8/3/17
I've been in Spain for a week now, so of course I'm only just now writing about my travels in Scotland. You'll notice I didn't mention England or London; that's on purpose. While I did stay 3 whole days in London I just absolutely fell in love with the whole country of Scotland. It's probably not fair to make this judgement after spending an action packed week in Scotland and a fever filled few days in London, but there's always time to go back and change my mind!
My original plan was to write about my entire trip in one post, but after writing my way through Glasgow and Edinburgh I already had a novel's worht of blog post so I've decided to split them up into each destination. So, without further ado: Let me tell you about beautiful Glasgow:
Glasgow
Off my plane and straight onto a train, only to walk about 100 meters before packing my bags into a car. The first stop in our Scotland trip would be the largest city in Scotland, an industrial beauty named Glasgow! After eight hours of driving (Lets' be real, I was asleep for seven of those hours) we rolled up to a shelled out church with a sign proclaiming it was "The Tartan Lodge." My sister wanted to see the city, I wanted to sleep. Jet lag never hit me so hard, and before she could complain I was out like a light. The hostel was perfect for our one night stay, it had plenty of space and was completely covered in plaid, which was just
so scottish. I would later learn that Tartan is actually what they call their plaid in Scotland, and it is a very important part of Scottish clans and culture. Men wear there tartan on their kilts, and women on their sashes, the colors of which tells the world whether you belong to clan MacDonald, MacAlistair, or all the many other clans in between. If you are wearing a tartan kilt of your clan's colors, you had better hope you don't run into a rival clan! Their grudges survive over centuries.
After passing some beautifully derelict buildings, my sister and I made it to our sinister first stop: Necropolis. Even the name is enough to bring chills to your bones. My sister proudly declared that is was the largest cemetery in the United Kingdom before promptly being corrected to a local. Biggest cemetery or not, the Victorian cemetery is absolutely beautiful situated on a small hill across from Clasgow Cathedral and littered with everything from ruined tombstones to large monuments to intricate mausoleums. We were told that if you lifted the grass up the entire ground would be filled with bones, giving it the nickname City of the Dead. It definitely felt strange to be walking around it and taking photos as if were any other park.
After exploring Necropolis we made a stop at Glasgow Cathedral, a really beautiful old building that was fun to look around. Straight across form the Cathedral is Glasgow's oldest house, built in 1471. That place was really built to last! Most of our day was spent walking around the city enjoying the architecture and ambiance. Some favorite stops were a point called "The Lighthouse" which housed an architecture center in an old lighthouse and allowed for amazing views of the city, and a statue whom the locals call "Wee man with a cone on his head." Which looks almost like it sounds; a statue of a man on a horse with a bright orange traffic cone on his head. Apparently the locals are fiercely protective of him and there was a long and drawn out battle to keep city council from removing the cone. Unfortunately we didn't have more time in Glasgow, but I felt as if I had seen all I wanted to, minus a few museums and restaurants.
Advice:
My advice for anyone visiting Glasgow: Talk to people! There are tourism banners all around the city proclaiming that "People Make Glasgow" and it's really true. Outside of Necropolis the local who corrected my sister also had some really insightful facts about the cemetery that I never would have known about otherwise. Similarly, we would have never visited the oldest house in Glasgow (or learned that it's probably haunted) if it weren't for the friendly locals. I am SUPER shy talking to people, but the citizens of Glasgow made it easy for me.
