Huntly Arms Hotel Aboyne

... almost, my wonderful father is still covering the plane tickets but that's not me being a spoilt brat, that's me taking advantage of one of his few decent job benefits. Standby tickets for the win. *thumbs up*

But of course, why bother going to the other side of the world and just stay in one place? I have more vacation time than there is volunteering time, so I shall do an unfortunately speeded up tour of the south-east Australian ...

... a crapload of work. And I'm also trying to find one of those "job" things so I can get some extra £ for travelling purposes. So no real time for immediate fun, grrr. But I'm hoping at some point I'll be able to do a bit of mountaineering, and also planning on heading down to Glasgow and Edinburgh sometime. There's a couple other Travelpodians scattered around somewhere too, but I think it's ...

Well I have finally begun my journey!!! It seemed like it would never actually happen, but as I boarded that plane reality began to sink in....As we all know, i have no idea when Ill be home, where ill go next, what Ill see or who Ill be spending time with....which makes it so much more exciting for me. Now i have only been here for half a day and have yet to settle, but once that ...

... in a 30 ltr something backpack. The photo here is what I've settled on so far plus the camera (minus the router of course). One really important item i realized i've forgotten till today is toilet paper.Thats in the red and white plastic bag so easy for me to find in case of emergency. The string if you're wondering is in case I need to wash my own clothes so at least I have something to hang the clothes from. Also a mini french dictionary for Syria ...

... I'll be back in Tucson by 8:35 p.m. I've drawn some conclusions from my trip to Scotland. First, it's not as foreign as I expected. Once you get over the accent and the fact that they drive on the other side of the road here, it's easy to forget that you're abroad. The day-to-day life seems very similar to that in any town of a similar size in the U.S.

Even so, there are a few things I've liked about Aberdeen ...

... serious doubts about our journey's future, we stopped in at Sandy's Fish and Chips for a pretty average lunch in one of the cleanest diners I've ever seen.

The rain did not let up, so we caught a taxi back to the train station and headed back into Aberdeen. I will try this journey again, though, since the castle is supposed to be amazing, and it's right on the North Sea.

Back ...

... exciting, but, as they say, when in Rome . . .

Things picked up as the evening wore on, and I ended my night at Cheerz, Aberdeen's gay bar and club. I took in a drag queen contest over a pint of Foster's, and even joined a conga line around the block. I called it a night after they played The Proclaimers' "500 Miles," as what evening is not complete at that point?

... from bar to bar ("pub" still sounds silly to me). I have a new coffee table at home, so I declared a mission to collect as many different coasters as I can while here. Free, useful, and interesting souvenirs. I added three yesterday.

Now that I've had the chance to experience the city a bit, I've made some observations. Here they are in no particular order:

• They need to stop teaching us in school that the Scots speak English. It simply ...
  Aberdeen, Scotland, United Kingdom joneswesl

... really. Apparently there were lots more churches here than there were congregants, so different businesses have bought the church structures. What's strange is that the types of businesses that are interested in churches here range from the irreverent to the blasphemous (e.g., casinos and bars). Beyond these few details, I haven't been able to deduce much more than you could easily learn on Wikipedia. I think I'm going to enjoy my time here.

... a coffee and some strawberries before heading off again... Scottish Toast: Here's to all those that I love Here's to all those that love me. And here's to all those that love those that I love, And all those that love those that love me. (You have to think about that one!) I drink to the health of another, And the other I drink to is he - In the hope that he drinks ...