A Wicked UK Tour, Part 3 - A Scotish Wedding

After a relaxing couple of days in Keswick, it was back into the broom-broom Blood Clot for some more highway time in the direction of Edinburgh, Scotland. Luckily Andrew, whose wedding we were attending, and who was putting us up for the night, had given us some directions for the more scenic route, so after the border it was off the highway and onto some of the back roads for some crazy driving fun.

After rocking up to Andrew's farm house, realising it was the wrong one, and then actually turning up at the right one, it was time to sit down and enjoy a break after...well...sitting down for so long in the car. Andrew was actually off picking up the first of the french visitors from the airport, so Elaine - the soon to be Mrs Wilson - looked after us while preparing the feast for the evening, including some great salads, seafood, and a mushroom risotto, which was all sensational, and me being me ate too much, of course. :)

After dinner, Andrew and Elaine were off again to pick up some more frenchies, coming to four in total for the evening. Elaine used to put french students up in her house when they came over to study, hence both her and Andrew speak french, and hence the large red, white, and blue contingent for the wedding.

A bridge to nowhere in the middle of nowhere.

That night I didn't sleep to well. The risotto from dinner was sitting like a brick in my guts, and I felt like I wanted to be sick. It wasn't any better the next morning when I got up either, but nobody else was suffering the same problem, so we were pretty sure that it wasn't food poisoning. So everyone else tucked into bacon and egg rolls for breakfast, and I enjoyed water, and nothing other than water.

After breakfast (around noon) we packed our stuff together and climbed back into the blood clot, and took two of the french contingent to the local P&R before heading up to St. Andrews via the scenic route. Apparently my driving on the local roads scared the french girl a little, which would explain the le mans like breathing that was coming from the back seat...

Honey? Did you remember to take the cray traps AND the boats out of the water before the tide went out?

Watchtowers like these are pointless on a day like today...or nearly every day in Scotland.

Taking the scenic route turned out to be a bit of a waste of time as it was completely fogged in the whole way up to St. Andrews. I also wasn't feeling that great when we arrived, so we headed to our B&B for a bit of a relax before going to dinner with Jarek and Evelyn, who were also up for the wedding. And later that night it started... Let me just say that I almost saw more of the bathroom in the B&B than the bed that night (the bathroom was really big, and you accessed it through what looked like the double doors to a big closet), and I didn't make it out of bed the next morning for breakfast. Luckily the B&B hostess gave us the tip to go to the chemist in the local town, rather than in St. Andrews, where I was able to pick up some medication to get my digestion going again and to stop the squirtle-turtles that I was suffering from. I actually found the consultation in the chemist quite funny, as the girl talked at a normal volume until it came to words like "movement" or "diarrhoea", then she would whisper. :)

Part of the ruined church in St. Andrews

More of the ruined church.

After the chemist we went to check into our hotel for the wedding and I spent most of the rest of the day in bed, while Belinda went for a walk with the rest of the group along the beach where Chariots of Fire was filmed. When she came back it was time for us to get dressed for the big event, and what does one wear when one goes to a Scotish wedding? You would think that most would wear a kilt, but out of the 6 kilt wearers at the event, at least 3 of them were foreigners, including Jarek and myself. But here's a tip for young players - if you have a case of the Bradley Pitts, a kilt is AWESOME! No fiddling with a belt - skirt up, boxers down, and THERE SHE BLOWS!!!

Brush and J-man kilted up to the 9s.	Brushy and his David McJones catalogue pose.
J-man, Derren, and Brushy in matching kilts.	Taking the kilts out for a spin. Can you see my arse?!?!

The next day I was feeling a little better and managed to battle my way through a continental breakfast at the hotel (the stomach couldn't deal with the full scotish that Jarek had) before meeting up with the others at Andrew and Elaine's hotel for another walk on the beach. By the time everyone got themselves sorted I was feeling a little dodgy again, so we said our goodbyes, went and got ourselves a fresh juice and some lunch (yes, it took everyone that long to get sorted) and headed off in the red rocket in the direction of the Scotish Highlands.

The Old Course - a shot that I took for my Dad.

In the next installment - me in normal clothes feeling a lot better, the highlands, and Nessie...

Tschüß,
Brushy