There has been a steady rain today, but it's not bad. I kinda like it when I don't have to walk around a city in sopping wet shoes, haha. It seems as if every Thursday it has to rain! But I hope it doesn't on the last Thursday I'm here - that's when we go to visit the Whitelee Windfarm in Glasgow as my excursion for Green Politics. I'm excited to see a turbine in person! (And I've wanted to see a windmill ever since "Wishbone" did that episode on Don Quixote when I was little, but that's an entirely different thing.)
Yesterday we went to Glasgow for a visit to the city. I knew that this was the largest city in Scotland, but I was totally unprepared for the size. I was expecting something a little bigger than St. Andrews, and a little more modernized. Hah! If you compare population sizes, Glasgow has 581,320 while St. Andrews has 16,680.
Right...
But even Edinburgh has 454,280 - the second largest by population - and it seemed so much more manageable! (If you want to see more cities/towns by population size, here is the credible source of Wikipedia.) Mind you, I've never been to any really big cities where I had to maneuver around, so I don't know what that makes my chances of survival in a place like New York City or Chicago...
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| George Square. First look at the city. |
Back to Thursday: Glasgow is a really a neat place! There are so many places to look around and shops to go in (yes, plenty of shops to go in). We were dropped off in George Square and given free range over the map of the city. Now Glasgow (pronounced "Gläz-ghɒ" .. I looked up the little letter things and the ä is a short 'a' like in "father" while the ɒ is an open back rounded vowel. If you want to hear a sample, just click here. Note that this is my interpretation of how people are pronouncing things - this is by no means legitimate. Disclaimer.) is known for it's architecture, and I can definitely see why. All of the buildings are so interesting to look at!
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| Sophie's tea strainer. We ordered loose-leaf tea! |
Also, in walking around in different places in Scotland, I have noticed a great many Costa Coffee Shops. I guess they're really popular around here. Sophie and I went into one the other day and it was really good! I got some Raspberry Iced Tea and a Raspberry Almond Bake. Yum. I think I was in a raspberry mood. But speaking of tea and yummy things, while in Glasgow, my friends (Sophie and Teran) and I went to The Willow Tea Room for afternoon tea. It's situated above a store with very breakable things down below...so don't knock off a sugar cube or you might be paying for more than the tea and biscuits!
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| Blurry picture of "treelings". |
Another thing I've noticed over here is the great care that they take in planting trees. Forestry is a big industry in Scotland, especially considering how much open land that there is in the Highlands that no one lives on, but I have never seen so many trees planted all around the country. We saw areas that had been cleared on our tour last Saturday, but for every area that had been cleared, there was another full of little saplings. They put a plastic tube covering around them so that they have a chance to survive before they are eaten by little critters or eroded away by the rain. Yesterday, on the way back from Glasgow, there were hundreds of little trees planted on the sides of the highway.
And to conclude, for all of you runners/cyclists out there, try this one out:
That's a tiny bit over 118 miles! And someone mapped this route! I can't even imagine.
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