Leaping Around London - Day #2

Our first full day in London was a Sunday and we were ready to rock.  After getting much needed coffee (we were both running on only a few hours of sleep with the crazy street noise and Erin was contending with jet lag) we hit the streets.  While most of our destinations were between a fifteen and thirty minute walk from our flat, we rarely took cabs, and probably logged a good six to nine miles per day.  This was exhausting, but it’s a great way to really get to know the city and explore.  Plus, it helped us walk off the martinis and oh so delicious meals we had at night.  ;)  Along our route to our first destination, we stopped for a few obligatory tourist shots.  Red phone booth and what not.  We came across an entire giant sized living room set made of turf.  Of course we had to climb up and grab some photos!  We also saw The Savoy, a world famous hotel in London.  You may know it as the setting of the press conference in Notting Hill where Anna Scott and Will Thacker reunite!  Sigh...  ;)

After our silly photo shoots, our first stop was the Tate Modern Museum.  The Tate is the most visited modern art gallery in the world.  It’s hard for me to give an opinion on this museum, because art is such a completely subjective and personal thing.  What appeals to one person, may not appeal to another.  For me, the Tate was not that interesting, but that is simply because I am not a huge fan of modern art.  There were a few pieces that I found captivating, but I definitely did not need to spend hours upon hours in this gallery.  Luckily, Erin and I are on the same page when it comes to museums.  Neither of us need to stare at a piece for ions, so we did about an hour and forty-five minute tour through the gallery and were completely satisfied.  If you are a fan of modern art, then I would definitely say the Tate is worth a visit.  Even if you are not a fan, or if you are unsure, I still think it’s worth a quick spin. I’m glad I went, but I don’t feel the need to go back.  

After a long walk to the museum, a few photo ops along the way, and our tour through the Tate, we regrouped with a snack and a second coffee.  We needed a bit of energy for the rest of the day.  Now, I promise I am not going to tell you about every single meal we ate, but this meal was so surprisingly delicious that I want to tell you about it!  We shared a sweet potato, spinach and poached egg hash and it was SO delicious!  It was a combination that I would have never thought to put together, but it was SO good!  I will definitely try to recreate this at some point!  

Next we took a nice long walk to see Shakespeare’s Globe theater.  We only saw the outside and I think next time I’d really like to take the tour to see the inside and learn more of the history.  Here’s what I do know.  Shakespeare’s Globe is actually a reconstruction of The Globe theater, an Elizabethan playhouse built in 1599 by Shakespeare’s company, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men.  The original theater was destroyed by a fire in 1613.  A second Globe Theater was built on the same site by June of 1614 and then closed in 1642.  The modern reconstruction of the Globe that we saw, “Shakespeare’s Globe,” opened in 1997 approximately 750 feet from the site of the original theater.  There are many other interesting facts about the reconstructed theater and how it was built to meet the criteria of the original 16th century  theater.  They still stage plays at the Globe every summer.  I hope someday I can attend a play there!

After seeing the Globe, we walked almost a mile along the River Themes (oh so muddy looking), and crossed the Tower Bridge to the visit the Tower of London.  I loved this visit.  The Tower of London is a historic castle located on the North Bank of the River Themes in Central London.  This is where the crown jewels are held and it is also an extraordinarily historic part of London.  Again, when I go next time, I will sign up for a tour or at least rent an audio tour so that I can learn more historical facts.  I have found that I am most captivated when something can come alive through historical relevance and story telling.  I love to hear facts and stories told by guides who are experts on the site.  Otherwise, I sometimes feel like I’m just looking at a pile of stones that don’t mean much!  Ha!  If you are not the kind of person who likes tours or audio guides, then I recommend bringing along a Rick Steve’s book.  His books are filled with interesting facts and tidbits about the various sites of a city.  He provides so much excellent insight and excellent suggestions for how to avoid lines, what you can skip and what NOT to miss.  Anyway, the jewels were spectacular.  There were crowns, swords, scepters, rings, plates, broaches.  Erin and I were in awe of the size of the diamonds, rubies and emeralds.  Simply amazing and beautiful!

After our visit to the tower, it was time to head home and rest a bit.  We had been out for hours and we needed to chill for a minute before our very fancy dinner at Hakassan.  Again, Erin was a research guru and had read about this restaurant as being THE place to dine.  My next post will be about our experience at Hakassan, because something very scary and personal happened to me during dinner.  

