So on Friday I flew to Edinburgh, Scotland, or at least that was the plan. I had a bit of an adventure getting there. My flight was cancelled due to technical difficulties with the plane. I was sitting in the airport looking at the screen waiting for my gate to come up and wondering what the poor people on the cancelled Amsterdam flight were going to do. Then they made an annoucement about my flight being cancelled! Luckily I got in the line to rebook fast enough that they just moved me to the Glasgow flight which left at the time I was scheduled to fly to Edinburgh. Then they arranged a coach for us to get to Edinburgh. I arrived an hour later than planned but it could have been a lot worse.

Megan and I had a great time together. I hadn't seen her since last August and that was only brief. It was lovely to be able to talk for a long while. On Saturday, we had a relaxing day, we walked about the city, ate ice-cream by the castle. (As we shivered in the wind we wondered about the logic of eating ice-cream on a freezing day! But it was so good. Two vanilla scoops in between two waffers that were filled with puffy cream, and covered in chocolate!) We also visited the Surgeon's Museum, which had lots of disturbing but fascinating exhibits of diseased and mutilated body parts and internal organs. It was gross but you just had to look!

Sunday was busy. In the morning we got up so that we would have time to go to a place called the Camera Oscura which had a room (a camera oscura) up at the top which, through a series of lenses and mirrors showed a view of almost all the city. It was neat. The image was projected on a curved canvas, and the woman could "pick up" people by putting a card down and lifting it up. The way the image was projected onto the card gave the illusion she had picked them up. At the end we were given cards to do the same thing. Megan and I together picked up a bus! It was so exciting. And the rest of the place was filled with other illusions and light exhibits. We had a lot of fun, like two little kids at a circus. The mirrors which distort your body were particularly amusing. We stood in front of them and laughed for ages. It was a bit ridiculous! Up at the top on the roof you could look at the city through periscopes. There was a little boy running around, trying to look at everything at once, "This is the coolest day of my life," he exclaimed excitedly. (In a cute Australian accent.) He was adorable.

In the afternoon, we had an interesting experience. One of her friends took us to a Passion play (it was Easter Sunday) that was performed outside and the audience moved with the actors to different parts of this big garden and through the town. It was cool, although we were freezing! The wind was biting cold. I don't know how the actor who played Jesus survived, it was a bit dangerous really, when he was on the cross he was wearing just a pair of cut-off jeans. I was cold wrapped in many layers! His legs started turning purple and he was trying so hard not to shake. It was slightly terrifying, which I guess added to the effect of the play. On a whole, it was really well done, and I enjoyed it more or less, despite the cold.

To end the day, Megan and I went out to dinner with another Bucknellian and a friend, and I tried some haggis, traditional Scottish food. I don't really know what it was. Megan wouldn't tell me before I ate it, and I didn't ask afterwards. (Some sort of meat-products thing.) It was quite good, much better than it looked but I don't think it will become a favorite food. Megan loves it.

On Monday, I took the train down to York. Booking ahead, a first-class ticket had been one of the cheapest I could get, at the time I wanted, so I rode down in style and got a complimentary snack and beverage. The journey down the coast was beautiful. My Auntie Mary and Uncle Gordon picked me up. They were a little late, because of traffic, and while I had to pace a bit to calm my nerves I didn't panic about them not being there. I was just about to call to make sure they weren't at home when they finally arrived. (Worse case scenario, I would have called my Auntie June, but I knew she would get all flustered and worried, so I would only call her as a last resort!)

The five days in Scarborough with them was really nice, although not quite as relaxing as I was expecting because there was a bit of a rush to see all the different relatives (other great-aunts and uncles and cousins (my mom's cousins technically) who wanted to see me. My last visit was three years ago! It was nice to be with family. I had many lovely home-cooked meals, roasts with potatoes and three different vegetables and yorkshire puddings. Mmmmm. And I drank countless cups of tea.

