Day 44: Game of Thrones (Part 1)

Today was the first of our two Game of Thrones tours in Northern Ireland!

For this tour, we drove along the East/North coast of Ireland, stopping at a couple pretty cool spots along the way.

This is the place where Arya was in the water in season 6. Great description, right?

This is the cave where Melisandre gave birth to the shadow demon.

This is the Carrick-A-Rede rope bridge, which wasn't related to Game of Thrones but was a cool stop.

 

This is the area that serves for the Iron Islands

We also stopped at the Giant's Causeway, which wasn't related to Game of Thrones either, but was a must stop location on the coastal route.

This is the Kingsroad, but with a lot of tourists.

A little tired of riding in buses (and being sick while riding on buses)

The Purple Writer

Day 42: Glasgow

Today was our only full day in Glasgow.

Why did we only have one day in Glasgow?

Because that's how it was organized, but we all would have liked more time to explore the large city and its surrounding countryside.

As it was, we spent half the day for our photo walk.

Our photo walk's assignment was to spend a set amount of time taking a set amount of photos in a set location. (Time: 1.5 hours, Photos: 85, Location: George Square)

It was definitely an interesting exercise, finding new angles of the same spot to photograph, while also monitoring how many photos one is taking over a set amount of time.

After the photo walk, we spread out for lunch, walking around, going to the mall, eating dinner, and packing back up for our trip to Belfast tomorrow.

Liking the style of the orange-cone-hat this statue is pulling off,

The Purple Writer

Day 43: Ferry to Belfast

We traveled from Glasgow to Belfast today.

What did this entail?

We took a coach ride from Glasgow to the coast, rode a ferry to Northern Ireland, and then took another coach ride from the coast to Belfast.

When we got to Belfast, we had about half an hour to unpack and then we headed out for a photo walk.

We walked around town for a bit, took some pictures, saw a few murals, and then it started raining pretty hard so we cut it short and walked back to the hotel.

Belfast is a pretty interesting city.

Starting to feel a bit gross from this cold,

The Purple Writer

Day 41: Glencoe and Oban Distillery

We drove from Fort William to Glasgow today, via Glen Coe and Oban Distillery.

Why'd we stop by Glencoe? 

Well, it's really pretty, but it was also used for the filming of several different big franchises.

What movies, you ask? Think Bravehart, Skyfall (James Bond) and Harry Potter.

After stopping for a while to walk around and take pictures, we headed on to Oban for our tour of the Oban Distillery.

It's interesting how much the city of Oban has grown up around the distillery.

Apparently, the distillery was constructed in the relative middle of nowhere, and then people realized how great a location it was (and how great the Oban whiskey was), and now there's a booming, touristy town.

The distillery doesn't have any room to expand, however, so it's pretty compressed but also super efficient.

Logan was sick so a few of us explored the center of Glasgow a bit to find a pharmacy, before having dinner and going to sleep.

Excited to have air conditioning in this Glasgow hotel,

The Purple Writer

Day 40: Free Day in Fort William

Those of us who didn't want to die while hiking Ben Nevis had another free day today.

We wanted to go do some exciting things but ended up not doing anything, really.

It's probably better that we had a day to relax, as Logan was feeling pretty bad and needed a day off to help her recover.

We did some eating, shopping, homework, napping, and Netflix watching, and it was pretty nice.

Because I don't have much to share with you today, I'll share a couple pictures from my adventures so far.

Slowly improving my photography and Lightroom skills,

The Purple Writer

Day 39: Fort William

I'm pretty tired after a day of traveling.

We didn't really travel that far, really.

We left Portree a bit before 9am and headed off to Fort William.

We stopped by the Eilean Donan Castle as our only bathroom break (and then an unplanned stop somewhere else, after some car sickness took place).

When we got to our hotel in Fort William, we had to store our luggage for a few hours before our rooms could be made available.

I changed into warmer pants and shoes than I wore on the bus and then walked with our group about a mile into town in a very windy and cold rain.

McDonald's was a pretty good reward for that walk, and then we stopped into a few stores on our way back to the hotel, where we settled in for a few hours of homework before and after dinner.


Not excited for a 7:30am breakfast,
The Purple Writer 

Day 38: Free Day in Skye

Today was a pretty chill day in the Isle of Skye.

We woke up for breakfast and then went back to our rooms for sleep, homework and TV (while our professors went on an impressive hike).

A couple of us then went to do laundry before lunch.

After lunch we did some shopping and then more TV and more homework.

I watched the last three episodes of this season of Game of Thrones, and it was pretty fantastic.

Because I don't have much to say about this day, enjoy this picture of a sheep next to the Tulm Bay on the Isle of Skye:

Thinking I should have done more to write about, 

The Purple Writer