More to come…. xo

Travel Tip #4 - DON'T  be embarrassed to take those silly pictures. Don't be shy to ask other people to take photos of you!  You will be SOOOOO happy you have them!  Just while writing this blog I was SO thrilled to have the pictures I have and I will cherish them always!  :)  Just do it!

Leaping Around London - Day #1

How is time flying so fast?  It is now September 30 and I landed in London on August 30!  I can't believe I am now a month behind on this blog.  This week I am going to do everything in my power to catch up!  Ok, so we left off with me saying farewell to the Irish, and bonjour to the British!  The flight from Dublin to London was very short and I was so excited to meet up with Erin.  As soon as I landed and retrieved my luggage, I spoke to an airport employee and asked for directions to the terminal for international flights.  His reply was that it depended on the airline.  Crickets….  Um, Erin and I had never swapped info about the airline and flight number that she was on.  What were we thinking!?!  Oh my gosh. All I knew was the time she was supposed to arrive…which in airline language means just about nothing.  Whoops!  Heathrow is huge and I really wasn't sure what airline Erin was on.  I had British Airways at the forefront of my mind, but Air France was also rolling around my noggin.  I went with my initial thought, British Airways, took the tram to that terminal, and was thankfully correct!  What a joy it was to see Erin come out of the terminal!  To be in London with one of your best friends and getting to travel together for two whole weeks in Europe!  Happy dance!!  We had done some research and learned that Uber is also in London, so we requested an Uber to pick us up and shortly we were on our way to our London flat in SOHO!  For those that don’t know, Uber is a car service that you can request via your smart phone.  You just need to download the app onto your phone, enter your credit card information and then when you request rides, you don’t have to worry about an exchange of money!  Everything is charged directly to your credit card!  It is the best system and we ended up using Uber in London and Paris.  

As we drove toward Soho, I saw my first red double decker bus and felt like I was in a movie or something!  The Georgian building designs were gorgeous and we were just so excited to be there! 

Unfortunately, our elation was set back a bit when we arrived to our flat to find what I’d pretty much call a dump.  I mean, it wasn’t horrendous and it wasn’t dirty, but we definitely did not feel it was worthy of what we had paid.  I am a huge proponent of Air BnB and usually rave about this website and company, but I was so disappointed with the flat.  The WiFi was totally spotty and really only worked in one room (we were counting on this to figure out plans, routes, do research, etc), the bathroom was TINY, the second bedroom was more like a closet, and worst of all, the bed in the second bedroom tilted a good thirty degrees.  I mean, it was truly unsleepable.  Furthermore, we were in the very heart of SOHO and it was SOOOO loud at night, it was very difficult to sleep.  I wouldn’t consider myself or Erin old fuddy duddies when it comes to noise or sleep…but this was rough.  Oh, and to exit the building we had to pass heaps of stinky garbage bags from the restaurant below our flat.  When we contacted the host of the apartment, her suggestions were to use earplugs, put a book under one of the leg posts to help with the tilt, or sleep on a thin twin sized mattress in the living room.  Really?  We responded with the suggestion that she give us a 20% refund.  Ha!  Luckily she did not fight us on this suggestion, considering we payed extra to have a two bedroom apartment and it really did not meet those expectations.  Anyway, enough about the crappy apartment.  By the second day we would make a game of it and place bets on how many bags of trash we'd have to hop over to exit the building.  It didn’t get in our way and we truly enjoyed London.  

Erin did a great job of researching some places for us to go.  Our first night we went to dinner at The Wolseley.  

The Wolseley is a gorgeous restaurant located on one of London’s most famous boulevards, Piccadilly.  It was originally opened in 1921 as a prestigious car showroom.  The architect who was commissioned to design the building drew on Venetian and Florentine influences and the interior is truly magnificent.  The building boasts grand arches, towering pillars and elegant stairways and the upscale cars sat upon the shiny, checkered tile flooring.  The Wolseley Car Company did not last long, and in 1926 Barclays Bank acquired the building, opening a branch in 1927.  It remained a bank for many years.  In 2003, the site was purchased, renovated and restored and what is now The Wolselely restaurant opened in November of that year.  It has an absolutely stunning interior and I would definitely recommend a nice dinner here.  

