Scotland...finally!

So I may be just about the laziest blogger on the planet, especially since I don't have much to do anyways!! But here it is, without further ado...our trip to Scotland during Memorial Day weekend! Andrew and Matt planned out a fun filled, five day road trip through Scotland...and boy did we cover some ground! I think if I had to do it over again, I maybe wouldn't have tried to make so many stops (we spent A LOT of time in the car), but then again I guess if you want to see everything, you have to drive and drive and drive!

Here's basically the route we took...obviously we couldn't take straight shots like this, but you get the idea!

We arrived on Wednesday afternoon in Edinburgh, picked up our rental car, and headed out to see Stirling Castle since it was only a few minutes away. For all you Braveheart fans, William Wallace's famous bloody battle was fought just down the hill from the castle, so the boys were totally excited about that!

After the castle, we figured it wouldn't be right if we didn't try to find a proper Scottish pub and mingle with the locals. It was starting to rain pretty good too so it was a good time to head inside. We chose a pub at random and we couldn't have made a better choice!

These characters were unbelievable! Andy, who to me seemed like the local rich guy who cuts out from work early to get drunk every day at this pub, and Frankie (a bit of a loon) who everyone said was the best jazz musician in Scotland. These guys found out we were American and played every American song they could find on the jukebox (ie Neil Diamond's "Coming to America," multiple Beach Boys tracks, the band America...you get it). In the end I think we were a big hit because they bought us all a round! YES!

This pretty much ended out first day in Scotland, as we had to head back to our hotel since dinner was part of our room rate. Did I mention said hotel was a castle? (Airth Castle to be exact)

After spending the night in Edinburgh, we took off bright and early and headed north to our next stop in Fort Williams. There was some amazing scenery on the way, and we ran into this guy just playing on one of the roadside turnoffs. I like to think it was an homage to my Glendora Tartans!!!

With a quick stop in Fort Williams for lunch, we continued on our scenic drive and stopped at Eilean Donan Castle, which may have been the coldest place that my body has ever experienced! Fa-reezing! We actually didn't even go in because we were already a bit castle-d out, but it made for a great photo op nonetheless!

Here's a castle fact for ya...this one has been in a bunch of movies, a couple of which were Highlander and James Bond - The World is not Enough. But other than that, just another castle!

Our final leg of the drive for Thursday was to head even farther north to the Isle of Skye where we would be staying in the little town of Portree. This was a cute little port village, where lucky for us, they were holding the Annual Accordian and Fiddle festival right in our hotel! Okay so we actually never went to it since we chose to stay and play at a local pub instead. And because we were so far north we almost missed dinner at ANY restaurant because of the tricky sun! We figured since the sun was still out that we had plenty of time to get something to eat, but I guess we didn't pay attention to the fact that the sun stays out up there until almost midnight when most kitchens are closed...oops!

Time for a blog break. Part two of our Scottish road trip coming soon!

Skiing in the Italian Alps...No big deal.

A couple weeks ago, Andrew and I had an opportunity to get in on a last minute ski trip with some of our friends for the MLK, Jr. long weekend. Our friends Matt, Khristine, Peter, Josh and new friends Amber and Chad planned out a great weekend skiing in the Italian Alps, and lucky for us somebody cancelled...we were in! Both Andrew and I had not been skiing for at least a decade, so we really thought it would be fun to give it a try for a day or two (and most likely hurt ourselves), and then enjoy the snow and the ski lodge/bar for the rest of the weekend. Little did we know that we would totally dominate the slopes, three days in a row, and have the best time with some great people! We should probably try out for the Olympics or something next time, we were that good. (okay so we weren't professionals or anything, but by the last day we at least held our crashes to only one a piece...not bad, eh?)

We all left on Thursday, taking a flight together up to Venice, and then about a 3-hour van ride up to the Italian Alps (aka the Dolomites as the Italians call it). Because it was later in the afternoon, we really only had time to check into our hotel, drop off our bags, and hit the village for some wandering around and maybe a cocktail or two until dinner.

Our sweet hotel.

The view from our balcony. It was alright ;)

Some "yay we finally made it after traveling all day" drinks.

