The Best Medicine

Sadly, I had to leave my second home of Edinburgh for the awesome city of Dublin. 

But guess who's here with me? The amazing Mandy!

For those that don't know, we met at JMU on the rowing team and have been telepathically connected ever since. She's joining me for a week in the UK, taking a break with her first ever official vacation-days. 

I arrived in Dublin a day before her, and of course with my luck, I had a mild case of the flu. It was a didn't-even-feel-the-plane-take-off-because-I-passed-out-during-the-safety-talk kind of sick. So Thursday was spent watching TFIOS, (so great!!!) drinking tea, eating soup, and researching tamiflu restrictions in Ireland. Regardless, I met Mandy at the airport Friday morning and we began our galavanting!

Turns out, eleven hours of sleep and two pints of Guinness can cure the flu. Don't quote me on that, but I am living proof that it's the best medicine. 

Now that neither of us are sick nor jet lagged, there are adventures to be had and stories to be caught up on!

More on that later though; too busy eating stew and watching Cup games to post anything lengthy.

Until tomorrow!

Edinburgh Living

Whelp, sorry mom and dad but I'm staying here in Edinburgh. This is definitely my favorite city so far. There's a castle, bookshops on every corner, everyone is welcoming, you can walk to any part of the city, there's good whisky, AND Scottish accents. Ladies, you know what I'm talking about. I mean, what else could you need? There's amazing food (not like Paris but still delicious), beautiful craigs to climb close by, and the museums are all free. I have had a wonderful time here in just three short days so far, and I wish I had a million more. 

Before I go any further, you must know how to say the name 'edinburgh.' It's not like Pittsburgh. It's much more refined. First, open your mouth just a tiny bit. Like you've just walked up a flight of stairs and have to breathe harder but don't want everyone to know you are breathing hard. Perfect. Now say "ednburra" without opening up your mouth any more. Roll the Rs a bit. Now you sound just like a local! Well kinda... I can't understand half the things the locals are saying. Ever watch the movie 'Hot Fuzz'? If you haven't, go watch it now, it's hilarious. The guy that has all the unregistered guns and old sea mine? They talk like that. It's real!! And hardly anyone wears a kilt in the city. Just so you know.

But seriously, this city is gorgeous. It still feels kinda old. Not like London where you're reminded of the WWII era all the time, but back in the sixteenth century old feeling. It was the first planned city after all. 

To be honest, I think I have spent the most money here... Which is a bit embarrassing but there's so much to do!! Obviously, the museums are free but I had budgeted them out for today. More on that later... You have to pay to enter the castle and boy was it worth it! Beautiful views of the city and lots of little museums inside. They even had a prison of war from the revolutionary war. Complete with recordings of hilarious American accents saying ridiculous things like, "I'm not a pirate! Where's my eyepatch then?" And rousing speeches along the lines of "how long until we can break out of here to burn the redcoats?" You get the idea. The national military museum had the most extensive collection of war memorabilia I've very seen. And the great hall was the hull of a boat!

They have the daily firing of the one o'clock gun, to mark the time for the ships in the bay.

Why one o'clock you ask? Why not noon like any other rational marker of time? Great question! Math is the answer. Twelve shots fired costs more than one and it gets the same job done.

Blah blah blah, great historical significance, Ally... But where's the fun stuff?

Look no further! I had an amazing in time in none other than the Scottish Whisky Experience!!

It's this awesome little building next to the castle on the Royal Mile where (no joke) you ride a barrel through the distillery process and then get to sample a bunch of whiskys. I even got a membership of their special club and a free whisky glass! Some pictures from this extraordinary afternoon:

They have the largest whisky collection in the world. It was floor to ceiling, about as big as a NYC apartment, rows upon rows of only Scottish whisky. Fun fact: even after sealing the bottles, a certain percentage of it is "lost" depending on what's in it. The reasons behind this evaporation isn't really known since it varies even between bottles from the same barrel. So the Scotts decided it was supernatural and call it the Angels' Share.