It is also a good location for tea or brunch, but we had the most amazing dinner including seared scallops, beetroot and goats’  cheese salad, and a heavenly dessert of pistachio, hazelnut and almond nougat ice creams, whipped cream, and butterscotch sauce.  All of this was washed down with several dirty martinis and a whole lot of laughter.  It was a perfect first dinner in London and we were full and happy!  

On our way back to our flat, we had the pleasure of seeing portable urinals set up on the sidewalks.  Soho is a predominantly gay neighborhood, so the bars and clubs had gorgeous men spilling into the streets in every direction.  I can sort of understand the need for extra urinals, but my goodness!  It came as a shock to us as we came around the corner from our elegant dinner at The Wolseley to see Joe Shmoe dropping trow in the middle of the street.  Shocking, but hilarious.  Picture worthy….  ;)

The next day we planned on hitting several touristy spots.  We woke up early, grabbed coffee and were on the go!  More to come in my next post!  xo

Wanderlust in Wicklow

Hello again!  Hola from Madrid!  I am so happy to be here and finally feel like I can breathe a bit!  The last month was exciting, exhilarating, and completely exhausting.  From August 23 to September 19 I made ten stops.  To be honest, the hardest part is the luggage.  Being weighed down by seventy pounds of luggage is not great, to say the least.  I thought I packed pretty light for basically moving abroad for a while, and I even shipped a few things straight to Madrid so I didn’t have to lug it around.  Yet, my luggage was STILL super heavy.  The thing about Europe is if you are staying in flats, you will be facing a lot of stairs.  If you want to save money, you will be doing a lot of walking.  These things are no biggie if you haven’t burdened yourself with a ton of stuff.  Anyway, I got used to walking pack mule style and didn’t shy away from walking when I needed to.  In one city, I walked well over a mile to my flat from the train station.  I literally wheeled my huge ass suitcase over bumpy cobblestoned streets for over a mile.  It was awesome.  Thank GOODNESS I took all those Plyojam classes and did all those squats this summer!  Haha!  

So now I’m in Madrid and I’m here to stay for a while, YAY!  It was wonderful and amazing to see so many iconic cities and I’ve definitely gotten a feel for where I’d like to return some day (Edinburgh and Bordeaux for sure!) as well as the cities I’d probably skip next time (South of France)!  Now I am so happy to be able to stay in one place and get to know the city I fell so madly in love with last summer. But before I start talking about Madrid, I’ll go back to where I left off in my last post.

I think we left off in Dublin, and I was telling you about my amazing walking tour!  Again, I highly recommend a walking tour in the cities you are visiting!  You will glean such cool and interesting tidbits about the city!  After my walking tour I was dying for a dance class.  Unfortunately I could not find a single Zumba or Cardio Dance class in Dublin that fit my schedule.  SO, luckily I had my handy dandy bluetooth speaker, my Plyojam playlist, my resistance band, and I borrowed my host's yoga mat and went to town.  I am so thankful that Plyojam is something you can take with you anywhere.  As long as you have several of the routines memorized, you can pretty much dance anywhere!  I got my sweat on and it felt great!!  That night I was not keen on going out for dinner as I had already maxed out my daily budget.  So it was beans for dinner!  

For my trip to Ireland, I definitely knew that not only did I want to explore the city of Dublin, but I also wanted to see some Irish countryside.  After doing some research and reading several reviews, I booked a day trip to County Wicklow and the gorgeous Wicklow mountains.  Along with very interesting history, I did learn that Daniel Day Lewis lives in County Wicklow.  Ha!  Mr. Lincoln himself!  :)  I’m not going to lie, going on a tour alone can be a tiny bit intimidating at first.  Most people are with friends or family or their spouses.  However, it only takes me maybe three seconds to get over any weirdness I might feel and then I just choose to really enjoy the fact that someone is going to tour me around and tell me totally interesting stuff about the land!  Also, I have found that most people are really warm and welcoming when they know you are traveling alone.  And when all else fails, buddy up with the tour guide!  On this tour we visited Glendalough and Kilkenny City.  Glendalough was absolutely stunning.  We saw beautiful lakes, took a gorgeous walk through the woods, and eventually arrived at a 6th century monastic settlement to visit the monastic ruins.  There were spectacular graveyards and multiple ruins of churches.  One church even had it’s original windows dating back to 1225.  Unbelievable!  

