A Three Day Weekend in Scotland

This is something we haven't done for six or seven years, but we found ourselves with a three day weekend and decided to take a quick flight for a long weekend holiday. Laura would find herself working about an hour from Edinburgh the next week and I'd been looking for a 10k road race to try on for size and found one in Stirling. So, we found Scotland beckoning our name. Hard to believe that it's less than a two hour flight away!

On Saturday we spent the day in Edinburgh (the boys are standing in front of the building housing the Scottish Crown Jewels inside Edinburgh Castle above). We started with Edinburgh Castle and, in what appears to be typical Scottish fashion, it rained off and on during our visit. Luckily, there was a lot more sun than there was rain!

We had one of the knights from the Robert the Bruce/William Wallace era to explain the wars taking place. His name was Elvis and Elliot decided he looked pretty good for a guy who was about 700 years old. The boys were really excited when he let them hold his sword and shield. You can't really tell here, but the boys were also pretty surprised by just how heavy those sword and shield are. They were real weapons. The knight's armor, for example, weighed well over 50 pounds.

Sir Elvis in the background, sans helm.

Boys and guns.

Edinburgh Castle view over the city to the Firth of Forth.

Riding the hop-on hop-off double decker bus.

We rode a hop-on hop-off bus for the first time on this trip. It was a fun way to get an overview of the city and find out there were so many things there that we wouldn't have time to see! Laura and I ended up in the back seat and it somehow ended up feeling that we were teenagers cuddled together in the back of car with romance on the mind...except that our young boys were sitting ahead of us, peering back, chatting and giggling. The cuddling had more to do with the cool temperatures, anyway!

That's Edinburgh Castle up there. Sorry, I thought we should get a view from the other direction.

This is the restaurant where J. K. Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book. We didn't eat dinner here.

But we did eat here. I couldn't resist this picture because I've never seen such a big milk mustache before!

The requisite phone booth shot. Actually, we have six of them.

We spent Sunday in Stirling. I kicked off the morning with my first 10k race ever! It was pretty fun, or at least not as miserable as I thought it would be, and I did beat my time goal by a few minutes, so I was pretty happy. In more perhaps typically Scottish fashion, I ran facing a beautiful rainbow for the first 4k or so, then got rained on for a couple kilometers, and then finished the run with some beautiful cool early autumn weather. I've got a long way to go to the marathon next July, but so far I've had a good start!

Rather poor shot of a rainbow over the William Wallace National Monument. From my vantage point at the beginning of the race, I saw this rainbow arcing between Stirling Castle and the monument. It was so perfect it looked like it had been planned...and as if it was artificial.

After the race I took a long hot shower and we finished our Scottish adventure with a visit to Stirling Castle and the Wallace National Monument. If you're visiting Scotland with kids, I would highly recommend Stirling Castle. They have a new exhibit set up just for kids where they can pretend to be court musicians, tailors, painters, woodworkers, jesters, etc. It  was really fun for the boys. Wallace monument is a pain to get to and up, but the views from the top are unbelievable! We also visited a playground in Stirling this day. It's funny how our boys' favorite memories of our little trips tend to be the playgrounds. We try to spend some time at one in each city we visit.

Cannons at Stirling Castle. If we had girls, would they still be drawn to the guns?
(That's a rhetorical question.)

Laura catches me in a contemplative mood.

I catch Laura in a playful mood.

We usually don't want to do this to our kids!

Who knew our ancestors were Tudor royalty?

Looks like a lonely dinner, but the setting is nice.

Playing in the Stirling Castle gardens. Do you think those women in the background find this view fun or annoying?

I love the cool things that just pop up behind random parks around here (Wallace Monument).

Nice view from up here!

That's Stirling Castle on the right. They think most of it was decorated in that beautiful yellow wash back in the day. It would have been quite the spectacle back when it was the home of the Scottish royalty!

That pretty much covers our whirlwind trip to a corner of Scotland. However, for anyone with young kids who is visiting, I would highly recommend the Holiday Inn Express in Stirling. The hotel was fine but not spectacular, but it shares a parking lot with the EatingInn -- a modern take on the brew pub with a HUGE climbing structure. The boys played and played on it while Laura and I had some time to enjoy with each other waiting for our food. It was such a great experience on Friday that we repeated it on Sunday night. And, it was Calvin's favorite part of the trip!

BONUS PICTURE:


A few weeks ago Calvin lost his Twins ballcap when it blew off his head on a chairlift returning from a hike. I promised a replacement and much to his mother's delight and his father's chagrin he asked for a different team's ballcap as a replacement. After many weeks of waiting (I guess it got shipped by sea?!) it arrived today. I present you with Calvin and his new baseball cap:

Cultural Norms

Well, we have had a big break here as I found little time to blog while the kids were home from school for the summer and then we spent three weeks back in Maine. I have a whole crush of things to write about, and we'll see if we can get to them now.

