I'm back!

Since no-one read this blog anymore, I decided to "dedicate" it to you, one and only haha. Yes, you've been lucky, Xavier! Actually, I wanted to thank you somehow for waiting till I come back, I hadn't been writing you a lot since I'd gone to Scotland, so...it won't be as cool as your video(s), poems and it's not even original anymore, but I hope you'll enjoy my narration.

I'll post here some photos which I think characterize my trip and write an explanation, a story, call it as you like. Hope it's not gonna be tiring! (seems like a challenge)


1) These white things are called "tunnels". There were 4 fields, the closest one was called "Margaret" and there were the best rasPberries. Therefore, mainly Romainian people were picking there (some people would call it discrimination). The field in the picture is "Roberts 3". I think the fields are named after their original owners. Anyway, Roberts 3 was, by contrast to Margaret, the worst field (in my opinion). The hill's been terribly steep and one had to go up with two trays (basically cases) full of raspberries (in "punnets", it's where you put berries). I shouldn't say that but...(try not to laugh)...once I left my stand with trays just in the middle of the hill, in the steepest place, and the moment I turned back to the bushes, the stand lied on the ground and so did the berries. Oops!

2) Of course that most of the times when we arrived to our caravans (our movable "flats" for 4-6 people), we were dead tired, so we just cooked dinner and then went to sleep. But as the harvest was good only for some time, later we started having more free time. And firstly, we didn't know what to do with it. So we played games! Like this one. I don't know if you're familiar with it, it's called "noughts and crosses". Well, it's supposed to be noughts and crosses but me and my friend improved it. So that time it was "hearts (mine) and flowers (hers)". Obviously, I've been winning all the time.

3) Talking about caravans and the farm itself, this is how it looked like from time to time, when the mornings were extremely chilly yet the weather was good. It's the path from our caravan to either a field or a lake (in the background). Isn't it beautiful? The photo was taken about a week before our departure and it was my first time to see sunrise in Scotland. Pretty romantic. I usually missed because it was raining and if it didn't, we just went straight to work, no time for shooting haha.

4) Food. In fact I thought I'd lose weight because of the hard work, but hell no! We'd go to Tesco by bus (double decker!) twice a week and I'd never seen so many new products in my life. And it was even cheaper than here (fine, the cheapest products were usually cheaper than in Czech, but higher quality for sure). And we were paid once a week, so...lots of money spent in Tesco, haha. At least once a fortnight, we made pancakes and it became one of my favourite meals. We did it with jam or spinach and cheese. Are you hungry already? :P Sometimes we went to a fancy restaurant (still cheap though, of course) and ordered a meal. The burger in the picture may look tasty, but in fact I didn't enjoy it so much. I ordered a beef burger and it was a mistake and I think I'll never have it again, haha. The greeny things in the middle, those are chilli peppers. Another mistake. But without the meat and peppers, it was quite good...oh well. No objections against the chips and onion rings, they were delicious.

5) There's one thing I fell in love with in Scotland, and that's scotch whisky. By the way, whisky is made in Scotland and whiskey in Ireland. Alcohol Jack Daniels, if you know this one, has nothing to do with whisky nor whiskey as we were told. My friend, the one that got me into the trip, wanted to go to a whisky destillery and I promised her to go with her. It was quite far away, so we hitchhiked there (my first time) and not only it's been great experience but the guided tour through the destillery was so good! The smell of it, just incredible. I could even understand what the guide was saying, which I honestly hadn't expected. Scottish accent, that's something. Anyway, at the end of the tour, we could taste whisky and that's when I started liking it. It's so expensive though, I think I'll just drink it occassionally...meaning, next year in Scotland. haha.

6) Here come our trips around Scottish nature and cities. I know it sounds a bit shocking, that we hitchhiked almost to every sight we visited and back, but it was no big deal. In Scotland, people are generally friendly and helpful. I felt quite ashamed to be Czech, it's so different here. Perhaps I just persuaded myself that it was like that, but as far as I know, everyone thinks the same. I would love to come back and it's mainly because of the people. If you have any chance...you'll see me there, haha.

So the first picture is from our trip "to the heatherland". I hadn't known before that heather (the purple smudges in the pic, haha) is a plant, I thought of it as a girl's name. My friend, who'd never seen so much heather in one place, was all like "oh my god, that's like from a fairytale!" and I was astonished too.
The second one is just a pure scottish nature. We were surrounded by such meadows...sheeps and cows on every corner, haha.
I wouldn't expect it, but we went to sea two times! People wouldn't swim there, but it was nice anyway. It's something different than just a sandy beach that everyone has been to, you know. I've seen a sandy beach there too though, haha, but the weather wasn't pleasant.
Finally, our trip to Inverness and Loch Ness. You heard about the Loch Ness monster, didn't you? We just craved to see it, of course! Well, as expected, nothing happened. It was as beautiful as other ones but nothing special. At least the weather turned out well. Inverness is also a nice city, about 7 miles far from the lake. In fact, most of the cities in Scotland are nice! Stony houses, clean streets...:)

(Yes, it's me on the last three photos)

End of a story! Finally. I mean, if you want to ask about something, feel free. I consider this summer to be one of my best...plus the last summer spent mainly writing with you, of course! Still. As I said, I wouldn't mind coming back.

P.S.: Sorry for not sending you any postcard...and for not replying immediately. I feel I'm not so...involved to our conversations as you are, but I want to carry on. Even if you're busy. When I came home, soon I checked your/our blog and the video you made because of our anniversary. I mean, seriously, you should stop being so sweet! haha. I love(d) the idea. Seeing those words...well some of them I didn't recognize (but you know my memory). It must've taken you so much time! I can't possibly thank you properly for it (but I thank you anyway).