From Glendalough we journeyed across the beautiful Wicklow Gap and saw spectacular landscape.  If you ever saw Braveheart or P.S. I Love You, parts of these movies were filmed in this area.  We arrived in Kilkenny City, the medieval capital of Ireland.  I had noticed another girl on the tour who was alone, but I heard her speaking Spanish and had zero confidence in trying to communicate with her.  Imagine my surprise and happiness when she came up to me as we were getting off the bus in Kilkenny and introduced herself!  Monica spoke enough English for us to communicate and was the sweetest and cutest thing!  And the major bonus is that she lives in Madrid!  We ended up having lunch together and hanging out the rest of the tour.  We exchanged information so that we can meet up in Madrid!  I can’t wait to see her again and I am SO glad she came up to me!  Bravery and taking initiative are going to make a world of difference in your solo travels!  So thank you Monica for introducing yourself!  

Kilkenny was lovely and we saw a magnificent church called the Black Abbey.  Our tour guide gave us a wonderful walking tour of this little city and the stories were fantastic.  It was a chilly grey day, and our guide told us folklore of black magic and witch trials.  It was so much fun and I loved every second!  

As we headed back into Dublin it was pouring rain.  I now understand how everything stays so beautifully lush and green!  It rains a ton!  Monica and I shared an umbrella back into the city and could not stop laughing and giggling as we got soaked in the rain!  It was a wonderful day and I felt that kind of happiness that feels like it’s going to bubble right out of you!  

That night I bought a delicious falafel from a tiny stand in Temple Bar that was INSANELY delicious, did some laundry and slept like a log.  I knew I needed to rest up for London!  The next morning I cleaned the flat, packed up my suitcase and boarded the bus back to the airport.  Off to London I went!  I was SO excited to meet up with Erin at Heathrow!!!

Ok, more on London in my next post!  Toodles for now!

Travel Tip #3 - Pack light!  If you are visiting multiple cities, no one is going to know that you have been wearing those same darn jeans and those same shoes in every city!  ESPECIALLY if you are staying in places with washers.  Also, be aware that most places in Europe don’t have dryers…just washers.  So if you plan on doing laundry, do it the first night you are in a place so that you give your clothes a day or two to dry!  

Dashing Around Dublin

Yikes!  I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to write another blog!  I have been on the MOVE!  My hope was to write a separate blog about each and every city, but considering I’m currently on the train to my ninth city, that idea may prove to be futile, but I’m going to give it a go.  If I can’t punch out every detail, I will at least fill you in on some of the highlights of the last three weeks..and perhaps some low points as well (like the fact that I ate a filet o fish in Marseille just now between train rides…a REAL low point…)  By the way, as I’m typing this I am on a six hour train ride to Bordeaux, France.  It’s a strange system.  You don’t have to show proof that you’ve actually purchased a train ticket until you are on the train and en route to your destination.  During some of train rides I’ve already taken, my ticket was never checked!  I can imagine that this leads to people hopping on the train without tickets, hoping that it will be their lucky day that tickets aren’t checked.  So here we are on the way to Bordeaux and I’m sitting in the first class coach (don’t go crazy…the price difference between coach and first class on a train is minimal and since this was going to be a six hour jaunt I wanted comfort!) Not one, but TWO people just got caught without tickets!  They both tried to do the song and dance that they lost them, patting pockets and checking their duffle bags, but it was so completely obvi that they were just trying to pull a fast one.  Wooo weeee!  The ticket checker started REAMING these guys in French.  And it certainly doesn’t take a native French tounge to understand that they were getting a proper blasting.  Not exactly sure what will happen to these stowaways, but they are most definitely not sitting in this coach any longer!  

