The Heart of Scotland

I have been in Scotland for about two days and I haven't heard nearly enough Scottish accents, probably because I have mostly been surrounded by Americans.

I arrived on Saturday and it was drizzling.  I think it would have seemed weird if it hadn't been.  The drive up to Stirling was very pretty except when we passed what looked like a landfill.  The were lots of sheep though (not in the landfill).  When we got to the university I realized that, unfortunately, Stirling and Eau Claire have something in common.  They are both surrounded by beautiful landscape that has been ruined by very ugly buildings.  The landscape is amazing as we are surrounded by huge hills on all sides.  Walking on campus is like walking in a park.  There are flowers everywhere and there are tons of bunnies and all kinds of birds that I haven't seen before.  There is also a loch with swans and a castle.

There is a hill that I can see from my bedroom window off to the west with a huge building on top of it.  I spent a lot of time looking at it on Saturday night and wondering what it was.  Turns out it is Stirling Castle.  Behind it, on another hill, is a wind farm.  From the common room window I have a clear view of the Wallace Monument over the loch.

So far, I've just been on a brief tour around the area but we did stop off at the oldest cathedral in Scotland. I'm planning on doing more exploring tomorrow.

Today was mostly about photography.  Our professor for that class is Canadian and absolutely batty.  Today's four hours of class were devoted to the history of photography.  It was pretty interesting stuff.  I didn't realize that the basics of the camera have been around basically since the 1600's.  The only thing that was missing was the photosensitive chemicals to hold the image on the paper.  The professor spent alot of time talking about how dangerous the chemicals are and how people have died from using the chemicals in poorly ventilated areas.  Then we go into her office that has black trash bags on the windows and we make shadow-grams of flowers and things and she developed them right there in the office.  She's really entertaining and really knows her subject but I have to wonder if the chemicals are starting to get to her.  Or maybe it's just an artist thing.  For homework we have to build a camera obscura which sounds like an interesting project.

I've got class tomorrow and then the traveling starts.  Thursday is a trip to St. Andrew's and Saturday I'm going up to Loch Ness!