At any rate, I thought I'd restart with a little observation that struck us over the head on our way back to the States...

We were working our way through the scrum of travelers crushing around the gate to get on the plane in Zurich when I overheard some Americans complaining about how rude it was that people weren't waiting in line. I turned and smiled to Laura, because this is just one of those things we've learned to live with. Whether planes, trains or buses, you just have to push your way in there. But, I got to thinking, is it really rude that they don't queue like Americans and Brits? It's not really impolite, I don't think, if it's not a part of the culture to queue. It's just different. I admit, it really bothered me at first, but now I'm accustomed to it....

The next day, we were driving through Boston and I nearly had a heart attack when the light turned green at my first intersection and there were another 2-3 cars that crossed my path, running their red lights. I guess I can remember that Americans drive through really yellow lights, and even red lights. That's why there's a period of time where both lights are red, right? But, I'd forgotten how bad it was. Or, maybe it's just really bad in Boston. Or, maybe people have continued to drive through later and later since we arrived in Europe? Laura and I continued to watch in astonishment, wonder, and sort of horror at each intersection as we waited for a few, well, really, a lot of, moments after each of our next lights turned green as a stream of cars continued through the intersection.

In Europe, I've gotten used to these things -->

They indicate that the light is about to turn green and cars are ready to roar through the intersection the moment their light turns. Many real Swiss actually begin rolling through the intersection while the light is still yellow/red. I can only imagine what would be the disastrous result if these worlds somehow "collided" and the norms were thrown together on a mass scale.

So, is it rude to cruise through intersections many seconds after a light is red? It's just a cultural norm, right? Still, I'd rather not have to adjust to cultural norms too often where the too-late adjustment results in death, injury, or a hefty accident bill! Our friend, Alan, tells us that Switzerland is going to make us soft. Alan, if you only knew, it already has!

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P.S. Another cultural adjustment: In Switzerland, our children have become accustomed to simply walking out into the crosswalk without looking for cars coming (they stop for pedestrians here, even if the pedestrian simply walks right onto the crosswalk without looking, because they all do). This makes visits to cities like Boston or Paris pretty nerve-wracking for the parents!!!

The most beautiful place on earth?

***A word of warning. This post is ridiculously long with an insane number of pictures. But, if you're going to title a post "The most beautiful place on earth," don't you need to justify it? ***

Apologies again for the big gap in posts, but I'm finding it very difficult to get things done over the past month and a half. Laura has been traveling a lot recently, and there was a lot to do to finish up the school year through June. Then, with the kids at home all day through July, it's been pretty hectic around here.

We had friends visit us over the first weekend in July. They arrived the same day the boys finished school, and we decided to take a quick trip to the Bernese Oberland -- the valley sections of the Alps near Bern/e and perhaps the most famous and "typically Swiss" part of Switzerland. Laura decided this was her "most beautiful place on earth." I guess I can agree, because not wanting to commit to anything, I've decided to have more than one "the most beautiful place on earth."

A photo-tour of our trip follows:

Looking across the Lauterbrunnen valley from Mürren.

That's a beautiful valley down there!

In this view, you can see how Mürren sits on a shelf in this side of the valley.

Three quarters of our family. The boys are at that age where asking them to smile
doesn't always work out too well.

Old* friends and the Lauterbrunnen valley (looking the other way).
* Not old, you know what I mean!

Watch out Elliot....
(If you look closely, you can see a paraglider in the middle distance of this photo.)

...that next step is a doozy!

These first pictures were taken just after we arrived in Mürren, when we decided to take a quick walk around town. We'd taken the train to Mürren, and in spite of making five connections (five trains plus an aerial tram) in three hours and 19 minutes, it was a pretty easy and relaxing journey. It was nice to take a trip with a group of people where I wasn't driving for once and could sit back and enjoy the view!

The journey was very scenic and kept getting better. First, we rode a train through the rolling hills of the plateaus above Lac Leman (Lake Geneva). Then, took a train from Bern into the Alps that included a run along the beautiful lakes around Interlaken. Then, a narrow gauge rail journey up into the Lauterbrunnen valley. Next, an aerial tram up the side of the valley where we gained over 1600 meters in six minutes. Finally, another narrow gauge railway trip to Mürren, this time in an 40 year old railway car along a track that skirted right along the cliff face above the valley.