Anyway, back to my travels.  When we last spoke (yes I consider this a two way dialogue..ha!) I was about to board my flight to Dublin.  That plane was practically a prop plane.  You know…the kind you have to walk out on the tarmac and then climb stairs to board.  Not my favorite.  However, as we flew over Ireland I was struck by the never-ending greenery below.  Of course, this was how I had imagined it to be, but seeing it with my own eyes was magnificent.  I literally saw fields of dancing sheep and shades of emerald sprawling in all directions.  After my little prop plane made a safe landing, I retrieved my luggage and made my way to the bus stop.  Public transport in Edinburgh had proven to be a bit overwhelming for me, but being that it is SO much cheaper than taxis I was on a mission to get to my Dublin flat via public transport.  SUCCESS!  I figured out how to buy the ticket, the route I needed, the stop I needed get off, and even managed to get my million pound suitcase onto the bus.  The only negative was the lack of seats available so I had to stand for the thirty minute ride.  This wouldn’t have been much of a problem except the bus driver was heavy on the breaks and I kept getting jarred and jostled around.  I ended up with a few bruises…but hey!  I saved a ton of dough taking that bus!  Oh, and if I hadn’t taken that bus ride, I may have missed the sign for the Leprechaun museum, which gave me a good chuckle.  Pandering to tourists with that one no doubt!!

I arrived to my flat in Temple Bar, a super cute, lively neighborhood in Dublin, and had about thirty minutes to kill until my Air BnB host was to arrive.  There was a bakery right next door to the flat so I parked it there and ordered a cappuccino.  Sitting in that bakery at about 3pm on a Wednesday afternoon, I noticed something.  I couldn’t believe how many people popped into the bakery for an afternoon pastry.  Hefty slices of carrot cake, muffins, brownies, tarts and cookies were ordered right and left.  And it seemed like this was a daily routine as the shop owners often greeted the customers by name.  Yet not one of these customers were overweight!  What do we think of this??  I’m sure it can partly be attributed to the amount of walking Europeans do.  I’d also have to imagine it may have to do with the quality of food in Europe as well as portion sizes.  People from other parts of the world constantly reference the enormity of American portion sizes.  I think Europeans tend to eat smaller meals.  What else do you think it is?  It was really quite interesting to me.  I sat in the bakery with just my cappuccino (trying to avoid a 500 calorie pastry) while the Irish traipsed in and out with their afternoon treat.  

The other thing that struck me was the feeling that I had been plunked down in the middle of a movie set.  The accents were just so gloriously thick and amazing, something all of us have attempted to mimic at some point in our lives.  But here I was sipping coffee amongst these incredible thick stunning Irish accents and it was music to my ears.  I could practically hear the music being cued, someone yelling action, and wind blowing through my hair as I rode alongside Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise in one of my old favorites “Far and Away.”  Oh Shannon…

My host finally arrived and showed me to the flat, which was totally adorable, cozy and just had a good vibe. I was very excited to be in Dublin!  I walked the streets of Temple Bar and could not BELIEVE the number of bars and pubs that lined every street.  Pub crawl central.  Beer belly central?  Hangover central?  LOL!  I ended up at Bad Bob’s Temple Bar and ordered some red wine.  Not even sure why I ordered this…not really my go to bevvo.  But I wasn’t in the mood for beer and it was a bit chilly out, so red wine just seemed right.  And it was.  I stayed at Bad Bob’s for several hours, drinking wine, talking to the bartender, and finally listening to some really great music when open mic night started.  It was a fun night, and the best part was being able to stumble only a block or two home to my flat.  

The next day I took the best three hour walking tour of Dublin.  Our tour guide Lisa was a beautiful charming red head who used to work in the corporate world, but left that to pursue a life of travel.  Ahem…this hit home with me for sure!!  We saw tons of spectacular sites including Dublin Castle, Christ Church Cathedral, Trinity College, Temple Bar, and St. Stephen’s Green.  Lisa told us wonderful historical stories about each site, as well as some funny local tales.  She relayed to us the fact that the wretched King Geoffrey from Game of Thrones is actually a 4th year student at Trinity College in Dublin and is quite a successful student.  And evidently he’s not a total scumbag…although it’s hard for me not to hate him.  We also saw the project arts center in Temple Bar where a little band called U2 got their start.  Lisa told us that one day in the very early days of U2 when they were totally unknown, Bono went into a bar across from the project arts center to buy a beer and apparently looked so disheveled that they refused to serve him.  They got into a bit of a tif and Bono exclaimed that some day he’d buy that bar from the man who refused to sell him the beer.  And guess what?  He did…he bought and still owns Garage Bar and the Clarence Hotel in Temple Bar.  However, I gathered from Lisa that the Irish think Bono is a bit big for his britches.  I had two different tour guides in Dublin tell the same Bono joke.  Here it is.  What is the difference between God and Bono?  Answer...God doesn’t think he’s Bono….  

