Woke up this morning, and went down for some breakfast. Darren was the hungover one today! We were running a little late, so had a quick breakfast and jumped on the bus. On the bus, Kay had some gossip about the last couple of nights that she shared with us; Bec and Heathers key actually worked, they were just putting it in the wrong way! One of the Aussie girls had thrown up all through her bed! She announced the pregnancy of Alison, who is 3 months pregnant, and it was also her birthday. But she missed the biggest gossip! Our two little DSL lovebirds, Bec and Mark, who had hooked up the night before!! Hilarious! Our first stop today wasn't very far away, along Loch Ness, in a town called Invermoristen. We went for a little walk along a trail in the woods there, to a little old hut overlooking a small waterfall. It was very pretty! Apparently this is the setting that inspired the story of Peter Pan and Neverland. Awesome. Back on the bus, we continued along the banks of Loch Ness, we were going to cover the entire length of the Loch, which is about 25 miles or so. So we had a very scenic drive. The next stop was a massive gift shop, with a big statue of the Loch Ness Monster out the front. You could pretty much get any kind of Scottish souvenir here, and lots of Nessie souvenirs! Our next stop for the day was the Culloden Battlefields, which is where the big battle between the English army and the highlanders took place, pretty much wiping out the clan system forever. That's kind of sad. We walked around the battlefield, where they had red flags lining one side, where the English frontline was, and blue flags for where the clansmen were, and all in between they had headstones for the fallen clans, clan leaders, and just graves marked with "mixed clans". It's a very sad story, and the wives and children of the clans weren't even allowed onto the battlefield to tend to the wounded. The English went around killing anyone who was still alive. Including some of the women and children too... Horrible. After walking the fields for a while, and looking at the monument for the clansmen, we went into the centre there for a hot drink, before heading back to the bus. The next stop was a lunch stop, in a town called Pitrochy, where we were recommended the fish and chips. We went for a walk to get the fish and chips, and were lucky to get there when we did, because a large majority of the people on the bus ended up being lined up behind us, and it was a tiny shop, with just one guy working by himself! We got some fish and chips, some deep-fried pizza and chips with curry sauce, which are all apparently really big over here, and are all delicious! We found a seat to eat at, and chatted with Kay and a few others from the bus. Then we went for a walk back to the bus, via a little cupcake stall! Yummy! Back on the bus, Kay passed around a book for everyone to write in, and I got nominated to do the artwork. Our buses clan name was Clan McBeBaBaBaDaBop, after the scat-man song, and I drew up a shield for our clan, for everyone to write their messages around. Our last stop for the tour was a little town called Dunkeld, which we walked around for a while, trying to find out what there is to do here... We weren't listening to Kay on the bus cos we were too interested in doing the book!! Oops! So we wandered for a little while, until we stumbled across a massive cathedral, set next to a park, next to a river. Stunning. We walked in, and found a little kitty cat that we played with for a bit, then just chilled out in the park, and on the river bank. I went for a walk inside the cathedral to have a look around. There were a few people in there, but it was dead silent. Kind of creepy. After that I left and hung out on the river with everyone else. There were lots of pretty pink trees around too that were shedding their flowers, which looked very nice. After making fun of Bec and Mark a bit more, we headed back out to the bus, and headed back to Edinburgh. We arrived and made plans to meet some of the crew later, and said our goodbyes to Kay, Jason and the rest of the bus. We shared a cab with one of the girls from the bus, and stopped at her hotel then continued out to our hostel. We couldn't be bothered walking out there, it's too far out!! The cab driver dropped us off out the back, because of all the tram works, and we went in to check in. Apparently Lyle had booked the wrong dates though... But they had room, so they put us in another 16 bed dorm. We went in, and were the only ones in there! How crazy would it be to have this whole room to ourselves! Lyle and Darren went in for a snooze, and I went out to the common room to charge our phones and things. There's no power points in the rooms at this hostel. So ****. I would advise anyone not to stay at The Hostel, Edinburgh. Ok? Good. So I sat in the common room and did some writing, and texted Jade, from work back home, who I saw now had a UK phone number. When it was almost time to go back out, I went in to wake up the guys. There were about 4 more people in our room now... Damn! When we were ready, we started the half hour walk down to the Royal Mile, which is the main street in the city centre, and saw Bec, Heather and Sierra coming out of a hostel on the way in. They were much closer than us though! We all walked together to the Haggis building, where we were meeting the rest of the crew, Team US, Mark, V, Mary and Victoria, and Ash from Sydney. We all walked down the Mile together to try and find the Indian place that Kay had recommended. We walked for quite a while, almost the whole length of the road, and didn't come across it. We were about half a block from the end, when Victoria decided to take charge and ask someone for directions. The old guy she asked was super friendly, and instead of pointing us in the right direction, he took the lead and walked us back up the street a bit, and down another street to Dynamic Earth, where we were pretty sure Kay had said the Indian place was opposite. We found no restaurant there, so the old guy, Robert, kept leading us on to a restaurant up the road a bit, while giving us some information about the buildings we were passing! Our own personal tour guide!! We eventually found a Swedish place, and said our thanks to Robert, but most of us had our hearts set on Indian by now, so we headed back out to the Royal Mile, and headed back up the street. (Later on we found that if we had walked that extra half a block before Victoria took charge, we would have found it.....) After going uphill on the Mile for a while, we found an Indian place called Shamoli. When we turned around we realised it was exactly opposite to the Haggis building where we had started! Argh! Oh well! So we went upstairs into Shamoli, where the staff were super friendly, and seated our table of 11, even though we didn't have a booking, and it was getting late! We took turns in going to the bottle shop next door to grab some BYO's, and all had an absolutely delicious dinner! It was seriously the best. If you're in Edinburgh, get Indian here! Delicious! We even got given free pappadums with chutneys at the start, and a free mini mango lassi and the end. AND they didn't charge us for corkage even though we drank so much wine! Amazing. After dinner we headed up the street to find somewhere to have a few drinks, and heard some live music in one pub, so we headed in there. Our group started dancing, and got a bunch of other people up on the dance floor too, and just when it was starting to get good, the band announced their last song, and the bartender called last drinks! That seemed crazy just when it was getting good, and it was still quite busy in there! So we decided not to get drinks there, and when the song ended we went to walk out, when Lyle comes up with a full beer in his hand and a bit of a smirk. So we made him skull it. Hilarious. Then we headed out to try find this live music venue that Darren had been recommended. The only problem was he couldn't remember the name of it... So we walked up the street, and just let Darren take the lead. Bad idea. We walked for probably half an hour, and still didn't find it, and Darren was still convinced we had to keep going, when Victoria and Heather took charge and decided we should turn back. So we all turned around and headed back the way we came. The guys in front decided they would stop at a random pub for a shot, then we kept walking. We got all the way back to the Royal Mile. Then we found the venue. It was literally the first building we had passed when we turned on the street. Darren was a little embarrassed... Well at least we got to walk off that massive meal a bit!! The venue was called Whistle Binkies, and the band was just setting up and waiting for their fiddle player to arrive! When he finally got there, they started up, and played a mixture of traditnal Scottish, Irish and folk songs. It was awesome. We did a little drinking, and a little dancing, and had a good time. When the band finished playing, we said our goodbyes and made plans to meet again the next day, and made the long trek back home to bed.