TARDIS

I have not forgotten to finish my trip posts.  My family has been very sick this last week, and now mom has it.  So while you wait, here's a little something for my fellow Doctor Who fans.  This was a huge highlight of Glasgow for me. 

Glasgow: Part One

 One of the big things I wanted to do while in Scotland was have Fish and Chips.  So dinner the first night was at this Fish and Chip shop. 

You can't see it in the above picture, but there was actually a surprising variety of things offered here.  I am not sure what I expected though, maybe I was expecting it to be just simple Fish and Chips on the menu.  

 

In the end, simple Fish and Chips is what I got, because it was what I was after.  I don't even remember what else was on the menu.  I also had Irn Bru (pronounced "iron brew") to drink.  It is something that is inherently Scottish and so I had to try it.  I didn't care for it and so it was also the last Irn Bru I had to drink. 

This was not, however, the last fish and chips I had to eat.  It left me wanting as the fish was just warm and the breading soggy.  However, the chips (fries to Americans) were delicious!

In my research before the trip, I came across several references to a "Full Scottish Breakfast".  This is the closest I got in Glasgow.  Breakfast at the hotel was served buffet style.  The black sausage was surprisingly good, although I don't think my mom could bring herself to try it.  I also discovered that I love tomatoes and mushrooms for breakfast the way they cook them over there.  The ham looking meat on top is bacon.  It's very different than American Bacon, but similar to what we call Canadian Bacon.  Still, the flavors are a bit different even from that.  The sausage underneath I don't remember the name of.  It was good and I would probably eat it again if it was on a breakfast buffet like this, but I don't think I would go out of my way for it.  All in all, breakfast was good and filling and carried us a long way through our day.

 Here we are on our walk to Glasgow Cathedral (which deserves a post all it's own).  According to Google Maps, it's only a 15 minute walk from our hotel.  I'm pretty certain it took us much longer than that.  I'm not sure if Google Maps is off by that much, or if we walked that slow.  It's probably a combination of the two.  We also stopped a few times along the way.

 I'm sure we've all heard the phrase "Dr. Livingstone, I presume".  What I didn't know was that Dr. Livingstone was a Scot.  This statue is one of many of him that exist in Scotland.

 This is just a pigeon I liked.  Every time I saw a pigeon on our trip, I would think of my kids singing the words to Mo Willems' book "Don't Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus".

I cannot remember what this building was!  And right now I don't have time to go look it up.  But it was huge!  And beautiful. 

Here's a close up of the statue on the building.  I'm not sure who it is.  I really need to find time to look this all up, because I'm sure it's fascinating. 

I promise when I do get a minute to look it up, I will post about it. 

In the distance here you can see a picture of the Glasgow Necropolis.  Such a beautiful place, and I promise you there are more picture to come of this.

I must sign off for now.  Enjoy.

Airplane Food ~or~ Getting To Scotland

Back in June I was lucky enough to be my mother's traveling companion on her dream trip to Scotland.  I can still hardly believe I got go!  Not only was it amazing to see Scotland (and a bit of Ireland), but I have memories of a time with my mom that I will cherish for the rest of my life. 

That being said, I know that one post would never be enough to share how awesome our trip was.  So I thought I'd revive things here with a series of posts and pictures.  And who knows, maybe a few other things in between. 

 We flew out of Chicago.  In the above picture you can see just how close the airport is to the main road, and where the trains come in between the airport and main road.  I'm trying to remember if that is a highway over pass on the right or if it was a runway that went over the highway. 

We got to the airport with plenty of time to spare and so had a few hours to kill.  I am actually surprised that I have so few pictures of it as I took well over 2,000 pictures of the trip.  I guess I didn't find O'Hare all that interesting after all. 

 Now we get to the part about the airplane food.  We flew on an Irish airline, Aer Lingus.  While there were things about the flight I did not enjoy (it was a very loud and busy overnight flight), the food was actually rather delicious and the attendants were so polite.  I mean it, if you've heard any stories about how nice the Irish are when you visit their country, you still don't understand.  They were that nice. 

But back to the food.  First off I was rather surprised at how much there was.  I've only ever been on one other long flight (two really since it was round trip) that included meals and this was a much larger meal than we got then.  We had Shepard's Pie with Salad, a roll, butter, a brownie and crackers.  Water and our choice of hot tea or coffee to drink.  I think the little container with the orange top in the bottom corner is the salad dressing, but I can't quite make out what it says. 

It wasn't the best meal I had on the trip, but it was surprisingly good.  It didn't leave me wishing for a better meal or wishing for a larger meal.  All in all it was a good way to start the trip if you ask me.

We had a short layover in Dublin, Ireland.  It was a smaller airport than I expected.  I'm not sure what I expected.  Maybe I just still had the size of O'Hare stuck in my head.  Overall though, Dublin is a bit of a blur.  I was pretty exhausted by this point as I had not gotten any sleep to speak of on the flight across the Atlantic.  

From the air I understood why they call Ireland "The Emerald Isle".  This was one of the last things I saw before we touched down in Scotland.  Did I mention how tired I was?  It was only an hour flight from Dublin to Glasgow, but I slept the whole way.  

And then we were there.  We had a hired car take us to our hotel where we really did think about sleeping for a while.  In the end, we just couldn't do it.  We had to go out and see a bit of the city.  I don't remember what this picture is of, but I do know it's not far from our hotel.  Glasgow is a large city and more industrial than tourist.  We still saw some beautiful sights there. 

Stay tuned for part 2...........