New Year Celebrations

Happy new year to everyone!! Hope you had a good new years eve celebration wherever you were!! Ours was at Hogmanay in Edinburgh - renowned as the world's best new year celeration.

Each year Edinburgh's streets are closed off for the biggest street party in the world that is called Hogmanay. This new years eve, we ventured over there and experienced it with about 18 of us - friends from Dublin, NZ, friends of friends from Australia & 1 Scot. The party was started off with a Chinese buffet dinner. Afterwards, we took it on down to the streets to join in the festivities which included concerts, ferris wheels, theme-park rides, street dances, fireworks... etc. The night started off relatively quiet at around 9ish, but by 11pm, the streets seem to have shurnk as they were absolutely packed to rival any moshpits. It took us at least 30mins to move a grand distance of 500m!!! Although, I have to say, it was probably the most fun part for me!! When it came to the count down, the whole town joined in and then the fireworks came in to light up the skies from 7 hills around Edinburgh. It was absolutely amazing!! The atmosphere there was something to be experienced truly and yay for having done it!!

The next day, while all of us were still in bed recovering, Rebecca - who seemed to not believe in sleep caught the 10:30am shuttle bus into town (after going to bed at 4:30am) to do the One o'Clock Run down the Royal Mile. Crazy but keen, good on ya mate! :-) After the race, they held a Dog-Sled Racejust behind the Holyrood Palace. 2 Huskies pulling a sled on wheels along the race track with a Xena voice-alike commentator... you just can't beat it!! aiaiaiaiai!!



While we were in Edinburgh, we also took the opportunity to climb Arthur's Seat. It's a big hill just South west of the Royal Mile and from it, you get a smashing view of Edinburgh in good weather and bad - we experienced the bad weather version, but it was much more rewarding after getting soaked and frozen I tell ya!