Scotland – summer as the locals said

I am back! Better and stronger. Long story, but my previous blog had been shut down, but I never give up and as promised: here I am. Okay, okay not better at the moment, but please give me time and it will be the best I ever launched.

It’s been a long long time since I had my last post, if I am correct it was back in October of Athens. Since that I haven’t been abroad. Crazy, no? I was a bit depressed about this fact, but no worries I solved this, and have couple of holidays already booked.

There is a reason why I am writing now is that I just came back from my holiday. It was quite random, but finally I went to Scotland, which became the 20^th country which I have been visited.

Let’s start from the beginning. As I mentioned it was a random trip, and I didn’t have time to plan. Literally I booked the flight the accommodation and rented a car for 2 days and caught the flight. As soon as I landed I saw a post of one of my friend, that she is in the same town. I texted her, so instead of travelling alone for 4.5 days I had a travel buddy for 3 days. What a coincidence.

The flight landed around 6pm at Aberdeen airport. To go to the centre is quite easy, there is a shuffle bus (727 – ticket is £3.40) in every 20-30 mins -double decker of course- and it takes another 20-25 mins to get in the city.

First evening I just went a quick wondering in the town and get some breakfast for next day. It was so weird for me that the sun was up even at 10pm. And also, that is comes up at 4:15 in the morning… But I am not complaining, I am happy that I saw the sun in Scotland. All the locals said, I was very lucky as they only had this kind of weather for 2 weeks in a year. That nice weather means 16 °C and sunny. I won’t lie I was freezing a bit, but I feel cold literally everywhere… Ah Malta what did you do with me? 🙂

On the second day I organised the meeting with my friend, she knows the city quite well, so she showed me around. Where else could we start than in a Scottish pub and had a light pub crawl by the end. It was very strange to see, they have pubs in churches. I mean from outside it looks like a lovely typical Scottish church, but when you walk by you see the opening hours and the menu and realise that it’s a pub inside. But of course, I went in one, that is a must I think.

What I can recommend is book an accommodation in the city center, and you can reach everything by walk easily and also the bus service seemed to be okay. A daily ticket is 4 pound, however I only used the airport shuttle bus. We walked to the seafront, but not because we want to tan or swim… That’s not the right place to do things like that. Maybe surfing but it wasn’t windy enough. There is a rumor that the biggest population of dolphins live next to Aberdeen. Shall I say, that I haven’t seen any?! Also, there are seals, but we went there 3 times, and there were no seals… I only see a picture on a board. It could be fake. 😀

Anyway, if you visit Scotland don’t forget to try the local drinks – I only drunk the local beers, which were really nice, especially the Brewdog – Elvis Juice. If you like reddish beer you will love this. You can buy it in a bottle or visit the Brewdog pub (did twice) to get a draft one.

3^rd day I still had my travel buddy with me, and I got a recommendation from another friend -who lived in Aberdeen for a year, small world yeah?! – to visit Seaton park and one of the oldest bridge in Scotland.

We caught a taxi this time to go there, as we walked at least 10 km the other day, and the park is quite big, and we walked to the seafront again – to check the seals…

The taxi was £8.00 but the guy told us some history and gave us some instruction where to go. I had to listen very carefully, this Scottish accent is still hard to understand. We stopped at Old-Aberdeen where is the university. It feels like you ended up in a Harry Potter movie.

The park is really beautiful, so much green everywhere. After Malta it was something different. We had again a lovely weather with sun and 16 °C.

