Elizabeth and I parted ways from our Calvin friends in London and took the ferry over to the Netherlands. My dad's old college friend Dirk Dijk met us at the train station in Amsterdam and we spent the following week with his family. Most of our days began with a walk through the Vondelpark on the way into the city. Most of them ended with rain, and three different times, hail. After a few days of being in the city, we both agreed that Amsterdam is much friendlier, prettier, cleaner, and more accessible than London (although that's a classic city with its own personality and merits). The canals, the trees, and the flowers are beautiful this time of year. The city has a unique charm, a combination of modern and quaint, the high old houses with their high facades and the pulsing dance beats pouring out of the doors of American clothing stores.
One day, Dirk drove us through Vriesland, the home of Elizabeth's forebears. Among other things, I was forced to try raw herring, which is apparently a very Dutch delicacy. I was much less thrilled about it than Elizabeth, who finished off the last two thirds of mine.
A constant source of entertainment was the Dijks' parakeet Yoshi, named after Mario's reptilian steed, who had a morning ritual of ringing two sets of bells, banging his beak against a little mirror and then staring down his reflection for a few seconds. He could also mimic a few words, which he tended to do a random times during dinner, to our amusement.
After Amsterdam, Elizabeth and I took the ferry back to England and waited in London for two days until her mom and brother arrived. We had some fun the first night, from about midnight until two, trying to find the hostel, which we eventually realized was located above a pub we'd passed several times. The next day we took the train to Oxford. It was a beautifully warm and sunny day, perfect for strolling the medieval streets and neo-classical gardens, perusing labyrinthine bookstores, and eating lunch and dinner in the Eagle and Child, the pub where Tolkien, Lewis, and the other Inklings had their weekly pints and debates.
On the second half of break, after Elizabeth met up with her family to go to Italy, I took a train deep into the Western Highlands of Scotland, real primordial countryside whose mountains can be both extremely beautiful and terrifying. There was one point where I looked up from the rocky path I was hiking and saw this huge black mountain looming over me and felt like it was about to crush me. It was a very Shadow-of-the-Colossus-esque moment (that one's for you, Dan).
The first day, I was walking along the railroad track to the only hostel for twenty miles (I booked my train before I knew the area, being the thorough planner that I am) when I heard a sound like thunder and I saw a herd of highland deer running across the moor about a hundred and fifty yards from where I was standing. I carried a sharp rock around the rest of that day in case I met a buck. It was around that time that I wondered whether there were any wolves or bears in the Highlands, something I'm still unsure about, although I didn't see any.
The second day of hiking was the most wearying and rewarding of the trip. I hiked for about nine hours across marshy moorland, over a corbett, through a river valley, across another moor, along a reservoir, across the reservoir dam, back across the reservoir dam (a navigational error), and down into another river valley before finally arriving at Kinlochleven. With mistakes, the journey couldn't have been less than 15 miles through rough country. But it was worth it when I flopped down in the first inn I came across in town and ate the first hot meal I'd had in 48 hours. That meal was perfection: a bowl of nachos, lasagna, chips, salad, a glass of Bellhaven, and a Gaelic coffee.
I watched Britain's first ever debate between the candidates for Prime Minister with an old Scotsman who kept making sarcastic remarks about all three. I guess a healthy dose of ire is the birthright of a people "colonized by wankers" in the words of Ewan McGregor in Trainspotting.
Glen Coe, ancestral home of Clan MacDonald was quiet and lovely. Walking along the road to my hostel both nights, I glimpsed a shining white horse grazing in the trees.
Along my hikes, I generally ran out of water about halfway. But one of the perks of being in the highlands is that (nearly) all the streams coming out of the hills are pristine. At least that was the reasoning I used. I figured that giardia was better than a lonely death of dehydration. I'll let you know if anything develops.
All in all a successful trip. A few moments of terror, as when I got out of my league trying to hike a munro and had to drop my backpack about twenty feet down a waterfall in order to scramble down myself (I retrieved it none the worse for wear), but thankfully I was kept free from any serious bodily harm. The worst of it is a persistent blister on my left heel, but that's my fault for not keeping up my exercise beforehand.
Thanks for reading.
A couple photos of the area taken from the internet. My own photos are on a pair of undeveloped disposable cameras. In order: a portion of Glen Coe, Rannoch Moor, Buchaille Etive Mor, and the famous Clachaig Inn.
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