Wednesday was a particularly marvelous day. I spent the day with my Auntie June and Uncle Raymund and we drove to Dalby Forest and through the Dales, both beautiful natural areas. The day was clear and the trees, all a sort of purple color, were very pretty. They made me think of how the trees at home on the shore turn a rather red color with buds. It was so nice to have the day with them. They are such special people in my life. Mom used to spend every summer with them and they shared stories about those times with her.

On the way home along the single lane, through the rolling hills, we drove through a farm yard full of chickens, three sheep dogs and a lass in green boots moving feed to the horses. We stopped to talk for a while. I love the friendliness of the Yorkshire folks. Sadly the farm is being sold, the old chap who owns it can't keep it any more. It'll be made into a house or series of houses and the road reworked. Soon people won't be able to have the experience of passing through. The lambs were starting to skip about the fields, although the fields are still mostly filled with pregnant ewes. We saw a lamb that had just been born, still wobbly on its legs, yellow and wet, trembling as its mother licked it. The farmer was at the other end, with another ewe and baby, and then he bumped over on his four-wheel drive and put this ewe and her lamb in the back of his trailer with the one he'd been dealing with before.

My last weekend, I took the train to Nottingham to see my cousin Julia. She's actually my Mom's cousin, on my granddad's side of the family. (The relatives up in Scarborough are my grandma's family). Julia is the daughter of my granddad's brother, but is only eight years older than me. The last time we had seen each other was 10 years ago. I was just a little kid then. In the last year, we've gotten in contact again through Facebook, and were looking forward to meeting up again. I thought I would have a good time, and we were both excited about seeing each other, but 10 years is a long time. It wasn't guaranteed that we would get along. But it was fantastic. I felt comfortable from the moment I arrived, and we had a lovely relaxing time together.

We walked around Nottingham a bit, had a couple of drinks in a church converted into a bar (which was a neat place) and mostly just talked and talked and talked. I was sad to leave her on Monday but now that we've reconnected we are determined to see each other again, so I know we'll meet up soon enough. Hopefully when Alicia, my sister, comes in May we can go up together.

The break went too fast and I had a very stressful start to the week because of course registration. It was very complicated because of not being on campus, needing at the last-minute permission to enter a class and then my e-mail stopped working properly. I didn't get into one of my classes, but I think it'll be okay. I'll just have to find something in the spring to fulfill that requirement. The plus side is I can now take a creative writing class called "Nature writing/Writing Nature" which I didn't think I'd be able to. Next fall is going to be really busy but I figure that if I can juggle all the work I had last spring while being sick with mono, I'll be okay this fall while being healthy.

We are now finishing up week three of being back after Spring Break. Time is going so fast. I think this semester has gone faster than any other semester I've had. Spring seems to do that, even though fall is shorter. We are now in the final month of the semester, and things are starting to get crazy as we gear up for papers and finals. I imagine it is much the same at Bucknell and else where for college students. (Facebook statuses would be a indication of that).

I shall leave you all with some pictures from Spring Break. (Although I don't have the ones from Edinburgh on me right now) and hopefully soon I'll be able to write about our week in Oxford which was awesome.

The sea-side at Scarborough.

Close-up of the donkeys on the beach.

Another shot of the beach.

Looking down at the beach.

Looking the other way towards Scarborough. Isn't the bay pretty?

Doors in toilets of the nature center in Dalby Forest.

Here is the explanation about what they are made of. They looked so cool and colorful.

The farm we drove through.

The woman we stopped to talk to.

Chicken from the farmyard.

The newborn lamb we saw.

And a closeup pic.

On the last day at Auntie Mary's, we started looking at old pictures. These are of June and Mary. I love old black and white photos.

Auntie June and Uncle Raymund and me.

Auntie Mary and Uncle Gordon and me.

One of the days I went birding with Gordon, and took these pictures. They are a bit fuzzy because of the way I zoomed in, but I think they still turned out pretty cool.

Robin.

Picture of grass with dew from Julia's backyard.

Julia and I.