I also took a couple tours. One get-your-bearings one and another dark side tour. Both guides were amazing, I highly recommend the Sandemans company when you're in Europe. But guess who we found while squelching through graveyards? (in order so scare us apparently) None other than the Dark Lord himself.

Apparently JK Rowling used this cemetery outside of the cafe where she wrote the books to draw naming ideas. There's also a McGonagall and Moody in the same area. The school through the gates gave her the idea for Hogwarts; it's four towers for the four houses. True fact!

I wish I had ages more time in this city. Alas, I fly out to Dublin tomorrow morning. Just in time for the USA V Germany game! But today has been spent resting. This morning I was raring to go to all the museums; I got to the library and the national one, but three hours into my day a cold hit me like a train. So I drifted back to my hostel and have been catching up on netflix (OITNB mentioned Outlander! One of my favorite books!!) and eating soup. Whisky helps too, I'm told. Normally I would just push through but Friday begins an amazing week with miss 'even-tempered and nice' so I don't want to be under the weather when Mandy and I are galavanting through Irish pubs or watching Henley. Even though that nickname is in quotes, please don't interpret it as sarcasm, she really is a wonderful person and very nice. 

There's Edinburgh! I hope to come back one day very soon and stay much longer. I have some heritage here so it shouldn't be difficult to persuade my ancestry-obsessed relatives to accompany me, maybe next year? 

Have a great Wednesday!

Doctor Who

I finally went to the Doctor Who Experience in Cardiff!! Just another perk of being unemployed and in Europe for the summer. It was a lot of fun, but much shorter than I expected. Turns out a lot of the props normally there were out being used for the beginning of Twelve's season. But I got to see a lot of my favorite evil aliens and even a few good ones too. Here are some pictures from my day so all you Doctor Who fans back home can be even more jealous of my adventure 😊

The only part I absolutely did not like was when you had to walk through the forest of the Weeping Angels. The statues flash from the background forward, and it's so dark all you see are them coming towards you. All I needed was another reminder of The Angels Take New York... Too soon!!

Overall it was a successful day. Even got to relax and get a little shopping done while in Cardiff. Which, if I thought shopping was stressful before I left, now it's mainly jut an argument in my head balancing the cost against the necessity and even more important, if I have room. So even though I would have loved to get the Tardis coffee mug and the 'don't blink' tshirt, they never would have fit... Oh well, that's what Amazon is for!

Greg and I started watching the series about three years ago with Nine, and we are almost caught up. Part II season 7 just got uploaded to Netflix so you know what I'll be doing my first week back! That and chipotle. Thank goodness there were no spoilers in the museum. Well except if you haven't watched any of season 7, they had the Pandorica in the experience section. 

In London now for a few days, planning on going to a good festival and the British Museum. I'll be in London a total of 8 days over three separate visits so I don't feel too rushed to see everything. Thank goodness, because I think I feel a cold coming on. No matter! On to watch the England v Uraguay game tonight in the corner pub with my host tonight!

I'll just leave this here... 

It Goes Like This

I am finally in the UK, the country in which I am spending the most time. I'm in Cardiff now, after spending a few days with family in their adorably English cottage near Bath. It was a wonderful visit and I was well taken care of. After Paris I told myself it's time to start eating normally again. Nope. My grandmother's nephew and his wife are such good cooks; I'm going to have to start running again in the mornings!

At this point, I don't get nervous anymore when I step out of the airport or off the train into a brand new place, that I have absolutely no idea where anything is. Today coming into Cardiff, I didn't even use the map on my phone. I knew approximately where the hostel was and found it somehow. Speaking of which, look how cool it is!

Took those real quick so excuse the poor quality. It's the bar downstairs, the only area with wifi so you're forced to be social. Sneaky.

For all those people reading this blog for the travel stuff, you're in luck! I have decided to do a comparison of the countries I've been to so far: the Netherlands, France, Spain, and England. I have moved 11 times to new places in the almost-month I've been away, so I feel like I finally have insight. And am very skilled at sleeping wherever, whenever.