 Lisa, our darling and funny tour guide!

 Bustling Temple Bar!

St. Stephen's Green.

I have more to tell about Dublin, but I’m so tired and this is getting long.  So for now I say Dia Guich…which means May God Bless You in Gaelic.  xoxo

Travel Tip #2 - Take a good walking tour when you first get to a new city.  I usually find highly rated tours on Trip Advisor and typically the guides are so proud of their city and have such cool and interesting stories to tell.  You miss out on some really interesting stories that make a place come to life if you just walk around by yourself.  It's also a great way to orient yourself with the city.  AND, if you are alone, this is a great way to meet people!!

Skipping around Scotland

My time in Edinburgh flew and now I am sitting in the airport waiting to fly to Dublin.  I always feel a bit sorry for the first stop on a vacation.  As with any international trip, you are in such a daze from jet lag and exhaustion, usually on the second day.  Approximately sixteen hours after I left home in Newbury Park, I finally landed in Edinburgh and made my way via taxi to my flat. I was too tired to deal with the bus and I honestly couldn’t face hauling my 49 pound suitcase anywhere other than the back of a cab.  My cab driver was a lovely man, born and raised in Scotland, with the thickest accent to match.  I was only able to understand every fourth or fifth word, however I was able to make out his tour guide-esque announcements as we passed interesting sites such as the birth place of Sean Connery, as well as the university Tony Blair attended.  He was a sweet, sweet man, eager to use the twenty-five minutes to tell me about his city.  I love it when people have pride in their home.  We arrived to the flat when I suddenly realized I had not studied the pound or any denomination of the pound.  Um, that should have been the first thing I did.  I had notes and coins in my wallet, but I honestly wasn’t even sure what they equaled.  UGH!  And my bleary eyes were having trouble reading the faded coins.  I felt really unprepared, which I did not love.  Anyway, I managed to pay the man, vowing in my head to immediately go upstairs and hit up my Rick Steves book to study the currency.  My flat was located on the Royal Mile.  This is a stretch of road in the center of Edinburgh filled with shops, restaurants, pubs, etc.  The location of my flat was a dream…with the exception of the six flights of steep stairs that I had to climb to actually get to the front door.  To be honest, this didn’t bother me much.  I figured it would help in burning off the pints of cider I was about to consume over the next couple of days.  However, hauling my suitcase, backpack, satchel and tired body up those stairs the first day I arrived was rough.  Almost tear inducing rough.  Luckily, the urge to cry was quickly quelled upon entering the beautiful flat and seeing that the very stairs that I was cursing a moment ago were just the thing that enabled me to have breathtaking views from every window in the place.  LUCKY ME!!!  

                                  VIEWS FROM MY FLAT

My Air BnB host greeted me, showed me around and departed…leaving me to quickly fling myself onto the bed and tear into the dainty package of shortbread cookies that were left for me.  YUM!  As I lay there inhaling a few cookies, I noticed I could hear the faint sound of bagpipes.  Was this a dream??  I mean really, a flat with breathtaking views AND some mood music drifting in from the streets below?  That afternoon I had the best time just traipsing up and down the Royal Mile, ducking in and out of shops, milling about the street and watching wonderful street performers, stopping for a leisurely coffee, and finally ending my night with INSANELY delicious fish and chips and a cold pint of Three Hops. I slept like a log on Sunday night.  

Monday morning I had already signed up for a Zumba class in an area called Morningside.  The trick was figuring out how to get there.  I was determined to use public transit so off I went, all geared up, to try and find the bus.  I attempted to get on one bus, but I didn’t have the exact change.  The driver kept saying something, but I could NOT understand what he was saying!  Damn Scottish accent.  I stood there blankly for a moment, trying to process whatever the hell was coming out of his mouth, with what felt like hundreds of people on the bus staring at me.  After a bit I scampered off the bus and promptly hailed a taxi.  I’d deal with the bus another time.  I arrived at the location of the Zumba class in Morningside, which happened to be at a beautiful church.  To be honest, everything in Edinburgh sort of looks like it’s straight out of a fairy tale.  I had the best time taking Zumba, and for an hour I actually felt in my comfort zone.  Figuring out public transport, the stress of airports, understanding new currency, trying to decipher thick accents….all out of my comfort zone.  But dancing?  Bring it.  The instructor Nadia was awesome and energetic and I really enjoyed the class.  

