Hey guys,

I've been in Edinburgh for over a month now and so far i've told you absolutely nothing it hahahahaha. Well the beauty about writing it like this is i can make it sounds like i've been incredibly busy doing non-stop tourist things rather than sitting on the couch watching TV like I may or may not have done a fair bit of over here.

No seriously, I've had an awesome time in the Uk and I've been lucky enough to get around to a few places but here's a summary:

Sept. 17th- Oct 10th: Edinburgh

Oct 10th- 12th: Tour of Scottish Highlands

Oct 13th- 16th: London

Oct 17- 20th: Liverpool and Manchester

Edinburgh was the first stop on the agenda after being prematurely kicked out (just in case you've forgot in between the extended periods when I have neglected to write anything!) and Greg and I were lucky enough to score some accommodation just near the city centre with Jo from my summer camp. While i had planned to come and stay with Jo for 2 weeks in late oct, i don't think she really expected me to hang around for over a month now...poor girl can't get rid of me!

Edinburgh is a gorgeous city that deosn't really feel like an imposing city at all. It's skyline doens't have towering skyscapers or office blokes and most of the buildings are old stone buildings I(i could pretend to name the period of architecture...hmm early victorian sounds good) or pretty nice modern glass buildings. Edinburgh Castle is a focal point with the city just kind of sprawling outwards from the hill it's perched on in the city of town. There's heaps to see luckily so i've done a fair bit of walking round town going to museums, a really really poor ghost tour, seeing a comedy show, clubbing, visiting the queen's scottish residence and a few other touristy things.

Greggy and i took off for a short tour up to the highlands a week or so ago and that was amazing! The mountain ranges and the coastline, the islands, the castle and the history was all pretty impressive. SO WAS THE BLISTERING COLD! My lack of facial and body hair is probably a good indication of how well i can handle the cold. The group of people on the tour were great as well with a lot of aussies, kiwis and an american or two. It seems like everywhere you go you can't escape the bloody aussies.

After the tour i headed down to London to stay with another friend from camp and managed to see a fair few touristy thing like big ben, westminster abbey, st paul's etc but 2 days probably wasn't long enough hehehe I stayed in whitechapel which was really interesting too...go an pull out the monopoly board and check out where that one is!!! pretty sure Gordon Brown doesn't stay in white chapel.

After a few days Clem (my london host) sam (another aussie from camp) and I headed up to manchester to visit some pommy friends from camp and have a mini reunion. I've only just returned from manchester today and am not really feeling all that amazing to be honest. The thursday we spent in manchester, friday we headed to Liverpool, Saturday was our tour of Liverpool and reunion party and sunday was a student party in manchester. The reunion with the pommy camp counsellor was awesome not only 'cause we got to catchup on all the stories and stuff but also for the amazing tour of downtown liverpool and a few of the Beatles hangouts from the 60s. Going to the pub to watch Liverpool play was pretty cool, they definitely do hooliganinsm pretty well over here. Our night out in liverpool was crazy too, i've never seen so many intoxicated people wandering the streets, passed out or buying pizza at 4am...actually I lie, sunday night was more impressive!

The club we went to on sat was called Pop World and had probably the most camp DJ known to man...i don't think shania twain or Kylie Minogue have ever been played so much in public...funny doesn't even describe it. Seeing a 19y.o bloke go home with a 35y.o liverpuddlian was possibly even funnier!! i won't go into details.

Sunday night was your typical student led pub crawl/ dance party with probably close to 1000 people wandering in matching fluro shirts and not much else. (the shirts were your ticket into each pub/club). Both nights were sensational and went some way to making up for the atrocious weather that seems to be constantly making you cold or wet or both.

Despite the weather and the fact the aussie dollar is probably worth less than trading in sea shells at the moment over here, the UK is fantastic. I've been incredibly lucky to have some very generous people put me up for a few nights or a month (Jo, i kinda owe you big time) and there's so many things to see! The history is overwhelming and you do get a bit confused as to how old everything bloody is! I'm off to ireland on another short tour with Clem (kiwi girl from camp who I visited in London) for 6 days then back to Edinburgh again before heading on home...booooooo hahaha kiddin.

Ooh i nearly forgot, I get to go and chillout in a little fishing village up in the highlands this weekend with Jo and her family!! should be brilliant! hope that keeps you updated guys!

-mike