The biggest differences reside in the transportation systems and food. That might be because these are the two things I tend to pay attention to anyhow... But regardless they are important.

The best transport system overall is... Drumroll please... Paris! The trains run every five minutes, sometimes more often, and the purchase system is so simple. You can buy a tourist card for a certain number of days and it gives you unlimited trips for metro and the bus. AND the bus!! DC would never do that...  I got a three day pass for €18, which was soooo worth it. The Netherlands was a close second but I found that bikes were much simpler to use and more common among the residents. I've used the tube in London once so far and it was not intuitive in the slightest. Let's see how it goes tomorrow when I begin my stay in the city... The Netherlands had the worst bus system; there were random exceptions that were not posted so it was all guess and check and then wait three hours for somethig to show up.

Food, of course France wins again. Everything I ate was delicious. EVERYTHING. Nutella crepes, pain au chocolat, baguettes, cheese (all kinds), macarons, wine, pasta, brick au fromage, quiche, and everything else I ate was never a disappointment. Sometimes it was a surprise because I did not always understand what I was ordering. Drinking was much nicer in Amsterdam for their beer, sangria in Barcelona, but I've found England to have the most variety so far. Tried a real (flat) beer the other night at the local pub in the village and it was actually pretty good. 

The language barrier was absolutely nonexistent in the Netherlands. I was very surprised. But as a mainly capitalistic country, and with such a small population speaking Dutch, they almost have to learn English. Wales has proved to be more difficult to decipher slang than I thought. Spain was next since I speak a bit of Spanish, and France was all gestures and "merci." The French and their language are all high emotion, no matter which it is. I saw people greeting each other with such excitement, and then yelling at strangers on the sidewalk for walking too close with the same gusto. To be honest, it was a bit exhausting, especially not understanding what was said.

Walking tours are the last thing I've done in each country. I still have Dublin, Edinburgh and London tours to do so that will be an entire post on its own. 

 Tomorrow, I am exploring Cardiff Bay and the Doctor Who Experience. There are a few other filming sites in the area so  if you are a BBC series fan, there will be lots of photos in the next post.

Cheers!

Too little time in Paris

Bonjour!

I am a bit disappointed in myself to only have one post per city; there's just so much to do and that takes up more time than telling you about it, so it shouldn't be that difficult. However, since I'm writing this blog knowing most of the people reading it, I spend a lot of time editing things in and out with certain people in mind. 'So and so' will love hearing about this, but this person will think it's dumb, and then I have to censor for the family 😁. It takes more time than you think. And now I have people from Russia and Canada reading my blog continuously! Hello there! (I can only see the country pageviews are from, not specific people.) My goal is to post more often so I don't have to write so much. 

Anyway, on to the good stuff. 

I arrived in Paris late Sunday night, after having to change my train because of the French rail strike. Just my luck to have a major strike on the one day I'm traveling into France... It's still going on now, but my train out is undisrupted despite the government's unwillingness to absolve to the unions. I arrived two hours later than it normally takes, no harm done. I am staying with a great host through AirBnB in the neighborhood of Gambetta, northeast of the center of Paris. Tons of great food places and easy to get around on the tube. Although I have yet to find an area of Paris without tons of great food places!

My first day in Paris was difficult to say the least. Since I was in a new city, it was easy to forget that everything doesn't reset and I had been walking nonstop in Barcelona. So when I went for a walking tour (definitely recommend those!) I spent most of the time thinking about how tired my legs were. Not the best way to listen to the history of Paris. It's a long one. I still got to see plenty of attractions (including the fountain Anne Hathaway threw her phone into in The Devil Wears Prada) and hear all about the French Revolution. But after that, I bought a bunch of macaroons and hightailed it back to the apartment to go to bed early. After about twelve hours of sleep, and a hearty breakfast of duck, I was finally ready to tackle Paris. 

Funny story about the Devil Wears fountain; there are two in the square where the guillotine was during the mass executions after the revolution. They are a matching set, but the city doesn't even turn on the opposite one because no one ever goes near it. That seems to be a common thing in Paris, lots of famous things but never for the right reasons.

