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My dear readers, I know I haven't updated the site for a week but my man was here, hooray!!
Of course, I will tell you all about what we did and from our visit in Brighton, but first, I need to finish my story about Edinburgh. My second full day at Edinburgh started quite better. I had slept decently and took a shower. Fresh and eager, I decided to do the Mac hop-on/hop-off tour, the final of the four on my list. The tour was pretty similar to one before, but I enjoyed seeing the city. After the tour, I considered going to the Edinburgh dungeon, but, because I am a fraidy-cat, decided against it (at least until my man comes with me to Edinburgh, then we can go together). As I hadn’t seen Edinburgh, I planned a 3-day-trip there. I booked the coach there (nine hours!) because it was much cheaper than the train or plane. My trip to Edinburgh started very, very (very, very, very, very) early. I got up at 5:30 and host’s friend fetched me an hour later. We were very early for the train to Waterloo and she, wonderful person that she is, waited with me at Surbiton station. I boarded the train to Waterloo and got out at Clapham Junction to get a service to Victoria. On the train, I met a Jamaican/English guy called Ricki (I altered his name slightly) and we started talking about Edinburgh as he had only been there a week ago or so. When I wanted to change the train, I was informed that all train services to Victoria had been cancelled, great. Before I could hyperventilate, Ricki, offered to guide me there, as he had to go there, too. So, with my personal guide, I finally arrived at Victoria. Ricki then brought me to the Victoria Coach Station, which was totally overcrowded with people, eager to get on the buses. Now, on a coach ride there is always one poor person who has to sit next to a smelly, obese chap who uses more than space than you can afford (I happened to be that person). Don’t get me wrong, this guy was very nice but on a nine-hour bus ride, you don’t necessarily want a 200 kg man next to you, especially when you’re squeezed into your seat anyway. So me and him had a little thigh fight which he easily won (by sitting down), and I had to accept my fate. Still, the ride was fantastic. We went right through the country and the route was very scenic. Especially for someone who grew up in a country like Austria, Tirol, it’s unbelievable to have endless landscapes on either sides of the bus expanding with hardly any houses but cattle, sheep, Shire horses, acres of land and forests – it was awesome. I was looking out of the window for more than nine hours (I will never be able to look to the left side again) and never got tired of watching the land passing by. Well, once I fell asleep and woke up because I was drooling – very embarrassing if a really fat, smelly person sits next to you and still you’re the one with the ew-factor. I don’t know whether there’s something wrong with me or whether things like these happen to everyone, but when I am on a journey, I commit at least one fauxpas. This time it was the public drooling and the toilet incident. As travel coaches usually do, this one had a toilet and when we took a break, I decided to use it. However, as the engine was not one, the flush didn’t work and all my, well, excrement, was staying right where it was, so I blew my nose audibly to make everyone outside believe I’d only used the bathroom for that and came out with a visibly red nose and sniffed for another ten minutes to make my story credible. When night was starting to set in, we finally arrived in Edinburgh and I was immediately amazed by this fantastic and ancient city – it’s gracious; however, my introduction to it wasn’t. Sweaty and hungry, I panted through Waverley station (instead of simply crossing Waverly Bridge) and had my first Edinburghian fauxpas. When I was riding down the escalator, with a loud helter-skelter, my trolley fell down the escalator and left me stumbling after it. Everyone was staring, no one was helping. So, when my trolley landed at the floor with a loud crescendo, I had the whole station stare at me and throwing me glances (douchebag). Still, I managed to find the hostel (in fact, I passed it a couple of times without recognising it before I finally realised that this was it). The hostel, St. Christopher’s Inn, was great. It’s very young and hip and friendly. The people were so terribly nice and the room was great (well, it had a bed in it) and there was a lovely pub adjacent to it in which I had a good drink and wrote these very lines while two nice guys were playing live music next to me. Good start, let’s see what’s going to happen tomorrow. |
AuthorIn September 2015 I started a new chapter of my life by moving (temporarily or permanently, not yet decided) to England where I work and socialise now. Archives
December 2017
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