Home Sweet Home

Home, home, home, home. Home. Home. Home. Home. HOME!!!!!!

I missed my house. How do you hug a house?

Feels soooooooo good to be home. To sleep in MY bed (in all its soft, fluffy, bedbugless wonderfulness). To drive MY car (who knew running errands could be such a joy?). To eat MY food (ORGANIC BROWN RICE!!! Heaping piles of GREEN vegetables. Spelt toast!). To use MY shower ( I will never complain about my shower again!).

I arrived home a week ago Thursday. Fortunately I left Edinburgh, Scotland before the terrorist incident in Glasgow on Friday. My luggage, which managed to not get lost for 20 flights over the last 6.5 months, didn't arrive in Syracuse with me from Chicago. The airline found and delivered it two days after I got home. Better at the end of my trip than at the start, I suppose.

After I left Australia, I spent 10 days in Scotland. I spent three days at the house of a friend in Edinburgh, and did a 7 day tour of the West Highlands, the Isle of Skye, and several Orkney Islands. What a beautiful country! Green and mountainous. Wide, open spaces. Lots of sheep. And cold. A warm summer day in Scotland is a warm winter day in Syracuse! The West Highlands reminded me of the Andes in Peru.

The tour I took was fabulous. We were 16 people and the guide. I was a great group. A good mix of people from Australia, Canada, Switzerland, Spain, England, and the US. We traveled over 1000 miles (1649 km) in 7 days! So the bulk of the trip was driving.

Every so often we'd stop to see a historic sight, or to go for a "wee walk". A "wee walk" usually entailed 45 minutes of walking up. "Oh stop your wingeing. This is Scotland. We have hills here," as our Scottish guide would tell us in response to our moans whenever he'd announce it was time for a "wee walk". And he'd walk UP those mountainous hills with the same ease as did those quechua people in the Andes. It felt more like a "wee uphill sprint". But once I made it to the top and caught my breath, the views were spectacular. One thing I've learn this trip is that I can safely remove "mounaineer" off my list of career possibilities.

Every so often Budgie ( the name of the tour guide: "Kids are cruel". He had a huge puffin beak like nose) would stop the car for a wee walk in what looked like the middle of nowhere. Just farmland dotted with sheep. "But there's nothing here as far as the eye can see," I'd think to myself. And off we'd go. And some 30 minutes or so later, you could start to see SOMETHING that looked promising. You'd never know this stuff was here unless someone from here told you. Sometimes he'd send us on our own: "Go straight for a while, turn left at the third sheep and go straight. When you're done, continue your way around and down I'll meet you over there with the bus. Don't stray off the path because you might sink in a peat bogg." (Sink in a peat bogg?!) And these directions actually worked!

And while in Edinburgh, I attended a kaylie (I don't know how to spell the word). It's tradional dancing with live music. Gotta love a dance where men where skirts and you can dance wearing hiking boots. Half the people didn't know the dances. it was a blast!

Scotland was great fun.

And now I'm home. Can't believe the adventure has come to an end. I had a grand time. I'm so glad I did this. And, FYI, I met MANY people on the road who had quit their jobs and decided to volunteer and/or travel for a while. I was in good company.

I will find a website to post some of my photos over the last year. When I'm done I'll post the link here in case any of you are interested in seeing the photos.

cheers,
Stacey