Including this one:

 

I did all the normal touristy Paris things like the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame of course. But to be honest, it really feels like I've hardly scratched the surface of this city. Everyone always says that when they have little time to spend somewhere but there is a depth to this culture I never even imagined. Not to mention the food! I feel as if I have gained weight just in the three days I've been here, but my host keeps saying "who cares who cares?" Because if I can experience at least one thing here it should be the food. 

I wish I had taken pictures of everything I've eaten here to show you how much and how well, but I was too busy stuffing my face every few hours to be bothered. Tried macaroons for the first time. How was that my first time!?!? All you people that have tried macaroons and are my friend, those are now mutually exclusive states of being! You have not told me of these wonders! Also, Nutella crepes are amazing. Eating one on the lawn beneath the Eiffel Tower while reading and drinking wine is probably the most French I have ever felt. 

Not really sure about any other instances when I have felt French, but you get the idea. 

I attempted the Louvre. Look how happy I look, all smiley and excited to see the biggest museum in the world. It started out great, I got to see some Egyptian relics and Napoleon's apartments. But then (this is when you say dun dun dun in your head) it got very frustrating. I know that you are not supposed to try to see the whole museum, which I was not expecting to do in the slightest. But this place is confusing and gigantic! Two hours in I realized I was spending more time trying to figure out where to go rather than seeing works of art. It's frustrating walking quickly past so many beautiful things just so you can see what you want, and trying to avoid getting lost. So I left. I know, I know, "Ally I can't believe you left the Louvre! It's only the greatest collection of art in the world! You're in Paris, you have to see the Louvre!" Deal with it. That's the beauty of traveling by yourself, you can do whatever the (censored) you want. Instead, I went to Museo L'Orangerie which I am so happy about. It houses the famous water lily wall-sized paintings by Claude Monet.

There are two rooms with four paintings each, reflecting the light of every time of day. It was magical. I sat there for about two hours. Cezanne was there as an exposition as well, one of my favorite artists. 

He is known as the father of modern art. At the beginning of his career he was doing his thing, hangin out with Renoir and all the other warm and fuzzy painters. Then he was like, 'nah I'm done with this lets try something exciting,' and in the middle of everything changed his style completely.

I've always admired that; being able to change so drastically just because you feel like it. It's not as if he wasn't already doing great things and impressing students or collectors, he just wanted something new. 

So the L'Orangeria was much more manageable and they gave me a student discount so today was successful. Plus I had an amazing dinner of lamb couscous. The food so nice they named it twice. Tomorrow I hop on another train to Bath to stay with some family for a few days and then on to London!

 

Barna!!

Better settle in and get comfy, this is going to be a lot to catch up on! 

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile (mom keeps reminding me I have a readership), I have been super busy here in Barcelona.

It started out with a much needed scenery change. Being in a country with a good chunk meant to be underwater is a bit draining. But of course you don't realize that until you land in Spain and see mountains again. *small sigh of relief*

I have found Barcelona much easier to navigate than expected. Their public transportation system is awesome, and my 6 years of Spanish are finally coming in handy. Haven't had to use it much, but at the end of day three, trying to change my train ticket I communicated about 30% in Spanish. I understand now how much easier it is to learn when you are forced to use it or lose it. 

Quick laundry list of what I've done so far:

Walking tour, where I met a bunch of great people!

Saw Sagrada Familia with a few of those great people.

Found out that Spain doesn't really sell deodorant...

Learned how to make seafood paella at a cooking class. Some of the attendees volunteered to help and I wish they hadn't because of their horrendous knife skills...

Drank some Sangria.

Hiked to the Castell du Montjuic (that was far).

Went to a club on the beach.

Got really lost in the Gothic quarter, which is built on top of the Roman streets.

Made my own tapas sitting on the beach.

Drank more Sangria. Because why not? 

And finally, "survived" the French transportation strike. Really, my train got cancelled so I have to take a four hour detour to Paris tomorrow. Whoooo

Some pictures from my many activities:

On Castell du Monjuic. 

