The Grant Arms Hotel Aberdeenshire

... Edinburgh soon though..

Anyway, day trip to Ellon, which is just half an hour out of town. Yay! Friend from uni lives here so went round, watched movies etc etc. Nothing too interesting, but it was nice to be away from the dorm for a bit! Leaving for holidays in a few weeks so things will finally get just a little more interesting. Until then, back to the books I go..

Okay, random and exceptionally early entry, but here we go -

So university decided to give me three nice holidays to work with, Christmas, Spring and Summer. Christmas is Barbados, Summer is the Eurotrip, but what to do with the Spring Break?

After looking at several options like much cheaper getaways to Europe, I decided I wanted to actually do something with this vacation, something that could help people. Heading down to ...

A month in and no activity? What's going on, Sarah?

WELL.

Moved in OK, Freshers week was a blast, but I just haven't quite gotten to the exploring part yet. Made a trip down to the beach, a few around town.. And it's actually quite nice here. It's cold yes, but it's a fairly quiet city. Not too big but not too isolated.

However uni [the evil *******s] have decided to give ...

... all taken care of the adventuring will begin. I'm starting to think Ill hop over to Dublin for a day or two before I start traveling south because I am dying to taste their Guinness! Ill write as soon as I know, but I think Ill be lounging around Scotland for two weeks while I get my ducks in a line. Obviously there isn't much to log yet but i promise it will get interesting soon!!!!

Tomorrow I'm catching the a 2pm flight out to Heathrow, a couple of hours of transit and off to Istanbul...arriving just after 11pm. There's no public transport other than taxis and its probably gonna be expensive to Sultanahmet where I'm staying. But the flight's cheap so can't complain really. 

For the past few days I've been packing and repacking, readjusting my inventory each time, trying to strike a balance between travelling light and having the ...

... 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 ...

I rose around 9:00 and went for a run down Union Street (the main drag). People looked at me like I was nuts. Apparently exercise isn't an Aberdonian specialty, particularly at 9 a.m. Afterward, I found a small out-of-the-way sandwich shop where I bought a roast beef and bacon sandwich with spicy English mustard. I enjoyed the sandwich on a bench facing Soul Casino— ...

A warning up front: this is not an adventure blog. If you're looking for crazy black-market money exchanges or spelunking, stop reading now and visit Sarah's and Vanessa's reports from Venezuela and Colombia. I think I can offer (slightly) more pictures than they can, however.

Yesterday I visited the St. Nicholas Kirkyard here in Aberdeen. It's a beautiful place, saturated in green, and dense with headstones and table stones. The classic, mystical ...

... The greens were white. All the ice made it incredibly hard to putt. The ball just bounced wherever it wanted.

It was the worst conditions, I have ever played in. Not too mention, the course doesn't allow you to wear jeans. But in the end, a day of golf - much better than a day of work.