The Harrison-Helins: July 2009

”They came to the city as individuals – they left as a unit.” – Doesn’t that sound like a great tagline for an action movie!? Grandpa Keith and Grandpa Stefan left today after 10 days of fun filled adventure, and who would have thought, they really hit it off! They were inseparable, like “Laurel & Hardy”, “Batman & Robin”, “Chip & Dale”, “Robin Hood and Marion”… you get the drift! It has been a wicked time and we’ve had so much fun.

As you can probably see from the pictures below, there has been something going on pretty much all the time for the last week and a bit, sometimes with myself, Shaena and Ethan in tow, sometimes the guys have done their own thing. Grandpa Stefan has taught Keith some Swedish, and needless to say, it was not “The Queen’s Swedish” if there is such a thing. It would be interesting to know what Keith’s success rate in the Swedish pubs and clubs would be.

One thing that is definitely interesting is that the two of them look so much alike. I mean, we knew that from before, but putting them side by side just gave another eerie dimension to it. Same height, same shoe size, same facial features, same liking of hats… and the same love for dirty jokes none the less. The Grandpa’s have been the first ones waking up in the morning, going out on their daily walks together to see if Starbucks has opened yet, and they have often been the last ones in bed at night. Impressive!

Anyway, it has been a great two weeks! We’ve been kept really busy and have not really had any time to update this blog, plus our internet crashed last Sunday so we had to have an engineer come out and fix it today. Crazy how crippled you are when something you take for granted like the internet is suddenly not working! How did people survive pre-internet?

I wanted to recap some of the things we’ve been up to once again just to keep ya’ll in the loop, so apologies if this entry turns into one of those really long ones where you are thinking to yourself: “Will it ever end? Oooh, I think my hair is turning gray/white/falling off from all this reading!” I’ll try to keep it brief:

Deep Sea World:
The Grandpa’s, Josh and I took the train out to North Queensferry where the Deep Sea World is located. They have the longest shark tunnel in the UK, a collection of rare fishes, frogs and other underwater creatures as well as a seal sanctuary. They even had a few of those super-poisonous spiky fishes from the James Bond movies! Those things are so deadly so they had to have an emergency box of antidote by the glass in case the glass would break. Very cool indeed, and everyone seemed to enjoy the day. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera this time around, but then again, we’ve all seen “Jaws” so we know how those bad boys look like!

Camera Obscura & The World of Illusions:
Michelle, Josh, Grandpa Stefan, Shaena and I decided to check out Camera Obscura. Shaena and I have already been there before but it is well worth a second visit. Basically, the whole exhibition is 5 stories of interesting pictures, experiments and cool facts built in a tower and the Camera Obscura is a type of periscope on the roof with a 360 degree view of the city. Fun times!

Daytrip to Loch Ness and the Highlands:
This was one of the highlights of the week(s). We rented a big 7-seater vehicle and headed north towards the imposing highlands with Loch Ness as our goal. We had decided to catch that monster once and for all! We drove off; all crammed into the Zafira and followed our old friend Emer, Shaena’s GPS she bought in Ireland. Emer first took us to Spean Bridge, then Fort William, then Fort Augustus and Loch Ness, and finally home again. We did a few pit-stops on the way and a boat cruise on the famous loch. Shaena and I had done the cruise on the loch before but this is another very interesting tourist attraction because they tell you so much about the history of the loch and the myth around “Nessie” and various attempts to find “her”. Plus, they have some pretty wicked techie-gadgets on the boat as well! Well worth a visit and everyone had a really good time, and Keith even found the hat of his dreams in a shop on the banks of the loch! It was also Ethan’s first road trip and his first time on a boat. There is a first for everything, so why not start when you are 3 weeks old!?

The Gathering 2009 – Highland Games:
Another cultural excursion! The Gathering is a major event in Edinburgh and is a combination of traditional Highland Games with caber tossing and other strongman sports, and a homecoming for expat Scots and a meeting place for people with Scottish heritage, so lots of Americans and Canadians of course. They had live music, a clan village where you could find out everything there is to know about clans and their history, traditional Scottish cooking, Highland Dancing and lots more… so basically it was an explosion in tartan and whiskey breath! We had a great time just walking around and we were amazed by some of the outfits people were wearing. Keith also had an opportunity to find out a little bit more about his MacIntosh clan heritage, so another afternoon well spent!

Rosslyn Chapel:
Dad and I spent an afternoon checking out Rosslyn Chapel outside of Edinburgh, famous from the movie “The Da Vinci Code” where the whole mystery is solved. Truly an amazing building with a very long and interesting history, and the Knights Templar story and myth is just amazing! Next to the chapel are also the old ruins of Rosslyn Castle, so we went down there as well to snap a few photos. It was a great day out, and Shaena, Keith and Josh also had a very nice day on the hop-on hop-off bus. I think we have established by now that Shaena and I are great tour guides! ;)

Dean Village:
We had some time to kill, believe it or not, so I took the Grandpa’s out on two separate walking tours of Dean Village here in Edinburgh. Dean Village is where we used to live when we first moved to Edinburgh and the building we used to live in has now been done up completely and it looks spectacular! We also walked up the Water of Leith Walkway and had a look at the waterfalls and ‘inhaled nature’. Very nice down there and I still cannot believe that it is smack in the middle of city centre!

We rounded off this fantastic time with a dinner at “Mamma’s” last night and today the guys went their separate ways, determined to stay in touch.

Thanks for a great time guys!