Europe Adventure Day 5: Highland Games

This was probably my favorite day. We got up and on the bus by 9am and all we knew about it was 'Highland Games'. We thought we'd be watching the Highland Games. On the bus ride over, we found out we'd actually be participating in a group version of the Games. I got a little aprehensive because I didn't wear or even bring any clothes to get dirty in.

When we arrived there were a couple of guys playing the bagpipes. I recorded a very long part of the walk on the video camera because the scenery was just so gorgeous.

 They had a snack/beverage tent set up- Bean enjoyed some IRN BRU, a Scottish soda that he remembers one of his friends having when he was a kid. The girls working were really excited that he was going to have some.

 They broke us into 4 clans: we were McDonald. Then they broke us into teams of about 12 people each. Half of our team didn't show up, so there were only 6 of us.

 The first game was the Haggis Malt Challenge. You take a piece of 'haggis' (a wooden block) and throw it as close to the bottle of whisky (wooden bottle) as you can and you get points based off how close you get. I have videos of both of us doing each challenge. Bean actually did really well on that one and got a prize- a small bottle of Whisky!

In the second game, there was a short log tied to a rope, and you stand with your back to the high railing and fling the log backwards over your head and make it clear the pole.

The third game was flinging wellie boots into tires.

Then there was a dance competition. They taught us a dance and we had to perform it in front of the other teams. Only us girls competed, but that made us lose points because they gave points just for participating. It was nice because we got to take pictures with the dance instructors and bagpipe players.

 The last game was the Caber Toss- the famous throwing of the log. The goal is to get the log straight/parallel to where you stand, but it has to make 1 1/2 rotations. These logs were obviously much smaller than the real ones. The video camera ran out of batteries right before Bean started to throw so I took a few pictures:

Then I remembered that I can record videos on the regular camera, so Bean recorded me throwing the log. Notice Matt, our cute helper in a kilt.

After the games, we walked to lunch. I can't get over the scenery!

 There were chickens running around, and we had a roasted pig.

 We ate lunch with the younger of the couples on our team. We all had a really good time hanging out and playing games. It was a great team building type activity. Lunch was really great. It seemed like the food got better and better at the company sponsored events as the trip went on.

 We got back on the bus and went back to the hotel for a little nap.

 Then explored Edinburgh on our own. We ate at Deacon Brodie's, he was the inspiration for Jekyll & Hyde. The carpet was plaid- they really love plaid in Scotland.

 Across the street was the John Knox house- he actually lived there. We didn't take a tour but supposedly it's one of the oldest houses in Edinburgh.

 I had bangers and mash, it was average but the onion rings were great! So was the mash.

 And Bean really loved his haggis. It didn't taste bad, but the texture was not good so I wasn't a fan. It came with tatties and neeps, I think one of those is mashed parsnips, which I liked.

 After dinner, we went to a 'ghost' tour, which really turned out to be a history lesson about the way people lived a really long time ago. It was at Mary King's close- a close is a really narrow street and it used to be what people walked down to get between the houses. We were underground in some of the old homes that they eventually just built on top of. It was pretty interesting except they had mannequins in some of the houses and that made it cheesy. But it was really interesting because they told stories of different families, and at the end we walked up the original close and she showed us the windows of the houses we'd been in before. We stayed at the back of the group and I snuck this picture looking down:

 And another self taken picture. This was the only time it rained the entire trip, so of course we didn't have an umbrella. We planned to check out a pub or two that night, so we decided to walk back to a place we saw called Candy kinda close to our hotel, but not close enough.

 Pretty buildings at night:

 So by the time we got to Candy (which I thought was a dessert place, but was just a bar with girly drinks), my hair was completely soaked and I looked like a wet dog. There was nobody in there, until a group of girls came in for a birthday party. They were all wearing very tight short tank dresses and very very high heels. One girl had on shorts that looked like mom jeans in the front and her butt cheeks were literally hanging out the back.

Then we had an encounter with Whitey. She was wearing a tight- white- dress, just as short as the other ones with long sleeves. But you could clearly see the outline of her thong, which was too tight, so it created unnecessary bulges. Then when she turned around, you could see the outline of her belly button- the first sign that a piece of clothing is too tight. Poor girl- I blame her friends for not suggesting she wear something else, at least in a darker color.

On the way home, we took pictures with a few of the art animals around the city.

And ended the night with a self taken picture with the monkey right outside the hotel. By the time we got back, technically it was my birthday!