For Saturday and Sunday, I rented a car, so Saturday morning I caught the bus to the airport, jumped in the car and started my castle tour. This day my unexpected travel buddy had other plans, so I went alone. I planned to go down to Edinburgh, but half way I changed my mind as it seemed to be so far, and my body had a daily routine so instead of sleeping till the alarm I was awake by 7am CEST every morning… Lovely 😀

So after a reschedule of my journey, I only went to Dundee which was around 62 miles on the high way. As I said I wasn’t really planned, so didn’t really know what to visit, where to go, but I marked some castles the night before. Luckily most of the “visitors attractions” have a brown sign, so you can’t miss them. As the first stop I visited Glamis castle, which is the most hunted castle in Scotland. The Queen’s grandmother lived in that castle before. No need to mention it is a private property -as most of them- so lesson learned, next time I will bring my CV and put it in every castle postbox. Who know, they might looking for a wife 😀

The castle was beautiful, and this was the only one I paid for a tour. It was £12.50 but worth it. However, after the 2^nd ghost story I was not sure I would like to hear the other…

When I arrived to Dundee I was heading to the city centre. You can’t go wrong with that. I find myself next to a Museum and the Discovery ship which was designed for Antarctic research. Also, I noticed there is 2 never ending bridge heading to the other side.

On the way back, I wanted to go all along to the coast, so I checked the road number and left Dundee. I found myself on the bridge, where halfway I realised I shouldn’t come this way… I am not joking that bridge was a nightmare, especially when you are afraid on bridges. I nearly cried that I have to come back on the same way. I stopped at a view point, I noted again how long it is, took a deep breath and went back on the bridge.

The coast road was lovely and also the sun came out. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, this day I woke up and it was cloudy.

As I wrote earlier, it’s quite easy to find the interesting places, as all has a brown sing next to the road. I really wanted to see the typical Scottish coast, so I checked on the map which city is the closest to the coast, and also noticed a sign with “cliffs”. The city called Arbroath has a lovely coast, where you can walk miles on the coast and cliffs.

From here I headed to Dunnotar castle in Stonehaven. It closes around 5, and it says there is hundreds of steps to reach the gate -which could take 1,5-2hours to somebody, okay I guess for some elderly people – so I decided not to go down and back up and, then coming back down and back up with my badly knee. But the view was amazing from upstairs as well. You can wonder around from both side and walk again a lot on the coast.

I arrived back to Aberdeen around 6pm, I dropped the car down next to my accommodation and went in town to have dinner. I am a bit crazy person, so where else I went, than Prezzo. For the record I was working in that restaurant chain for 4 months. 😀 Not much changed in the food, luckily, but it was nice to nostalgia a bit.

In the evening my travel buddy contacted me again, what is the plan for my last day as she would like to join. What else was the plan, then castle tour No. 2.

We jumped in the car on Sunday morning and headed inland. I was chasing the hairy cutie cows 4 days now, and finally we passed a field where we saw a lot. Of course, we turned and stopped for some pics. It was a good idea, as after we haven’t seen any more.

As the first stop we went to Drum Castle which has a really nice and huge garden. The rain started to fall, but it was very light so didn’t ruin our journey.  There is a tower where you can go up on a caracole. I felt like I am in Eger in the minaret, where I promised never go up again. – If you visit Hungary, don’t missed that. With my claustrophobia and agoraphobia, I went there already 4 times. The view is lovely, but the way there and that “terrace” is scary.

Back to Scotland. So yeah you can go up in the tower, where you can see the garden and the surroundings. You can also go down, but there is a well there, but after visiting the most hunted castle, I had the feeling better not visit the basement of any castle.

A tip for this castle: go there when the roses are blossom as a part of the garden is full of roses

From here we headed a bit north and visited Castle Fraser. No point to say, but it has a huge garden as well, and we saw some rabbits. They are cute, and there is a sign if you go to the closed garden: please shut the gate to keep the rabbits out.

On the way back, we gave another chance to see the seals, but of course we were not lucky again. I think you either need to go in the morning or in the evening around sunset. I couldn’t manage this, as the sunset was too late, and I was sleeping by that time.

Unfortunately, I had to leave to the airport to drop the car down and catch my flight. I shouldn’t be in hurry as it was delayed 3,5 hours… And we had to wait this on the plane.

However, my flight back wasn’t smooth, it couldn’t ruin my trip. I have to say I love Scotland, the landscape is amazing, I love all the castles and the coast is beautiful as well. Well, the weather helped a lot to have this amazing experience.

I don’t have time to rest, as on Saturday I am going to Rome. Will be back soon with another post.