Planning!

Hi again!

These past few days I've been planning the rest of my stay in the UK, and trust me, I'd rather have 20 essays to write! In any case, I'm leaving for the Isle of Skye tomorrow at... 4.45am! Together with Chiara, I'll travel from Edinburgh to Glasgow and then from Glasgow to Portree (city on the Isle of Skye):


Arriving at 1pm we are going to hike our way to a hostel in Uig, which lies on the western coast and is indicated on the map by the green arrow:


On the 16th of May, we will stay and explore the mountains to the east of Uig, and on the 17th we plan on walking back to Portree but taking the longer coastal route: head to the northern-most point of the island and then carry on along the eastern coast until we reach Portree; however, this is quite an ambitious plan and it is by no means certain we will be able to carry it out. Still, I'm an optimistic person, so I think we can do this!

Annavera will also be in Portree then, and on the 18th we will be sleeping in and wait for Vilhelm to join us too. The rest of the 18th we will probably head to the east or south of Portree, and on the 19th Joost will arrive.

On the 20th Chiara and I will unfortunately have to head back to Edinburgh, so the highland adventure will be quite short for us.

On the 21st I will spend a day in Edinburgh (watching sunrise from Arthur's Seat - an old plan never come true), but on the 22nd I'm heading to Manchester to stay there for a few days to attend the Manchester Phonology Meeting (yay! I'm really looking forward to it!). Although I could find lodgings for the 22-24th, my hostel was booked for the night of the 24th and I still need to find a place to stay. However, I think I will be staying somewhere near the Yorkshire Dales, so I can cross these on the 25th in order to catch a train to Newcastle where I will be staying until the 27th. Klaas is kind enough to pick me up in Newcastle on either the 25th or 26th and we will explore Newcastle for a bit. The 27th we will return to Edinburgh to stay there until the 29th, and then it will be time to say farewell to Edinburgh.. but let's not think about that for now! On the 29th Klaas and I will go to see the Lake District and in the evening we will stay in Manchester, which we are going to explore on the 30th, with possibly taking a break in Stoke-On-Trent. On the 31st our journey to Dover really begins: hopefully we will have enough time to visit Stratford-upon-Avon, Oxford and Canterbury before we catch our boat in Dover, which will take us to the mainland (Calais), from where we will drive home.

All this means I will have very little time and will largely be unavailable (it will be hard to kick the habit of checking my e-mail every hour but I will survive); I do not know when I will have time to keep you more up-to-date, so I figured I might just as well tell you now :).

Now it's very late (11.30pm) and I still have to prepare the sandwiches for our journey tomorrow, pack by bag (travelling light!), as well as figuring out how to walk from Portree to Uig.. so I will have to leave you for now.

Take care!

Cheers,
b