Scotland

Oh, I forgot to tell you that almost everyone tried haggis, neeps and tatties. We all decided that it tasted like spicy meatoaf but the texture was very strange.

After dinner that night we went on haunted tour of the graveyard, Grey Friar's Kirk. The tour was a little spooky but luckily, we did not see Mackenzie's ghost. We learned some of the history from the area and we heard a lot of really neat stories. Our guide told us that JK Rowling would frequently walk through the grave yard and it is thought that she based some of her characters from the names on some of the tombstones and Hogwarts on the nearby George Heriot's School. The girls were so intriged by these stories that we had to go back the next day in the daylight to find some of the things that he had told us about. We had a great time exploring the cemetery, who knew? We found Thomas Riddell's (Tom Riddle or Voltamort) headstone and took pictures of the school. 90 pictures on everyones cameras and 2 hours later, we decided to go sightseeing
to some other places.

We toured the National Galleries of Scotland, the National Museum of Scotland and then came back to our apartments and made spaghetti for everyone. We decided to watch a movie while a few people went down to the waterfront.

Today we went on a tour of Mary King's Close. It is and old part of Edinburgh and has been buried by other buildings that were built on top if it. A close is a tiny street and is called a close because the walls of the building are so close together. Most of them have been buried and destroyed by the buildings on top of them but Mary King's close is like an old underground city that thousands of people lived in from the 1600 - 1800's. After the tour we headed up Edinburgh Castle and did a little shopping along the way. The Castle is huge and built on the top of a rocky mountain.

Katelyn meet an new friend on our way back from the castle.

After lunch the girls and Chris climbed to the top of the Scott monument and then we walked through the Princes Street Gardens to get a better view of the Castle.

We have really had a great time in Scotland. We leave tomorrow morning to fly back to Engalnd for the night and then we will be off to Germany. We probably will not have internet service until we get to Germany so will let you know what we are up to as soon as we can.