                   ZUMBA IN MORNINGSIDE WITH NADIA

After the class was over, Nadia and another kind lady quickly gave me a mini lesson on the currency and I felt ready to attempt the bus system again.  Success!  I took the bus back to the general area of my flat, but got off a bit early to walk around Princes street and buy tickets to a couple of shows.  I was lucky to catch the tail end of the Fringe Festival, one of the largest performing arts festivals in the world.  I bought tickets for an A Capella show and Fifty Shade of Grey, The Musical.  

After heading back to the flat for a shower, I went back out to hit up a few pubs before the show.  At one pub I met some really nice people and they seemed to LOVE that I was from Los Angeles.  Their first question was if I had ever seen any celebrities.  Very cute!  I had to tell them of my recent sitings of Ryan Reynolds and Mark Wahlberg, of course!  They squealed!  I finished my cider and off to the shows I went, which I thoroughly enjoyed.  Walking between venues was an experience because it was COLD in Edinburgh.  The nights were low 50’s, even high 40’s, and it was chilly!!!  After the shows, I was walking back to my flat and stopped and witnessed one of the main chefs of a restaurant on the Royal Mile getting a bucket of ice water dumped on him (ALS ice bucket challenge).  Mind you, it was about 12am and probably 49 degrees at this point.  Brrrrrr.  As I continued walking I heard some amazing guitar coming from a pub, so I popped in to enjoy some tunes.  As I was sitting there enjoying the music, a VERY drunk Scottish man danced toward me.  Like, he was actually doing that lasso thing where they pretend toss it to you and then reel you in.  Picture it…I’ll wait.  Got it?  I just about died, but kept it together.  I politely declined, but still got a kick out of his slurry Scottish accent.  I also had a good giggle when I overheard a table of Americans talking about how they’d give their right arm for a Chipotle burrito.  I guess they’ve been abroad for a bit.  I just looked at them and said "I get it."  I mean, it's Chipotle.  I finally got home at about 1am, but had the worst insomnia.  I was able to text with a few friends, and then FINALLY fell asleep around 5:30am (as the sun was coming up).  Surprisingly I was able to sleep until almost 2pm.  This bummed me out a little because I had to skip some of the activities I had planned on doing.  However, NOTHING would have been fun or enjoyable on zero sleep.  

INSOMNIA  :(

Tuesday morning was lost to sleep, but I made the most of my afternoon and evening.  I grabbed some coffee and off I went.  I ended up logging nearly 8 miles of walking.  I walked all over Edinburgh, visiting St Giles Cathedral, Mary King’s Close, Grassmarket Street.  I had a late lunch at a fantastic cafe called Hula where I could have sworn I saw Gerard Butler.  Unfortunately, last night on Twitter I saw that Gerard was in Los Angeles at the Chelsea Handler wrap party so I suppose it wasn’t him.  Oh well, dare to dream.  I also hit up an adorable cafe called Lovecrumbs, recommended by my cousin Elka who lived in Edinburgh for a bit.  Sitting on the most comfy couch, I sipped violet petal tea and just breathed it all in.  I reminded myself not to rush, not to see this trip as a checklist, running from one thing to another, but rather as an in the moment journey.  I relished in the sounds of accented conversations all around me, crisp scarf wearing weather, and the warm mug of tea in my hands.  Happiness.  I knew I wanted to take one more Zumba class before leaving, so I googled the location of the class.  It was 1.9 miles from where I was sitting.  So off I went…walking through gorgeous neighborhoods with the bright Edinburgh sun on my face.  I arrived to the class and danced my feet off for an hour, loving Nadia’s class even more the second time!  By the time the class was over, I could not face walking all the way back to my flat so I asked the lovely girl at the front desk to call me a taxi.  Everyone was so incredibly kind.  From the taxi drivers who I could not understand, to my Zumba teacher, to the bartenders I chatted with over pints of cider.  Edinburgh was wonderful.  As I said before, I always feel a bit sad for the first city.  I’m sorry Edinburgh, if I cheated you a bit with my jet lag and exhaustion.  But, I solemnly promise that one day I will be back.  

