A Hogmanay New Years!

Thomas and I had been hearing all about how amazing Edinburgh's New Years celebrations are since we moved here, and since Thomas was home this year, we decided it was time to check it out for ourselves! The base travel agency organized a bus up to Edinburgh on New Years Eve Day and was to leave the city at 2am after all of the celebrating. Since we've already been to Edinburgh we figured that would be the perfect choice for us, especially since we just got back from Slovenia the day before New Years Eve. 

We went with a group of friends and had plenty of laughs and snacks on the way up to Edinburgh, and we got a jump start on the "celebrating" thanks to some flasks and Camelbaks full of wine. ;) Edinburgh was just stunning all lit up and decorated for Christmas, especially with all of the old historic buildings and the castle as the backdrop. We wandered around the city and took in the atmosphere, had some mulled cider (delicious!), checked out the carnival rides and skating rink, and headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner to meet up with some more friends. After dinner we wandered some more, hopped from pub to pub, and spent far too much time waiting in line for Porta-Potties (seriously, it was a half-hour wait every time!) while waiting for the fireworks to start. The fireworks show was well worth the wait though, it was the best display I've ever seen! They set the fireworks off over Edinburgh Castle, and that just added to the spectacle. We made our way back to our bus, and were back on the road by 2:15am - it was a very quiet ride home, thank goodness!

I'm so glad we went - Hogmanay was definitely worth the trip and craziness of the city, and any excuse to go to Edinburgh is fine by me! :)

Thomas and I

Massive amounts of Porta-Potties...but it still didn't seem like enough!

The carnival with Old Town in the distance

Skating rink

The ladies

The gents

Spectacular fireworks!

My NYE bestie :)

New Years Eve

Drew made it in to London on New Years Eve Day for his visit, and he did AMAZING the whole day with his jet lag! We didn't get back to the hotel until about 2am that night, and he was a trooper throughout everything. We dropped his luggage off at the hotel, then headed to Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park where Drew had a yummy bratwurst - he talked about how delicious it was for days! :) 

We then met up with my friend's who were in London to see a show that day. We had dinner and then headed out to find a spot to watch the fireworks. After a looooot of walking, and a little bit of rain, we made it to a spot along the river Thames where we could see the fireworks display over the London Eye at midnight. While we waited we had some entertainment, a "friendly" (aka drunk) gentleman from Australia who was fascinated by us and our stories from the States, and a group of people who thought that climbing on the porta-potties would be a great idea. We kept waiting for them to fall in/topple over, but alas they did not. Last year the fireworks in London were spectacular, and I'm sure that they were this year as well...if you were on the opposite side of the river where the wind wasn't blowing all of the smoke towards you. We ended up being able to see only about 2 minutes of the show before it was too smoky to see anything. I was pretty bummed because I wanted Drew to see it, but he said he had a great time, so all in all the evening was a success!

Drew and I on the tube

Harrods

Ice skating rink at Hyde Park

Safety precautions for New Years Eve ;)

London

Our dinner date for the evening, The Ashcraft's

Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square - given to London every year by Norway

Big Ben...still a couple of hours away from midnight

Happy New Year - 2012!!

New Years!

We originally planned on spending New Years in Edinburgh, Scotland, but our plans fell through. Luckily we had a pretty awesome back-up plan: London! We picked up our cute new car (I'll post pictures later!) on Friday morning and left for London in the afternoon. We met a couple for dinner, found a pub on the way to fireworks, and then waited for the fireworks show to start. The other guy with us was very friendly, so we made a lot of friends while waiting for the show to start. One British couple was especially talkative, so they shared stories with us about England politics, the Princess Diana conspiracy theories (we didn't even know they existed!), and and how to correctly pronounce the name of the county we live in.

Then the fireworks started. And they were AMAZING. I'm not just saying that because fireworks are one of my favorite things. Even Thomas was amazed - he forgot to kiss me at midnight because he was gaping at them! I don't know how to take good picture of fireworks, but I'll share some others from New Years.

Pretty Christmas lights

The Disney Store in London!

The London Eye in the background - we don't know those people :)

Waiting for fireworks to start

The Tube was PACKED after midnight!

Hope everyone had a safe and happy New Years!