totally worth it.

I didn't have the best train ride to Edinburgh the next day though, it felt about twice as long as it was (4.5 hours really) and i just barely made it to the hotel in Edinburgh at the time we were supposed to meet. There are three other girls going to York, all of which are from UCSD. I roomed with Mimosa (i'm giving Heather a run for her money with roommate names!) who i'm on the train with now.

Yesterday was really busy, we started out the morning with actual academic orientationess for a couple of hours at our study center at Edinburgh Uni. We had lunch at one of the famous pubs of Edinburgh, Deacon Brodie's and then went to Edinburgh Castle. Didn't spend a lot of time there but it was really cool and i probably would have seen more with different company. I had a wee little spill down some steps to the Prisoner of War exhibition and have a right nasty injury on my left forearm and a painfull bruise on my left buttock. Luckily i'm fine now and and was still able to climb the mountain.

Mountain you might be asking yourselves, in Edinburgh? Why yes, but to be completely acurate it's actually an extinct Volcano. Arthur's seat is about 850 feet above the city and has great views to the estuary and the land across. It took about an hour to go up and down. It was very windy at the top and i felt like i might get blown off, i'm not a little girl so that is very strong wind ;)



Anyways i think that is enough for now. I'm going to enjoy the beautiful scenery of Northumberland and Yorkshire in the lovely autumn light.

Cheers!