Great Weather in St Andrews

It was another perfect day in St. Andrews without a cloud in the sky. I watched some groups tee off on the 1st hole yesterday and got to see Luke Donald tee it up for his practice round.

Dunhill Links 07

This week the Dunhill Links Championship comes to St. Andrews, and because it is a Pro-Am, all the celebrities get in their practice rounds in the beginning of the week. Today we already were graced with Samuel L. Jackson's prescense on the 18th tee. Here he is looking very sharp.

I had a football with me and tried to throw it tohim after he teed off. Unfortunately he didn't want to play catch but he did shoot us a smile and a wave.

Scotland Coast to Coast Walk

Hello all!

I am returning from a long summer hiatus to tell you about my recent walking trip across the countryside of Scotland. I have sent all the pictures to almost everyone on Snapfish, but if you're reading this and never received an email like that, then please leave your address in the comments box so I can send them to you as well!

On September 16th I flew and in to Edinburgh and arrived in St. Andrews late that night. The next morning my friend Laura and I took buses across to the West Coast to the town of Oban. We then walked along paths, highways, hills, dismantled railway lines, ACTIVE railway lines (just for about 5 minutes because we were tired of the highway, but it was probably one of the worst ideas I ever had), and fire roads all on foot for about 80 miles over five days ending at my friend Jack's house in Crieff.

If you want to take a look at a map off Scotland to see where we went, here was where we got to each night:

17th Oban to Taynuilt
18th Taynuilt to Dalmally
19th Dalmally to Crainlarich
20th Crainlarich to Glen Dochart
21st Glen Dochart to Comrie

Then my friend Jack drove us to his house in Crieff.

Trip to Spain

I went on a nine day backpacking trip through Spain over Spring Break in early April. In Barcelona, I saw FC Barcelona beat Deportivo 2-1 in a stadium that seats 100,000 people. By far one of the coolest experiences in my entire life. I enjoyed very nice weather and great Tapas in Valencia. The calamari was especially delicious. Then I took an all day bus to Seville, where I met two friends from college that were traveling there. We were lucky to be there during holy week, when thousands of people participated in a religious parade around the maze-like streets of the city. Finally, I took the high speed train to Madrid, where I saw some amazing art, including Pablo Picasso's Guernica. I hope you enjoy these few pictures, but I'll show you them all when I get back this summer.

Thurso Trip March 24-28

I spent the first five days of my Spring Break in Thurso, near the northern most point in mainlaind UK. I was looking at rocks in the area with my geoscience class.

Plans for Next Year

Today was a pretty big day for me. I was accepted into my dorm for next year at St. Andrews, which makes me want to come back even more than I already want to. Only about five minutes after finding out this news, I received an acceptance email from Cal Poly for Landscape Architecture in 2007. I now have an enormous decision to make within the next three weeks, and I'll keep you posted about my decision when it comes.

P.S. Scroll all the way down to read about my February happenings that I have posted today. Sorry for the delay!

Hillwalking in Tyndrum

Another successful Hillwalking trip this last Sunday brought my friends and I to the hills of Tyndrum. It was a successful but monstrous day that covered 18 km and two Munros, putting me at a grand total of 6 Scottish peaks in my repertoire. The two peaks were Ben Lui at 1130 metres (the big boy) and Beinn a' Chleibh (don't know how to pronounce that) at 916 metres. That's only 278 to go. Enjoy the pictures of what was unfortunately a pretty ugly day in terms of weather. When it did clear up though, the hills offered some stunning views.

The Black Keys, Edinburgh, 2/16/07

This was hands down the best concert I have ever attended. They are arguably my favorite band, and seeing them in a tiny club like that was amazing. I was standing about ten feet away the whole time and they played an awesome set. I'm pretty sure I'm somewhere in the video this other guy shot, but it's kind of dark. Enjoy.

Mr. Atholl/St. Andrews

Unfortunately for you, my faithful readers, my action packed month of February went undocumented an unseen. I sit here now on March the first hoping to describe and show my amazing adventures and antics of the shortest month of the year.

It all started with a competition within my hall, Mr. Atholl, which I was pressured into participating in because of lack of participation among the guys. The winner of this competition then moved on to the University-wide Mr. St. Andrews, taking place in a 600 person venue on a stage complete with flashing lights and pyrotecnics. Naturally, because of my rugged good looks and unmatched wit, I won Mr. Atholl and moved on to Mr. St. Andrews, embarrassing myself immensely along the way. I didn't win, but I have to say, it was a pretty good way to spend a weekend. Plus I got free booze (which I enjoyed responsibly). Enjoy the pics!

Snow in St. Andrews

Click on the pics for the full size image.

