Scotland the brave

Now we've been in Edinburgh three weeks and we are loving it. The job hunt is continuing (although it looks like I'm sorted now) but the rest of the time we're lazing about and checking out Edinburgh. Mark has also taken to baking, although, unfortunately, ingredients are hard to find as it's obviously not a normal Scottish pastime.

We also went on a daytrip to the seaside resort of North Berwick, went to the Beltane fire festival, have been orienteering twice (and discovered more than we needed to know about Scottish stinging nettles), have watched Mhairi in a tournament, played soccer with the locals and have been on a Scottish pub crawl.

Apart from the cool old buildings, the endless double-decker buses and the funny accents, there are a number of other differences from NZ:

- The bike lanes are awesome. They dedicate whole pathways to cycling.
- Helmets are not compulsory, and it feels really weird to bike without one (so I got one anyway)
- Food comes in silly sizes (like tiny vegemite jars - what's the point?)
- Brown sauce.
- Cider. Yummy.
- Cobbled streets. Uncomfortable for biking.
- The severe lack of cafes and the huge number of pubs.
- The enormous white swans.

We're going on our first overnight trip away from Edinburgh this weekend, up to Mhairi's parents' bach at Braemar. Hopefully that will inspire some futher stories and photos!