Edinburgh

Yes, I'm back from Scotland! We really only did one full day of touring and such, but it was definitely a great time and I think that we made the most of it. Immediately upon arrival, we checked into our hostel (by the way, if you're looking for a good hostel, I definitely recommend Budget Backpackers) and headed to the pubs. I don't know if it was where we were or what, but the pubs we went to in Edinburgh were...ew. Let's just leave it at that.
The next morning we got up nice and early to go out and explore the town. After walking by a few shops, we decided to go to a free art museum (very cool, but we couldn't take pictures). The museum housed everything from portraits to landscapes to abstract art, oil on canvas and wood panel and sculptures. We even ran into an art school class, sat in for a few minutes, and realized that we had no idea what the professor was talking about so we decided to leave. Next door to the art museum was this amazing tower called the Scott Monument. I'm pretty much obsessed with it. I was really not feeling well so I didn't climb to the top, but a bunch of my friends did and they took pictures which you can view in my album. After the monument we walked around for awhile up to this random hill that overlooked the whole city, which was absolutely beautiful. We sat there for a bit and then headed to Edinburgh Castle to see the cannon fire. We also got to walk around the grounds and check out all of the museums they had; there were a ton of war artifacts and paintings everywhere and it was really interesting to see the pride that the Scottish have in their history. We also got to see the crown jewels, which have a whole museum dedicated to them. They were breathtaking in person, and I'm definitely disappointed that we weren't able to take pictures of them because they were the best part of the whole castle, hands down.
Post-touring the city we went to some random pub who gave us 2-for-1 on lunches. That's right, two meals for the price of one. Unfortunately, I was with a bunch of boys who actually wanted their own two meals so I had to pay full price. Bummer. After lunch we took a little break to recharge our batteries (by this time it was about 4pm) and while some of us relaxed and napped, others went up to Arthur's Seat. I'm a bit sad that I didn't get to go to Arthur's Seat, but I'm not sure that I would have been physically capable to get up there because I was so tired. We all met up again around 7pm to go on a famous Edinburgh ghost tour, where we heard some history about St. Giles church, witch burnings, and peasants living in underground vaults. Apparently there is some paranormal activity known to have taken place in the vaults, although it seems nobody really experienced anything. There is an active Wiccan church that is located in one of the vaults, which is really creepy because there is nothing else down there but stone, water, and slime. We did, however, get scared to death by a woman who ran up to us in one of the vaults, screamed, and ran away. It was part of the tour, so I guess at least we didn't pay money to not get scared. That's right, double negative. After the tour we went to a pub crawl that was absolutely insane and as I said before, most of the pubs were horrible. So, word of advice, if you ever go to Edinburgh, beware of the pubs.
Lastly, as always, here is the link to my photo album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2008463&id=1083330009&l=85124