Monday, June 04, 2012

My UK/Ireland Vacation, Part II


Here's what's been going on in Scotland, where the sheep are funny and turn up in many different colours.  I have no idea what day it is. I do know that I am back in my hotel room at the Howard Hotel. I must tell you that we chose this hotel based on the website which earnestly and extravagantly extolled the benefits of their superior concierge staff. According to the site, there was no chore too big, or too small to ask of them -- shirt ironing, suit pressing, shoe polishing, packing and unpacking, minor laundry repairs, restaurant recommendations and booking, onward journey planning including online check in for air travel, collection of shopping or gifts, hosting drinks receptions in your room or private events suite!  So I knew it would be no problem for them to find me a doctor to write me a prescription for my Epipen, which had expired.  I figured that since it will cost me $240 to refill it in the states, I can see a doctor here, and pay for the prescription for less than half of that. Therefore, before retiring for the night, I asked the concierge service to find a physician for me to visit.   At my request, the woman at the front desk looked at me with Bambi eyes and the stuttering of a would-be king and replied that my request taxed her mental abilities and that she would have to look into it further.   She called upon her partner concierge who was in a hustle and bustle to help another guest and showed little optimism for my needs to be satisfied. I gave them further information and asked them to attend to it.

Imagine my surprise when I approached the concierge at noon the next day and the 'concierge' simply stated that she didn't know: ‘But, Mary might know, but I don't see her right now…’ 

I, with bag in hand was ready to go out for the day, and asked her quite  kindly to get off her damn duff and go find this Mary and see what they'd come up with. I'm not here for the week, you know.

Twenty minutes passed while she attended to the matter, and before the sun had set, I had an appointment to see a doctor at 5:30 p.m. which would costs me 60 pounds. The Epipen, as quoted by the Boots Pharmacy, would cost another 7 pounds so, I'd be way ahead on prescription costs in the USA.

Cindy and I trudged South up the road and toured Edinburgh Castle, which was quite fun. We paid the extra fee for the headphones and recordings tour. It's funny, but what we enjoyed most about the tour was the military prison, and the general prison. At the end of the tour, I declined to put in an offer on the Castle because there was a definite lack of kitchen facilities on view. Sure, there was that stone, bread-baking oven, but, can one live on bread alone? From there we got ripped off at the local gift shops on the Royal Mile, then trudged over to the doctors office.

The 15-minute walk to the doctor’s office estimated by that fabulous concierge was really a 30 minute walk. Nevertheless, being the seasoned travelers that Cindy and I are, we arrived just in time. I filled out forms and we were then directed to the waiting area, wherein Cindy got increasingly agitated by the sick people in attendance. Pretty soon I was called into the doctor's office, and told him my request, showed him my expired Epipen and asked for a refill. He asked if I was healthy otherwise, I responded that I was so healthy it was just wrong.  He asked if I was on any other medication, I responded of course not (not, that he would ever know, that is), and he wrote out the prescription.

From there Cindy and I went to David Bann's restaurant where we enjoyed a nice vegetarian meal (please God, let me have some meat) and I embarrassed the cooks by photographing them through the little access window. Cindy and I also again made note of the proper way that people eat here in the UK. They don't just bolt down their food like people in the U.S. do, and they certainly don't eat while strolling or driving. The have their fork in their left hand, they use their knife in their right hand to gently push food onto the fork, then deftly move the fork to their mouth. So damned civilized.

Cindy even counted the number of scrapes with knife to fork before each bite from one adjacent diner. Four to six. We intend to try to eat like that from now on. Then it was a walk back to the hotel in the drizzle where I made note of the Harvey Nicks store as we passed, for future reference.

Look how I’m speeding right through this!!!

