August 9, 2009

Hello from Scotland! It seems a little surreal writing that greeting after waiting and talking about this for SOOO long - years in fact! Don't take this personally, but I'm really happy not to be seeing the vast majority of our family and friends for a whole year! We won't forget you though (especially with Emma and Sophie talking on Skype with their friends everyday so far), and hope that anyone interested will be able to follow our Grand Adventure as I update this blog on a regular basis.

Briefly, here is what we have done so far (followed of course by a few photos). Firstly, it was strange to leave Canada on Thursday at 6 pm, and arrive at about 6 pm on Friday! Fortunately, although the clocks seem to indicate 24 hours, it was actually much shorter than that as this included the 8 hours time adjustment on top of the flights and layover time in London. You'll see how excited everyone was at the start of the journey, and how the waiting and flights gradually zapped our energy. Overall, the journey was great though, and Calum Thomas (my Scottish replacement in Canada) had arranged for his brother Duncan to pick us up at the airport. Duncan actually had to make 2 fully loaded trips (his car, not him) in his station wagon in order to get all five 0f us, our 10 large suitcases, 5 carry-ons and 1 guitar to our new home. What a great guy! You'll see a photo (below) of our new home - awesome, with a big, beautiful backyard leading down to the river.

The next day, after sleeping in to 1 pm (the kids and Kim only, as I got up at 7:30 to go for a nice jog along the Waters of Leith) we spent the rest of the day figuring out the online transit system (not easy), catching the bus into Edinburgh city centre, and going shopping for some groceries and soap. Coming home, we went for a beautiful evening walk finding the local schools and churches.

Of course, we again slept in, and got another late start to our Sunday morning - but we finished the day spectacularly as we went for the afternoon to the huge Edinburgh castle. I really enjoyed watching the Emma, Sophia, and Isaiah have a blast at the "real castle" (as Isaiah calls it). Although we spent 2 hours visiting it, we still have quite a bit of it to see (the kids are REALLY camera-happy), as we seemed to strangely encounter this funny little kilt-clad man ALL over the castle. We'd leave one part of the castle (leaving him behind), only to enter another room, and run into him already there! I think that he might have been a Leprechaun on holiday, disguised as a Scotsman. I had to take a picture of him with the kids just to make sure that he was a real person and didn't vanish as the camera went off. We will definitely go back as we purchased a year-long family pass to all of the Historic Scotland sites. This year-long pass actually only cost 30 pounds more that the tickets for the 1 day visit to the castle would have! We are quite happy about this. Anyways, it was a great day today! I'll attach some photos for your enjoyment below!

Cheers,

Jimy MacJohnson

Ready for take-off!

... (12 hours later)... Going, going...

Gone!

Are our kids huge, or are these officers small?

Our Scottish home

Or maybe it was this one...

3-2-1... Fire!

The strange little man...

Hmmm... Sophie?

The guard left, so I thought that I'd help!