On-line for 24 hours -- whoopee!

I wish we were online every night so I could keep up with our adventures, but we are actually rarely online (not to mention pretty busy!)...

Here's some pix from The Gathering 2009 in Edinburgh. It is the largest gathering of the clans since the tragic battle at Culloden. The parade up the Royal Mile was amazing -- clan after clan after clan for an hour and a half, with pipers and drummers sprinkled throughout -- wow!

I wore a kilt today - purples and blues - hey, I like those colors! (We haven't downloaded the pictures yet.) The rain and sun continue to take turns -- on Friday the rain dominated, on Saturday, we had lots of sun, and then today we sometimes got sprinkled on, but nothing drastic.

We have walked all over local Edinburgh -- it's only 1.5 miles to the Queen's Castle where the event was held (Holyrood Park). The Edinburgh Castle is right up the hill from us - maybe a five minute walk. The architecture is overwhelming and we have taken hundreds of pictures -- two of flowers....these are in Scotland near the moors...We leave for Ireland on Tuesday via ferry out of Stranraer to Belfast, then on up to the northern coast to see the Giant's Causeway. We will be all over the island until next Monday when we will see Riverdance in Dublin (wow!) then hop on the 2am ferry to ride over to Wales and hopefully sleep for the three-plus hour trip! :)

Oh, did I tell you all that we walked over 600 stairs at the Salisbury Cathedral and over 400 at the York Minster? Stairs, stairs, stairs, and more stairs. At the castles and palaces, too. My knees are getting really strong!!!

Enough for now....more, much more, later!

Greetings from the Isle of Skye

We are about to drive around this amazing island where the sun came up this morning around 4am and went down last night around 10 pm. We went to a local pub for live music and my favorite piece was, (of course), Dougie's MacClean's song: Caledonia. There is a local ceilidh (traditional dance and music event) tonight, but we do not yet know if we will be here on the island or on our way to Aberdeen! The distances between cities are so short that we are constantly surprised. Yesterday we left York, spent a great deal of time at different locations on Hadrian's Wall, went to Glasgow, drove along Loch Lomond and through the Trossachs, and ended up here in Skye staying at a youth hostel! An adventure every day!!

Barry Rides an Elephant near Victoria Falls

Sometimes Busy is Great!

Finally finished weeks of heavy antibiotics and my energy is beginning to return...

Applying for many teaching positions, but not being called for any interviews yet this year.

Current plan: sub all over and hope for a situation like the one in Marin, where I stepped in as the teacher of record on Nov. 30. That's all I need to finish my credential (by Nov. 30th - actually of 2011 - prefer sooner than later!).

Enjoying beautiful daughter and happy, funny, and ENERGETIC grandsons.

Missing Barry - but glad he gets to pet lion cubs, see all sorts of wild animals, and go on some crazy adventures!

Missing Brian and Sarah - and they can't make it up just yet.

Haven't read any blogs of been on the computer in days -- sorry about no commenting, etc. Still owe grad presents to Greg and Alex!

That's all for now.