Top Gear

So I've been living in the UK for a good bit of time now, and recently I have come across a British television show called Top Gear that all of you should be watching. It is really the only TV show I have seen on the BBC that has actually caught my attention, and it is truly a quality program. Basically it's an hour show (actually 1 HOUR because there's no commercials) hosted by three hilarious car enthusiasts. The show always includes a funny bit in which they do things like try and resurface a three mile stretch of road in less than 24 hours or try and pitch there favorite cars to be displayed in the Museum of Modern Art. Then there's a bit in which they compare two cars, usually awesome sports cars, and tell you which one is worth getting. Finally, they always have a celebrity guest on the show that must drive a lap on the show's personal race course, and then compare the time with other celebrities that were formerly on the show. While all the females reading this are thinking it's just some show for guys to drool over awesome sports cars, just give it a chance. What makes the show is the constant comedy these guys can churn out while doing crazy things like driving cars at 140 miles per hour around banked turns. The enormous budget also helps, on last night's show they drove a 1.6 million dollar production car at over 240 miles per hour. The celebrity guests are quality too, Hugh Grant was on last night. Here's the only problem, many of you probably don't get BBC America, which is the channel the show airs on in the States. If you do have some form of extended cable and get this channel, I encourage you to watch the show, you won't be disappointed.

Top Gear Website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/topgear/

Lake District Pics

Click on the pictures for a larger view.

The Lake District

I had an awesome trip to the lake district with the Breakaway club this past weekend. The first day we climbed to the top of Scafell Pike, the tallest point in England at 3,199 feet. At the summit, it was 0 degrees Celsius with a wind chill at -20 degrees. It also broke out into a hail storm for about five minutes. The next day we hiked along a tall ridge covered in snow with the same high winds and low visibility. Finally, the last day my three friends and I went on a monster 9 mile hike up to the top of a ridge and summiting about six or seven peaks along the way. It was a weekend well spent and there are lots of great pictures to enjoy!

Cool Stuff

Here's a list of some of the cool stuff I'll be doing within the next month.

Jan. 19th-22nd: Traveling to the Lake District in Northern England for three days of hill walking with my friends. It sounds like the "Yosemite" of the United Kingdom (in terms of beauty, not elevation) so I should have plenty of pictures to share.

Jan. 28th-February 4th: Sometime within this week a couple friedns and I are going to go snowboarding in Glenshee (that is if they ever get any snow).

Feb. 16th: I'm going to a concert in Edinburgh with a friend in this cool small venue that holds about 600 people to see The Black Keys and The Black Angels, both of which are awesome raw blues bands.

That's it for now, I gotta go study for my last exam on Geoscience!

2007-The First Update

So I'm finally writing to tell you all that I am back in Scotland and right in the middle of my exams. I just had my Medieval History exam today, and I felt like I did pretty well on it considering how nervous I was going into the test. It really was not as bad as I had expected it to be. In celebration I had my first drink tonight since coming back to Scotland as my friend and I chatted with a pretty funny old Scotsman in a pub. Here is the first thing he said to us after we introduced ourselves: (picture an old man with a thick Scottish accent) "Eeh, lemme tell ya somethin, don't ever f&!%@ get married." He turned out to be a pretty nice guy with lots of funny stories to tell.
Anyway, tomorrow I'm planning on playing golf on the Old Course because the ballot is wide open from 9:30 onwards. I just hope the weather holds up, as it has been raining almost every day since I have returned. After exams are finished at the end of next week, I will be going with the hillwalking club on a four day backpacking trip in the Lake District in northern England. It should be really fun; I'll take plenty of pictures. I'm also planning on taking advantage of the two weeks we have off by going up north and snowboarding with some friends. I don't expect the slopes or the snow to be as good as the stuff I am spoiled with in Tahoe, but I'm sure that I'll have a great time. That's it for now, check in soon!

The Old Course (now w/ 16, 17, and 18!)

I finally got to play a full round at the Old Course last weekend and it was a perfect day for golf. With barely any wind I somewhat recovered from a rocky start to shoot a respectable 86. Here's a couple of pics on the 17th tee and then atop the Swilcan Bridge.

Hall Ball Pics

One More Raisin Weekend Pic...

The Foam Fight!

Raisin Weekend Pics

I know these are small but if you click the picture it goes to full size. From top to bottom: My name and dorm in case I pass out somewhere; at my academic dad's flat party; my academic mom's flat party; the resulting carnage of the foam fight (I'm on the left, Sean my golfing buddy in the middle, my roommate James on the right); Frank(my academic dad) and Luke as the bartenders at the shanty party.

Raisin Weekend

I have now officially completed Raisin Weekend, a 24 party that has been a tradition at the University for over a hundred years. The partying started off on Sunday afternoon around 1:30 at my academic mom's flat, where many games involving beverages were participated in (clean version), then moved on my academic dad's flat, then to the Shanty party in my hall, were basically the entire second floor in my dorm was converted into a bar/dance club. I remember having a bunch of fun at my mom's party, relaxing with my friends at my dad's party, and then waking up on my bed at 2 in the morning. Needless to say I had a bit to much to drink, but then again so did everybody that night. I was just happy to wake up in my bed, clean, with no signs of anything terrible happening. That wasn't all for raisin weekend though, because Monday morning at 11 was the foam fight in the quad, participated in by the entire freshman class of St. Andrews. I was dressed up along with my academic siblings as a domino, and we all walked to the quad in freezing cold weather, with the rain falling sideways, to the quad for the fight. The fight was crazy and when it was finished we were all covered from head to toe in foam. Finally, after a nice warm shower, I could finally say that I survived raisin weekend!