June, 2022
We are back to the UK – this time for about a month, planning to travel mainly in Scotland.
London, England
June 3, 2022
When the celebrations of the Queen’s reign Platinum Jubilee meet the Pride Month…
Colorful, joyful and, as usual, London is full of tourists. At first, we did not understand why there are almost no cars on the streets, and the whole city is full of UK flags, and then it turned out that we landed exactly for the weekend of the official celebrations – Jubilee weekend. Add to that the colors of the ‘Proud holiday’ and pleasant weather and you get a particularly festive feeling. And of course, the TV broadcasts are focused on military parades of people with funny hats and carriages with women in fluffy hats.
York, England
June 6, 2022
We continued to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee in the Old City of York. It turns out that the famous Shambles street was the inspiration for Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter movie. Of course, this fact attracts thousands of visitors who are willing to stand in a very long line to enter stores that sell all the best products related to the world’s famous child-magician. Fun fact – the film was never shot on this site… the famous street was built in the studios.
The city itself is definitely worth a visit.
Yorkshire Dales National Park, England
June 8, 2022
The most common word we’ve all heard in the context of England’s landscapes is ‘green’… so green here. So indeed, there is no novelty here, just a certain envy of this country with its special color. Of course, the price is mostly wet weather and also cold – we are already approaching mid-June and we found ourselves digging in the depths of our car’s trunk to take out the coats we have already stored deep, having in mind and hoping for that the cold is over and we are already in the summer. So, the summer in the north of England meanwhile is more like a cold winter in Tel Aviv.
By the way an interesting phenomenon, we saw several weddings on the way where the groom arrived in… a tractor! We do indeed drive mostly on side roads and country roads and yet we were surprised by this demonstration of agricultural loyalty 😊.
Strathpeffer, Highlands Scotland
June 10, 2022
We are in the Highlands of Scotland. And even though we are deep in the area where we are not supposed to understand the spoken language (because you know … Scots speak funny), to our surprise we have not yet heard standard Scottish English! We heard a lot of different accents but not Scottish … and we have prepared for it – we practiced rolling our eyes and raising our ears, but in the meantime in vain 😉.
Also, everywhere there are pictures and dolls of a giant bull with a pony, so we found him! By the way his hairstyle looks much neater than that of the British Prime Minister 😉.
P.S. We passed Loch Ness along its entire length, we checked, we searched … there is no monster here 😊.
Edinburgh
July 16, 2022
The weirdo’s density indicator…
Admittedly I only invented it now, but it exists in every big city 🙂 – how many weird and special types of people you meet in every square meter 😉. So, which big city do you think leads here? I think it’s still London, but Edinburgh is really close to it (especially on the weekends)! You do not know who to look at first: a group of women in strange uniforms celebrating something (some are celebrating the ‘brides to be’, but there were quite a few more and it wasn’t not clear what they were celebrating); men in skirts, some are playing an instrument that by itself stands out in the musical instruments community (the bagpipe of course 🤔); a group of naked cyclists (!), we could not figure out why…; and many more colorful types… Edinburgh – 9 on the weirdo’s scale 😊.
England
June 21, 2022
Roads – our default Google Maps setting is “Avoid Highways”, usually this is still not enough, so we look for the thinnest roads on the map that lead in our direction. In England these roads will be narrow to the passage of two vehicles, so if a vehicle comes in front of you, you need to find a slight widening of the road and let the vehicle pass. The British are so polite that if they see you from half a mile away they will stop at the side and signal you to pass, and finally even wave as appreciation for letting them do you a favor.
These roads meander through green fields, sometimes surrounded by bush fences, and sometimes in dark woods and there is no greater fun than driving through them for hours. Everything is well and nice as long as only few vehicles pass on the road, but we have often encountered such narrow roads that have a lot of traffic that includes trucks and buses, and then crossing each mile takes hours. Then I ask myself: “What is the problem to add another 30 cm across the road and at the same time use the opportunity to take care of cellular reception as well? ” And I answer myself: “Do not change anything – that’s exactly how this should be!”
England to France
June 29, 2022
We’re parting from England… for now. Stunning views (we have also visited Lake District which did not disappoint), welcoming pubs, English spoken everywhere and lots of castles. Today we crossed the channel and we are in France. One thing has not changed – the lack of cellular reception in the villages, but we are sure that the quality of the food will compensate for it.
On the way to Berlin
July 3, 2022
Three countries in three days (once there were organized trips like that, remember?) – we passed France and Belgium without noticing… we did not eat French food or Belgian waffles and we did not drink Belgian beer… Now we are in Germany, traveling between the endless wheat fields. And yes, some of us have already eaten a huge sausage and some of us have been drinking German wheat beer. We arrived in Berlin…
Berlin
July 4, 2022
Sheldon from the Big Bang Theory looks at the dish in front of him and says – I do not understand my food. We came to Berlin and after two days of walking the city (20 km every day) we say – we do not understand this city. Yes it has a lot of cafes, bars and restaurants, full of shows, and even there is an international music box festival, but we could not find the special charm in it – like the history and romanticism of Paris, the frenzy of Barcelona or the strangeness of London – Berlin is just another city. To her credit it should be said that we were only here for two days and maybe need more time to fall in love with her (like in Edinburgh or Tel Aviv). Spoiler alert – Sheldon threw in the trash the dish he did not understand.
Romania
July 11, 2022
As part of our ten countries in ten days travel we passed Poland and Slovakia. Poland is really cool (we were in Poznan and Krakow) and it should be noted that we liked them much more than Berlin. Young cities with a good vibe and interesting history. Slovakia on the other hand looks less developed with signs of poorness at the edges, (except for Kosice which is very nice). And now we are already in Romania, right on the border of Ukraine which we bypassed from the south for obvious reasons. In two days flying to Israel (God and airports willing 😉)
P.S. How do we know we arrived in Romania? There are many stork nests on the electricity poles, fruit and vegetable stalls by the roadsides and horse-drawn carts 😊… and of course the prices that have dropped by dozens percent’s..
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1 thought on “England and Scotland”
I like scotland
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