Today we awoke in time to trudge back up the big hills and arrive just in time for the start of our bus tour of the Scottish Highlands and Lochs. I don't know if it was the lack of circulated air in the van (Mercedes) or what, but Cindy and I kept fighting to stay awake. We saw some marvelous castles and some beautiful lochs and I even managed to herd some sheep in an effort to photograph them near an abandoned castle. The rain was on and off all day. Our tour stopped for lunch at a lovely little fishing village and we chose a hotel restaurant for our midday meal.  They were quite busy and we had doubts that we’d be seated and supped in time to make it back to our bus at the appointed hour.  Learning of our dilemma the sweet hostess walked us through the building to the bar where we could order lunch from the same kitchen.  Fantastic.  I finally was able to enjoy some fish and chips and, my gosh, it was wonderful. The fish was so moist, the chips so crispy.   Plus, the entertainment!  The local old men draped over the bar were quite a hoot! You'd think these regulars actually owned the bar instead of just being patrons. They kept instructing the young female barkeep  on how to do things.  A hapless tourist mistakenly entered the back of the bar through a tiny door and they shouted at the poor woman to go away, then one of the regulars used his cane to reach through the bar and slam the door shut.  Loved it.

No big dinner tonight. Tomorrow, we plan to find a pharmacy that actually stocks Epipens, visit the Parliament Building and shop at Harvey Nicks. or is it Harvey Knicks? Does it matter? It's a department store that my hairdresser insists I visit.

Today’s our last day in Edinburgh, our last day in Scotland, so I decided that I'd better have some authentic Scottish food and some Scotch, or ‘Whiskey’ as they call it here. Unless someone lied to me.  

Cindy and I have worn out Edinburgh, definitely worn out the crap shops on the Royal Mile. The day started with a visit to Boots where I picked up two new Epipens. I come to find out that the prescription was more pricey than I'd been told, but still, even with the doctor visit, I obtained two Epipens for a total price of 143 pounds, (70 pounds for doctor visit, 73 pounds for two Epipens) that's $230 U.S. dollars. It would have cost me $480 for the two in the States. Ha!

After Boots we visited Harvey Nichols and enjoyed the lovely clothes, the ugly clothes, and the quite amusing food market and restaurants on the top floor. At the food counter, there was a little circling conveyor belt on which floated different deserts in front of the diners -- just like at one of those funny sushi bar.   On the other side of the floor, just past the fancy foods area, was a sushi bar, with sushi dishes drifting by. Funny.

Cindy looked for Celtic salt and I purchased a wee little gift for Ma. Next up, Cindy was hot to go to some baked potato take-away that she'd read about -- (so it must be great, right?) I foolishly purchased one with cheese which was filled with restaurant grade, non-melting cheese, and the whole mess cooled off immediately, so I nipped into some of the potato, then wrapped it up and shoved it into my bag. I should have stuck to my desire to visit an authentic pub for lunch...but, no....

We walked to the new Scottish Parliament building and enjoyed the beautiful architecture. We got tickets (free) to sit in on the afternoon session and it was pretty darn entertaining, I think. I enjoyed a debate on the state of women's correctional facilities and loved the way that Brits express their opinions during someone else's presentation by drumming on their desks. Funny. Human. The Scottish accent can be so very deep, but, when you get into the rhythm of it, you can do alright understanding it. The people I speak to here probably feel the same way about me and my speedy American expressions.

Afterwards we wandered some streets that we'd somehow managed to miss and wound up at a large dining hall with a great many rooms. The drill there is to go up to the 'till' at the bar, order your food and drink, take your drink, and tell them where you've planted yourself so that the server can find you and bring you your food. The place was pretty crowded -- especially for the early hour, 5 ish. I ordered a nice British Beef and Ale pie with mashed potatoes and ate most everything up. Yum. Meat! It was good for soaking up the wine and the wee bit of whiskey.

I ordered a shot of Glenfiddich, had a little sip, dramatically aired out my mouth and then settled back with a glass of Australian Chardonnay and realized that I'd had an epiphany.

