London, England to Edinburgh, Scotland: The Roundabout Route

I spent this weekend in London with my beautiful friend Millicent. I am very sad to now be sitting on the train back to Edinburgh.

The train from London to Edinburgh usually goes straight up the coast via Newcastle, but there appears to be some kind of track work happening up in the north of the country so I had to get the train through Coventry, Birmingham, Kendal, Carlisle and eventually across to Edinburgh.

It’s definitely the roundabout route, but gosh it’s beautiful. Although it takes much longer, the virtue of this train is that it runs along the edge of The Lake District.

I have never been to The Lake District, but I have seen Miss Potter, and if you’ve seen it too you’ll know that it is an absolutely gorgeous part of the world. I spent two hours trying to do university readings, and then as soon as we hit The Lake District I just spent an hour staring out the window sighing.

I couldn’t photograph it to show you, I’m sorry. I probably can't describe it well enough to do it justice; but picture, if you can, rolling hills of patchwork green, sheep roaming, rolling rivers and a perfect pink sky. That is the best I can do, if you can’t picture it you will just have to come and see it for yourselves.

I think I may have been sighing out loud, because the gentleman who had been sitting across the table from me since Euston piped up and said ‘this is the most beautiful part of the journey, is it not?’. We then had a chat about capitalism, inequality and societal problems in the UK and Europe. It was very informative. It turns out he is a John’s College (Cambridge) fellow and an economics lecturer. Needless to say, I was well out of my depth! But he was very nice and, except for the fact that his second question was ‘are you Canadian or American?’, I enjoyed our talk very much.

I love meeting people like that. You leave knowing next to nothing about each other, but having brightened each other’s days. It’s so nice.

But back to London - I was in town for only 40 hours, not nearly long enough, though I had a wonderful time. My mother expressed her concern on Friday that Milly and I might ‘just talk and talk and forget to eat and sleep and do anything else’.

She wasn’t far off the mark. We did indeed spend most of our time wandering and chit chatting. But we managed a few notable stops on our travels around London town.

We made our way down to Earl’s Court to visit the T.A.R.D.I.S and see if The Doctor was there. He wasn’t. It was very sad.

We walked along the Thames to the Tower of London to see the Poppies in the Moat installation.

The installation, actually titled Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red, completely surrounds the Tower, and was set up to commemorate the 100^th anniversary of World War I. It’s beautiful. My photos don’t capture how powerful it is.

Each of the poppies are made of hand crafted ceramic, and by the 11^th of November there will be 888,246 poppies in the moat. Eight hundred and eighty eight thousand, two hundred and forty six. That’s one poppy for each British and Colonial fatality in WWI. That’s huge.

We stopped by the Borough Market, my ultimate foodie destination! This time we traded the Ethiopian for Thai (because I’m yet to find a decent Pad Thai in Edinburgh), but we kept the milkshakes and salted caramel fudge – favourites from last time.

From there we visited a newer foodie destination, the Maltby Street Markets. Thank goodness we had full stomachs – this market was full of divine looking goodies! It’s definitely on the list for my next visit.

Then we wandered up to through the Borough of Tower Hamlets to the gherkin. I LOVE the gherkin. The other additions to the London skyline don’t compare to this guy.

 We also found a little lego gherkin nearby, which I thought was very cute. But people have started stealing the lego. This is why you can't have nice things, humans. 

The missing pieces

To spice up our walk through Whitechapel, Milly told me gruesome stories about Jack the Ripper, pointing out spots where his victims were found. She’s a fountain of knowledge, that girl!

She also pointed this out to me.

It’s a model of Geoffrey Chaucer’s house. This is where the Canterburian magic happened. Milly explained that Chaucer was a customs officer in charge of the Aldgate – which is why his house was so high - it was above the gate. So there you go, artists back in the 1300s had to have day jobs too.

So that was my brief getaway to lovely London.

Tower Bridge - it never gets old

An amazing sculpture in the entrance to the Old Operating Theatre

 Now time to put my head down and hit the books.

Ha. Like that’s going to happen!

Edinburgh, Scotland: Little Things

The past week has been a little bit flat here in Edinburgh.

Everyone hit a lull at the same time. We've been here for a month, we actually need to start doing university work, people are starting to miss the comforts of home, and the young ones are realising that university might not be as amazing as they were always promised.

It's the same no matter where you are. All students hit the university blues at approximately week four and then again right before exams.

I have been overseas for two months now, not terribly long by my standards, but I have just come through my first little period of home sickness. Now, when I say 'home sickness', I obviously don't mean it quite like many other people do. I highly doubt that anyone who knows me really thinks that I would miss Brisbane! But I do miss my people.

I also had a visitor from afar last week and it's always sad when visitors leave!

We can blame this guy for the onset of the blues - no more visitors.
(Not really. Everyone visit please!)

So I let myself be a little glum for a week along with everyone else. Then I decided this morning to take some time today to appreciate the little things here that make me very happy. 

As I've not been doing anything particularly interesting to share with you, I decided to share some pictures of things that brought me joy today in Edinburgh.

This space. I love sitting here and attempting to study. So far it hasn't proved to be a terribly productive space, but I love it all the same. 

Walking through The Meadows. When the weather is nice this huge green space fills with students with Vitamin D deficiencies. No sun this morning though!

My love for this castle is no secret. Today I walked around it and admired it from every angle. It's just wonderful, and I get to see it every day.

Walking down my favourite street and looking at all the nice things in the window of my favourite store.

These tiny, delicious Scottish strawberries I bought at the Stockbridge Market yesterday.

So tiny.

I had too much fun taking pictures of the strawberries. I know.

I only realised today that most of the leaves have fallen off the trees. I love Autumn. 

One of the things I miss most about Canberra when I am in Brisbane is Autumn. Brisbane doesn't have seasons, just periods of varying warmth. 

So it doesn't have pretty leaves like these ones. 

I spent at least 40 minutes playing in the leaves today. I would have spent longer but I'd been asked to leave three times so they could lock the park gates...

These flowers. 

This view. Which I will never be able to capture in one of my dodgy photographs. I love it.

This little alleyway, which has a tiny garden at the end. A tranquil little spot hidden away just off the Royal Mile. 

And this street art. We do love Scotland!

So those were my little things today. I hope they brought you a little bit of joy too.