Monday morning was a nice early start, leaving my house about 4am to get the bus to the train station, then the train to the airport, then the plane up here to Edinburgh. Keith and Tiff arrived from Germany at much the same time as I did which worked out well. We had hired a car and from Edinburgh, took a drive up to Inverness where we spent the past 2 nights. The first night we grabbed a bit to eat, had a few beers, walked around the town and took some scenic photos - where the outside temperature was down to about -11°C. Definitely one of the colder nights I've experienced.

Tuesday morning we had booked a tour on the Loch Ness, which kicked off around 10 in the morning. It started off with an hour cruise on the loch, followed by some time spent around the 6th century age old ruined Urquhart Castle. The landscape surrounding us while on the cruise was incredible - the entire land was white from frost, the red sun was shining through the orange coloured clouds, the sky above us was deep blue, the water was a shade of dark purple from the cold and the temperature difference caused a band of stream to rise off the loch in the distance.

That night we had booked into the Loch Ness hostel and spent the evening at a nearby hotel for dinner, drinks and pub quiz. The pub quiz turned out to be all based on local Scottish knowledge, which meant we failed hopelessly at that. Yesterday we left Inverness and drove back down to Edinburgh. En route to Edinburgh, we stopped off at St Andrews, regarded worldwide as "the home of golf" and is one of the oldest and most prestigious golf clubs in the world.

We got into Dunferlime (where I hotel was) around late afternoon. From there we got a lift with one of Keith's mates into Edinburgh and from there I met up with the others (Kate, Loz, Mick, etc) who had already started their new years celebrations around mid afternoon. After some pre-drinks at their place (as well as springboks, jagerbombs and even winebombs), we missioned into town for the actual street party and the new years countdown with the other couple of hundred thousand people. A brilliant way to see in the new year!

After a mission to leave afterwards and sometime back at their place, we managed to get a cab back to the hotel. Today, after a bit of a sleep in, we headed into town for a bit and took a walk up Arthurs Seat, had dinner and get a ghost tour walk around the city, in the cold, rain and wind. But that's all comes with winter, and new years, up in Scotland. Well I'm off tomorrow morning down to Newcastle for a night which should be cool.