GORGEOUS SITES IN EDINBURGH

FAREWELL EDINBURGH!!!

Travel Tip #1 - Get comfortable with being lost.  You will feel lost constantly and instead of letting it frustrate you, see it as an opportunity to explore, test your skills as a survivalist, and invest in the idea that the extra walking while lost is totally burning off the calories of those shortbread cookies you devoured the first night.  :)  

Gifts That Cost Nothing!

The other day I was thinking about stuff.  How we accumulate so much stuff throughout our lives…things that we really don’t need, that fill our junk drawers, fill boxes in our closets, hang out in cabinets unused.  We spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on stuff that in the end, won’t mean anything.  I’ve been all about simplifying lately, tired of the junk and clutter.  Consumerism is so empty, it fills our homes, but it doesn’t fill our hearts.  It is friendship and love and experiences that fill our hearts.  It is the support of a friend, the kiss of a loved one, a simple action or touch or statement that fills us and makes us whole, especially when we start to feel a bit broken.  Not stuff.  Then I started to think about how much power that gives us….good power, I mean.  We have the power and ability to give each other gifts all day, every day.  With a simple decision to do so, we can distribute beautiful tokens of love on the daily.  We have the ability to build each other up, support each other, compliment each other, love each other.  And guess what?  These gifts don’t cost a dime!  Which leads me to wonder…why don’t we do this more often?  Why don’t we bestow these free gifts upon each other day after day, when they are 100% free and so powerfully positive?  Are we all just too consumed in our own self centeredness to do so?    Are we too shy?  Too uncomfortable?  Too caught up in our own lives?  Do we forget that it costs nothing to give these gifts away?  What’s even more powerful is when you start to realize that the more you give these free trinkets of love and support away, the better you start to feel yourself.  You will build a kingdom of positivity and good karma in your life so it’s truly a win win.  I say challenge yourself….take a minute to stop thinking about all that you have to do, all that you have on your plate, all that you want, but don’t have…and give a gift to someone else.  Give a compliment to someone (a genuine one!), send a thoughtful text asking someone how that interview went or if that nasty cold has gone away.  Remembering something specific that is going on in someone else’s life is a gift worth a million bucks because it makes that person feel heard and remembered. Hug someone that you might not normally hug.  Send a card, draw a picture, hold a hand.  Step outside of the love language you are used to using (or maybe you're not used to using any!), and try something new on for size.  Perhaps touch isn’t always comfortable for you…hug ‘em anyway.  Perhaps saying “I miss you” feels weird, do it anyway.  Sometimes even asking questions feels weird to some people.  Do it anyway.  Give the gift of time to someone.  Stop with the junk and start giving gifts that will last.  Just some things I’ve been thinking about.  XO

Almost Ready to Leap...ALMOST!

I've been an emotional wreck the last few days.  I leave for Europe in 4 weeks and although I know I'm about to embark on the journey of a lifetime, and I will experience the most incredible things...it's also VERY scary to leave everything that is familiar.  It is especially scary to do it alone.  I've altered so much in my life to do this!  I have not lived in my own condo for over a year.  I have given up my job, my salary, my benefits for a year.  I am leaving my family, my friends, my dog.  I know I'm leaving all of these things for an INCREDIBLE opportunity...but it's still scary to do so. For now, I waver between excitedly planning outings and excursions all over Europe, and minutes later curling up in a ball sobbing into my pillow, not wanting to leave all that is familiar and comfortable.  

Despite my nerves and fear, of course I will board that plane on August 23.  I will go...possibly on wobbly legs with a few tears in my eyes....but I will go.  It's not like I'm going off to war.  It's not like I'm leaving forever for goodness sakes!  Well, at least I don't think so!  Believe me, I know how incredibly lucky I am, so I am not trying to be dramatic about the whole situation.  But..I am leaving and I'm a little nervous.  However, I know life begins when you step outside of your comfort zone.  That's when the good stuff happens!  So my foot is dangling off the cliff and I'm ready to leap.  Well...ALMOST ready!