It was a military fort that both protected and controlled Barcelona in it's long history. It was started in the early 9th century, so very old. 

The cooking class

On the walking tour; the last place Gaudi was before he died, and the first area that was bombed at the start of the Spanish Civil War.

In the central square.

I tried to get into the Catedral de Barcelona but I completely forgot about the dress code and got turned away for wearing shorts. I will refrain from getting on my soapbox about that.

Tomorrow my plan is to get some food at la Placa de Boqueria and relax on the beach until my train leaves.

Hope everyone is enjoying the humidity back home, it's been 75-80 degrees and no more than 70% here all week! 

Permaculture

This post is for those interested in the actual work I did this week while wwoofing. I know not everyone wants to hear the technical ramblings and I did not want to make them weed through my other posts (ha see what I did there?).

I made a few references to the idea and practices of permaculture in my post when I first arrived, but I do not believe I did enough justice. I also learned a bit more...

There is a lot of letting nature do its thing in this particular garden. Obviously there are not any pesticides or insecticides used, which means a few weeds. But we only pull out the weeds if they hinder walking through the pathways. 

Otherwise, they are there to help pollinate the other food-producing plants. And I have never seen so much pollinating going on in such a small space!! The garden actually hums with excitement from the bees and flies. It's definitely working, everything grows so fast here.

Yesterday:

Today:

The poppies just exploded today! 

The paths exist only so we can harvest, otherwise the garden would be just one giant conglomerate of growth. Everything growing inside the rings is there for a purpose, so it needs to stay there. When I weed, I lay the weeds and their bare roots around the stalks of the plants we want so that the weed corpses protect the plant from the sun and other weed seeds. All plants have a reason for being there, and we do not discriminate. Also interesting fact; the Dutch call Weed (marijuana) 'wheet', so we had some very confusing conversations while working in the ring with the Wheat (grain). Each household is legally allowed to grow five weed plants per person, which a lot of people in this area take advantage of. Apparently there's a guy close by that built a house out of hemp. 

There are several water sources throughout the garden either in effect already or being planned. Ponds and/or canals are for irrigation and attracting animals that eat pests. Rain barrels are used now to water everything in dry weeks.  

The potatoes are in an experiment now; instead of planting then in the soil, they planted them in a thick layer of straw. The idea is that when they are ready to harvest, you just pull up the straw and bam! There are the potatoes fully grown and without disease! I'm interested to see if it's going to work. Almost the same thing was done with the corn. Which I thought they kept calling "mice" until I realized it was meant to be "maize." They have dealt with tomato blight by stabbing a copper wire through the stalks when they are still young, instead of using a copper spray. The pumpkins are planted in boxes to contain their roots system a little better. They have a cold and hot compost, which I don't think both are necessary since weeds are not seen as a bad thing in the garden. But any and all "biologicish" soil amendments are welcome in this garden.

There are a couple of things uniquely different here from how farms work in the United States. Firstly, providing great juxtaposition to my time working with organic+ agriculture is that we are basically on a conventional farm. There's a wheat field directly behind the garden that gets sprayed, and a factory chicken farm butting up against the property line. The two farms are so close to each other. 

I'm standing in the outer ring of the garden in both of these.

The other different thing is that these farms are not in a rural setting. It's called rural to those that live in the Netherlands, but we would not consider it rural.

This is the driveway to the farm:

And the street they live on:

It's in a neighborhood! One of my hosts always exclaims how quiet it is here, but all I hear are cars going by all the time. All relative I guess.

So in conclusion, I like the idea of permaculture, but it felt too disorganized to me. I think maybe a smaller garden using permaculture might be easier and more manageable alongside an organic garden. Especially to help with pollination. 

My next farm will be very different. It's in the Scottish highlands, close to the water. Will be fun to compare and contrast again!

Moving on up

It's my last day on my first WWOOF farm! This one has been MUCH better than the one I left last week. No slave labor. You shouldn't laugh at that joke, it's a terrible one.

