Scotland and Ireland

During March Break 2013, I travelled to Scotland and Northern Ireland with some SF students. It all started out well...we made it to Ottawa in plenty of time to catch our plane to Toronto, but that's when things started to go badly.

When we got to Toronto, we were to collect our luggage and then transfer to a flight to the US. From there we would connect to Dublin. The airport had recently updated their systems in the US area, and it backfired on us. We waited for luggage that never came, tried to get through customs, with no success, and were eventually forced to face the fact that we were stuck in Toronto (we did see Mike Holmes in customs though). And to make matters worse, because of a storm on the east coast earlier in the week, and it being March Break, there was no way to get us out until 2 days later. The kids and I were pretty upset, but I was determined to make the most of it. We were booked on a flight to Belfast, and were to spend some time in Toronto and New Jersey.

Since we would be stuck in Toronto the next day, I decided that we should go downtown. We got on the subway and made our way to the CN Tower.

After the CN Tower, we went to the Eaton Centre. The kids shopped while I read. We all had a great time. The next morning we flew to Newark where we were to have a 9 hour layover. The company we were travelling with arranged a personal sightseeing tour of New York City! Everyone was so excited. We toured around for 3 hours and saw all of the sites.

New York City

 Finally, we were on out way to the UK. Because of our delay, we had only one day in Ireland, but we made the most of it. We saw the sights, bought our souvenirs, and had a great time. While in Belfast we toured both the Protestant and Catholic areas. Even though it is now pretty peaceful, tensions are still high.



The murals in Belfast

 We also got to go to the Titanic Museum, on the spot where the great ship was built. It was very cool.

After one day in Ireland we were on our way by ferry to Scotland. This was to be the highlight of our trip.

One of the first sights we saw on our trip from the ferry to Edinburgh was this giant rock sticking out of the ocean. Turns out it is the place where they get rock to make curling stones.



While were were in Scotland, we visited two castles. The first was Edinburgh. It was very cool, but my favourite part of this city tour was going on a witchery (haunted) walk that evening. I learned a lot, and it was very entertaining.

Edinburgh Castle

The place where JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter.

On the way to Stirling we travelled through Glasgow where we had an impromptu visit to the cathedral and the Glasgow Necropolis. We stayed in a hotel just outside of Stirling. I walked down the street one night and I could see the castle sitting on a hill. Stirling was also the place where the boys stocked up on Irn Bru, a delicious Scottish pop.

Glasgow Cathedral

 

Stirling Castle

One other place we visited was the town where Robbie Burns lived. We toured his home, and went through the museum, but the most exciting part for me was seeing this monkey tree. They are my favourite kind of tree.


Monkey Tree

Overall, I'm very glad we got to go on this trip, and I can't wait to go back to Scotland again!