We stayed at the Hotel Eiger in Mürren. It was pretty expensive, but had a wonderful room for the family, a superb deck with the most amazing views of the Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau, a pool (great for energized kids and weary parents!) and by far the best service we've had at any establishment in Switzerland. It's quite expensive, but if you're ever in the Bernese Oberland, we'd highly, highly recommend the Hotel Eiger!

We've found now, after a few trips, that while they enjoy the views, museums, churches, etc., the boys' definition of a successful day is finding a great playground. So, in order to maintain health and sanity of parents, we always try to find a place to stop and play. This was our playground in Mürren (will the kids end up rating European destinations by the quality of its play equipment?).

Kids spent 90% of their time on this, and we have a million pictures of it, but they all look pretty much the same....

Adults can get in on the fun, too!

Laura took a couple of nice portraits at this park:

The next day, our first order of business was a visit to the Schilthorn. 

Ring any bells? No? Okay, how about the restaurant on that peak called Piz Gloria? 

No? All right, how about James Bond? Do you remember that hideout the villain Blofeld had that was on top of a mountain, and James Bond got trapped there and tried to monkey-walk his way down across the cables for an aerial tram? The movie was "On Her Majesty's Secret Service," the actor was George Lazenby (the guy after Sean Connery), and the setting was the just completed revolving restaurant Piz Gloria.

We went there. More aerial trams. These things are suspended way high up in the middle of the air, and it feels like you're barely moving until you pass the tram going the other way and you realize that you are just flying up the mountains!

That's Piz Gloria we're heading for.

Random view from the tram.

Beautiful view! (And I'm talking about the foreground, not just the background!)

Panorama from Piz Gloria. Chrismas picture?

Big boy enjoying the panorama. You can see the intermediate stop where we changed trams on the tip of the mountain peak above his forearm.

Our fellow travelers head out to the mountain top, should we follow?

Good looking family!

Christmas photo? Wait, didn't we already take one of those?

Looking back at Piz Gloria at the top of the peak.
(You can also see a helicopter in the middle of this photo, against the mountains.)

Taking a break.

The other photographer!

Snow in July!

Having fun!

Two seconds before they toppled over and the smiles disappeared....

I took dozens of pictures of the flowers up here, but I'll only bore you with two.

Random family beginning a walk down toward Mürren. The lake in the background is one of the two lakes
surrounding Interlaken.

I like this because you can see the drop off into the valley. It doesn't quite give
an accurate representation of the plummet, but it's close!

Happy for the handrail. One of the few places in Switzerland that has a safety feature!

On the tram heading back down to Mürren. I like this photo because you can really see how Mürren sits on that plateau hanging onto the edge of the cliff.

Eiger...Mönch...Jungfrau. One of the most famous vistas in Switzerland.
 Sorry for the tram cable right in the middle of the picture!

So, that was just our morning activity. Next, we took a little hike in the hills above Mürren.

In a funicular singing songs from the Sound of Music. I know, I know, that's Austria, not Switzerland....

Found another park! Important to stop when you see one.

Edelweiss. Yes, it grows in Switzerland, too.

The hills are alive! Wait, wrong country again! Okay, look, it's Heidi!

Nature, it's all around me! (Moving from Rodgers & Hammerstein to The Samples.)

This was described to us as a flat walk.

Just another random beautiful view!

More nature. Flowers, meadow, trees and mountains all together this time.

The two big kids leading the way.

Hmm, looks like we'll be sharing the path with cows if we want to continue with our plan.

Yep, those are cows.

Mürren again.

This is why Calvin doesn't mind these hikes. This won't last forever; he's already getting pretty heavy!

Time for a break. Should we have lunch here?

More nature. Laura went crazy on the flowers this time....

First, let's try this with Elliot.

Add in Laura.

Let's get that same picture, but be able to pick out your faces this time!

Yep, nature again.

Where's Waldo Elliot?

What, I'm carrying him around on my back and he's sleeping?!

We found a cute little mountain stream.

Calvin wants to touch the water.

Watcha doin'?

Ooh, that's COLD!!!

I'm getting out of here!

Very proud girl found a butterfly and walked with it on her hand for 10 minutes!

Showing off her discovery!

Almost back to Mürren. Christmas photo #3?

More nature. Laura didn't notice the caterpillar until after she was looking at the flower on the camera display.

Just finished our hike. Tired, but happy!

I should mention that half way through that hike we stopped at a little farm where they made ice cream from their own cows, probably some of the same cows that you saw in the photos above. That was fun, and it helped with the kids to promise them that we'd have ice cream part way through the hike.

That's pretty much our adventure in Mürren. We were only there for two nights and one full day plus a half, but we'll definitely be returning again!