I've decided that in my next life, in whatever World is set before me, I will enquire after an instruction book straightaway so that, next time, things will go a bit more smoothly. No, there is no established religion that talks about such a concept, but, as I said, I had an epiphany, and in this vision I feel that, just before I'm sucked into the new world where I'll spend who knows how many years...perhaps they won't even measure it in years....it will be all so different...but before being thrown into my next life, I'll call out to God, or one of this messengers and say: "Eh, Pal? Can you give me the instruction book on how to do things right this time? And, make it quite quick, if you don't mind, because I need to absorb the knowledge completely just before landing naked in the new place.” I'll remember to do that. Perhaps one of the readers here will remind me of this plan on my deathbed so I'll have a better shot at achieving this new goal.

After that, we stumbled into some other precious stores -- Camper, Cath Kidson and Anthropologie, then returned to our little room to make arrangements to fly to Ireland first thing the next morning.
After flying into Dublin tomorrow, we will board a train for nearly 4 hours. Fun, fun, fun. We disembark in Tralee, the get a rental car which we will expertly steer out to Dingle. What a great name, right???

Cindy and I were tallying up and reviewing the hotels we've stayed in thus far. None have looked anything like they were advertised on the web. Ah, the genius of creative photography. But they've all been safe, cozy, adequate, and so far the bathroom never disappointed. In hotels number two and number three, we had heated towel racks which are a wonderful thing. But, neither of them worked. Poo. Let's see what happens in Ireland.

Good morning, it is now Friday, April 27, 2012 and it's been a long day already. Cindy and I had to get up before the crack of dawn to make our Aer Lingus flight from Edinburgh to Dublin. After checking our bags, we strolled through a lovely cosmetic and doodad shopping area, then found a table in the oversized bar/restaurant. The place was perfectly busy with men in kilts and team shirts drinking beer -- at 7:30 a.m.!!! I went to the till to order our breakfasts and waited for some kind busboy to clear the previous diner's rubbish from our table. That never happened, I bused the table myself. Oh well. I did my best to eat my scrambled eggs on toast the European way -- knife in right hand, fork in left hand, upside down, scrape food onto back of fork and bring it delicately to your mouth. Tricky business that! How will I ever get plump doing that?

It was one of those flights where you drag your things out onto the tarmac, then climb the stairs into the train. The stewardess was very sweet, especially in her demonstration to naughty travelers who put their suitcases in the overhead bins, but clearly failed to notice that it was too jammed for the bin door to close. She had long dark hair, and freckles up and down her arms, but Cindy let it be known that she was actually a natural redhead. She was quite cheerful under all conditions. We napped a bit on the one-hour flight, and then got the sweetest cab driver at the Dublin airport who was originally from Dingle. Nice, nice man.

He told us we'll really enjoy it there once we get used to the language…says they pretty much ‘sing’ to you when they are speaking, they don't know they are, but that's the way it is. We talked of politics, and his impression of Obama when he visited their country recently, 'seemed a nice enough man', then chatted about the many Republican candidates, the Eurozone, austerity measures, Brussels, Greece. When the rain started coming down on the cab his said: "here comes the soft day" -- what a lovely way to say that the rain is falling!

Once deposited at the train station we got our tickets, queued up for the train and were pleased to see our names in lights over our table seats facing each other. I am traveling backwards and am enjoying the countryside. We were joined by a couple who are taking the train to Cork for her brother's 60th birthday. She MUST be the older sister. I'm sorry to say that we weren't as welcoming as we should have been to them joining us at our table, but we were then into a week of travel, joined at the hip, and just not as gleeful as before. Bad us. To make matters a little more difficult, I tumbled a little onto the little metal strip between the seats and bruised my tailbone. 

More to come...including: rental car debacle, Cindy drives in Ireland and we arrive in the most beautiful, magical countryside in all creation.

not your usual Catalina Island shot

not your usual Catalina Island shot

fun with spelling

fun with spelling
downtown l.a.