Fairies, Elves, and probably Centaurs

It's been a week and a day since we landed in the UK. It seems so much longer than that (in a good way) because we've seen so much.

We left Bath Monday morning (at least that's what I think. I ask TC at least twice a day what day it is. They all mush together), and headed to Derbyshire. The day was spent mostly just driving and relaxing once we got to the inn (we took a night-long break from hostels).

According to Pride and Prejudice, Mr. Darcy owned half of Derbyshire, and the house that Jane Austen probably had in mind while writing about Darcy is the Chatsworth House. Now, that's all going on what I've heard, but it would make a lot of sense.

Because ohmygosh it's amazing.

Tuesday, we thought it was going to rain on us (which happens a lot here - the thinking it's going to), but the sky cleared and was very blue. I've decided England is the land of the dramatic sky. All of our surroundings looked like a painting; there were even sheep.

The inside of the house has a pretty impressive art collection and an amazing library (I have not been dreaming big enough). You can seen the doors at the bottom of this picture for scale. They were probably 8ft doors, too.

The garden is huge and lovely. We had a great time wandering around and seeing all the flowers and statues. We could not get over the sky and surroundings. I cannot tell you how many times I kept saying "Oh my word, this is gorgeous!"

I did nothing to the color of the sky in this photo!

We also took some time to have afternoon tea. It was delicious :)

There was also a small animal farm section of the property. We hung out with some guinnea pigs, pet some horses and goats, and watched a cow-milking demonstration. As we got into our car to leave, it started raining. Oh! And I had to stop to let some sheep cross the road at one point, so that's checked off my list of things to do in the UK.

We were originally going to drive to Edinburgh after that, but in our planning, we decided that was a long drive. So instead we stopped off at a hostel outside of Carlisle. That was an adventure.

The GPS got really confused because apparently there have been quite a few changes to the roads very recently in that area. So we were wandering around until after dark trying to find a tiny town in the middle of absolutely nowhere. I'm sure the surrounding were beautiful, but we missed most of the them between the hedges and the dark. When we did finally find the road that the place was on, there were about twenty cows in the way. And they did not want to move. For way too long.

We brought the number of people staying there up to four. The guy was from nearby, but the girl there was from Australia. She was super cool. We did not get a lot of sleep that night because we were talking about life and accents until late in the night. Hilarious conversation. I love hearing non-Americans try to do the American accent. Just "park the car" made us laugh for a while.

Wednesday (right?) morning we drove up to Edinburgh, where we are now. At one point we stopped on the side of the road to take pictures because the drive (the GPS took us the scenic route) was phenomenal.

On our way, we discovered that in both of our minds, Scotland is a magical, mystical land, and that maybe there would be fairies that sprinkled fairy dust on us as we crossed the border. And that elves probably lived somewhere in Scotland. Maybe even centaurs.

No fairies did we see at the border (but fairies are small and we were driving quickly, so it's not a definite), and I'm guessing the elves are in the Highlands, so maybe we'll see some in the next couple days. There is, however, a painting of a centaur on the wall of the hostel.

We checked out Portabello, which is the coastal town part of the main city. It was nice but cold. I'm the slowest at adjusting to the cold, so I've been rather pathetic for a couple days.

Today it's raining. We check out a cathedral which was pretty, and then the Edinburgh Castle. Honestly, I was a little disappointed by it. Maybe because of the weather since the views weren't as great (when everything is grey, it just isn't that exciting).

I didn't get a lot of pictures because of the rain and because I just wasn't feeling it. That part makes me sad. I really wanted to be excited about it. I guess I can't have everything. I think part of it is that this is our third city in a week and we are sort of over cities, especially since seeing the country has been so great. That and my shoes have been hating me. My feet are not accustomed to so much walking and therefore get blisters. Boo.

Tomorrow we head up to Inverness and LOCH NESS!! Nessie better be ready, because I'm willing to risk hypothermia and/or pneumonia to say hello to her.