I fly out to Barcelona tomorrow and I have to say I am a bit disappointed to leave so soon. My hosts have been very gracious, and patient with my endless questions about permaculture. I won't bore those of you that are following me for the adventures, so I'll make a separate post for my eco/ag friends who are following along.

My Facebook account is finally back in my hands! I was hacked a couple days ago so there were 48 hours of radio silence. I'm a bit disappointed that it was locked down during my birthday because who doesn't look forward to opening up your profile and seeing you have 56 notifications? Only happens on your birthday 😄 I got to speak to my parents and emails from the family and friends rolled in, so I still felt connected to my loved ones on my birthday. Bought myself some ice cream and read in the garden all day (The Fault In Our Stars; SO GOOD!!). Pretty much what I would have done in the States, but maybe with more wine. Or any wine.

Tonight, we had a great dinner on the patio. Since half the household is vegetarian, we had a semi-BBQ meal. I was the only one with grilling experience so basically the whole operation was on my shoulders. And they only have an electric grill... Made me miss the awesome meals Greg and I make during the summer on the "real" grill.

But it was a great way to end my stay here; a beautiful day, lots of laughter, and good food. 

Finally on the farm

Did you know that the government tests the alarm system every first Monday of each month in the Netherlands? Because I didn't. That was really fun, imagining all of the ways I was about to die from as I ran across the field towards the farm house with six sirens going off from all directions...

That was my first day on the farm. Rather exciting right? But it actually was! Apart from my "near death experience," I had an amazing day. This establishment has two of my favorite things, education/psychology and agriculture. The 'farm,' or rather a very large garden with a field behind it, also has a foundation with a  small scale school open to everyone, but mostly children with autism and any sort of learning issues attend. I hope to be able to sit in on a lesson sometime this week so I can learn more about how it is run.

Now on to the good stuff.

The garden is set up by the principles of permaculture. For those of you that were not close enough to hear my stories about agriculture during my JMU days, permaculture is the practice of holistic management in a garden through the irrigation, nutrient systems, and design; it is made to keep a closed nutrient loop throughout the property. For example, the chickens they keep are let into the garden to eat slugs and poop everywhere, therefore keeping the nutrient cycle closed. Theoretically nothing will enter or leave the loop. This particular garden is set up in a commonly used design, a wheel. At the center they have an apple tree, surrounded by circles and paths which get get higher as you move towards the outside. This helps block the wind and allows for a variation in shade and sun so species diversity is greater within the wheel. The perception I have about this practice is that you have to try everything the wrong way before you can do everything right. As D (woman running the farm) was leading me through the tour, there was a lot of, "and we hope this is going to work," or, "let's hope those will make it."

Throughout my environmental classes, we

path between two circles

touched briefly on permaculture but never had the time to delve into the details as much as I had hoped. Now I get to work in the midst of a growing permaculture farm! It is their first year on this land so everything is new and experimental. But my favorite part is that when you are weeding, you don't have to worry about putting the weeds into a wheelbarrow or burning them, you just
shake off all the dirt from the roots and place them in a little alcove between the other plants. The idea is that the soil will build a tolerance but until then, will benefit from the nutrients the decaying weeds provide. I'm not too convinced on that, but hey, no more wheelbarrow trips for me!
So today I cleared some of the paths of weeds, tried to fill in holes in the students' playing field, and trimmed these plants that are the devil himself. They are called burn nettles; great for making tea to increase the iron in your blood, but terrible for touching. I was warned of them, so I donned gloves, pants, and a long sleeve shirt. I was completely covered! Except for that little tiny space on my wrist between the gloves and sleeves. That was terrible. It burned for about an hour and faintly still stings, but all I have left to show of the ordeal are two tiny little red dots. Luckily I do not have to deal with that section again for the rest of the week. I have plenty of other fun things to do. AND...

THEY HAVE RABBITS!

I finally figured out how to format my pictures, so make sure you check out "Where the wild things grow" page for all the stuff that doesn't make it into these posts.

Goedenacht!