(Andrew's arm, Chad, Peter, Amber and Matty)

A typical scene during dinner at the hotel. Part of the room rate included a 5-course dinner every night which was followed up with stories of who took the worst spill during the day's ski runs. And by the way, the food at this place was by far the best that I've had since we moved over here! We probably would have taken pictures of it, but it was eaten within seconds of being set on the table, so sorry..no pictures.

And now for the fun part...skiing! Non of us own any snow equipment so we rented out all of our gear for the weekend, complete with helmets for everyone (a concussion caused by the inevitable falling would have ruined the fun), and went straight to the top of the slopes to teach ourselves how to ski. Slowly.

The view from the top...it sure was a long way down!

Andrew and I...photo-op at the summit.

It didn't take any of us too long to find our rhythm and scout out the easier (but not too easy) ski runs, and we had such a fun time all day skiing, laughing, and yes falling.

Chad took the "slide" approach a couple times.

Josh making it look easy.

Me dodging rogue ski poles and trying not to fall in front of everyone.

We all ended a run or two just like Peter. By the time you hit the bottom your legs are on fire and all you can do is collapse.

New snowboarder Khristine!

Thank goodness for those green pants...we never lost Matty amongst all the others on the slopes!

And the reward for getting to bottom faster than the rest of the group - a much needed break and a seat in the snow.

Although we really did enjoy our hours spent skiing all day Friday, Saturday and Sunday, we did appreciate taking a few breaks in between runs to grab some much needed food and drinks. I think I can speak for us all when I say that we found the ultimate hangout - which also served as the rendesvous point in case anyone got separated from the group or wanted to sit out for a while.

The town we were in was so far north in Italy that it was mainly a German town, with German food, German people, and best of all German beers.

The front of the lodge was turned into a makeshift ski parking lot.

How do you know which ones are yours?

This place had a spectacular view since it was just about at the top of the mountain, and plenty of outdoor seating to take in the sunshine and views of the Alps.

We usually parked it on a picnic table big enough to fit all eight of us...along with our beers and bratwursts.

We really had such a great time on this trip, and were really thankful to be added to it just in time! The best part (for me at least) was that I think we made some pretty good new friends to hang out with in Naples from here on out!

All photo credits go straight to Andrew on this trip. He was the only one who could be trusted not to fall with a fancy camera strapped to his back. And since he was the fastest skier, he raced down to the bottom every time to take pictures of the rest of us coming in behind him...or sometimes falling to the bottom. Because of that, the poor guy is hardly in any pictures! I promise we'll do better about sharing the camera and putting him in more pictures...but for now, to prove he was there, a picture of my professional skier :)

Click HERE for the rest of our pictures from the ski trip!

A Tuscan Thanksgiving - Better Late Than Never, Right?

After an almost two month blog hiatus, I figured it was about time to play catch up and finally post about our trip to Tuscany for Thanksgiving with the Merritts. Brian & Clare were living in Germany at the time, so we figured if we couldn't be home with our families it would be nice to spend our holiday with some good friends and good food. We all stayed at a bed & breakfast, managed to cook our very own Thanksgiving dinner in the smallest kitchen ever, visited a winery and strolled through the town of Siena. Since Thanksgiving seems like it was about a year ago, here's a quick recap of our trip...in pictures!

The Bed & Breakfast...

Andrew & Erin's room...aka the Thanksgiving room

My wine boy...

Makeshift outdoor wine bar - Toby the chicken chaser

The SUPER FEAST Menu

-Erin's Very First Turkey

-Clare's Green Beans

-Garlic Mashed Potatoes a la Brian

-Clare's Homemade Cranberry Sauce

-Hawaiian Rolls courtesy of the Navy base grocery store

-Erin's Apple & Walnut Stuffing (which fed us the rest of the weekend)

-Andrew's Delicious Pumpkin Pie

Day trip to Siena

Tour at the Dievole Winery..

Inside the winery - Andrew's new friend

Ready for wine tasting!

Big THANK YOU to the Merritts for a very memorable Thanksgiving weekend in Tuscany! I think we'd all agree that we celebrated in style!

Good luck to you, Brian & Clare (and Toby), with your latest adventures in Texas...we'll miss having you so close for visits!

**By the way, with our camera and the Merritt camera, we took about 8 thousand pictures so if you'd like to see the rest click here. Tuscany is so pretty, I think we all got a little camera happy!