Our Trip to the Faroe Islands

My parents and I went to the Faroe Islands for 4 days.  The trip planning sort of started off as a joke when we saw a youtube video called Sheepview 360.  I'll leave the link for those of you who want to watch.  Basically, there is no Google Street View in the Faroe Islands so this was a way to get Google's attention.  They strapped cameras to the back of sheep so that they could get pictures from wherever the sheep went.  There are some obvious flaws in the plan of using sheep but the video was successful in luring us to come and their ultimate goal of getting google street view.

Sheep View 360

We left on the Friday morning.  Going through customs involved the customs officer just stamping my passport without a single question asked.  We then went to get our rental car.  They had no record of our rental car reservation because the agent that had originally booked it for us, booked us a car for Faro Portugal.  But after some sorting out, we got our car.

The first thing we did was head to the west of the island Vagar.  We headed out to Gasadalur where there is a beautiful waterfall.  Before 2004, the only way to access the town was by climbing over the 400m mountain or by helicopter.  In 2004 they built them a tunnel through the mountain.  The population was dwindling to 16 but it is now back up to a booming 18.

The waterfall with the town behind

Obligatory Sheep Photo

We headed into the capital Torshavn where we were staying.  We walked around town for a while and then settled in for the evening.

The Faroe Islands Parliament - The Prime Minister's office is the
building on the left

View of the Capital from Parliament

The next day we headed out driving around the islands.  It was sunny and rainy with gale force winds which made walking around quite a challenge!

So windy the waterfalls were going up!

One of the many tunnels on the islands.  They have tunnels through mountains and tunnels
under the ocean to connect the islands.  Most of the islands are connected but some
are too far and you have to take a ferry to those islands

Vidareidi - The northernmost island and town you can drive to without taking a ferry

View from Kunoy Island

Faroese Sheep

View of Mikladalur

View of Kalsoy Island

Risen go Kellingin - Legend says that giants in Iceland were jealous of the Faroe Islands

so a witch and a giant set off to steal them.  They tied a rope around the islands but

were unable to move them.  As the sun rose the next morning, the witch and giant were turned 

to stone and now lie at the northern coast of Eysturoy

The next day my dad and I started the day with a hike around Leitisvatn lake.  The lake is 40m above sea level and ends with a waterfall into the ocean.  After scaling some rocks we were able to get the view we set out for.

Where the end of the lake meets the ocean

View toward Koltur and Hestur Islands

A nice stop for a picnic - at least the sheep thought so!

We stopped in the town of Sandavagur to look at the church we had admired every time we drove passed.

Our last destination of the day was Saksun.  This inlet originally formed a natural harbour but a large storm came through and blocked it.  It is now only accessible at high tide by small boats.

On our last day in the Faroe Islands we went to the town of Kirkjubour.  The town is famous for its church which dates back to the 12th century and has the oldest inhabited wooden house which dates back to the 11th century.

Scottish Highland Cattle in the Faroe Islands?

Oldest Wooden House in the World

St Olav's Church - The oldest still used church in the Faroe Islands

 It was then time to head back to Edinburgh.  The scenery in the Faroe Islands was incredible (can you tell how I struggled to narrow down pictures for the post?)

A couple sheep friends at the airport terminal

And I think I will leave it there since this post has gotten very long with so many pictures.  Next post will be about being back in Edinburgh for a day and my trip to Copenhagen and Stockholm.

I can't believe it's over

It is hard to believe the summer is over and it's already the start of the third week of classes.  So much has happened since my last post, I will probably fit things into a couple posts.

Over the summer I completed 6 weeks of small animal clinical placements.  My first placement was with a board certified cardiologist.  The week consisted of grading heart murmurs, looking at ECGs and echocardiograms.  The cardiologist invited me back for a day a couple weeks later to watch and help with a Patent Ductus Arteriosus (PDA) closure.  A PDA is a vessel remnant from when the animal is still getting its oxygen from mom.  It should close just after birth but in some cases it doesn't.  If it doesn't close after birth, there ends up being a mixing of oxygenated and unoxygenated blood.  A catheter is inserted through an artery in the leg and then fed through to the heart with the help of ultrasound and x-ray imaging.  Once the catheter gets to the opening a balloon is blown up and closes the vessel permanently.  It's not a common procedure and is very specialized so I was super lucky to get to see and participate in the PDA closure!

My second placement was with a veterinary ophthalmologist.  Ophthalmology terrified me so I decided to tackle it head on.  At the end of my week, it was slightly less scary but it also made it pretty clear to me that I do not want to be a specialized ophthalmologist.

My last four weeks were spent with two different general practices.  The one practice worked with a kitten rescue so I got to perform lots of paediatric neuters and help with the paediatric spays.  It's also where I got to complete my first dog neuter.

Other than placements I spent the rest of the summer hanging out at home and the lake, working for my dad and seeing friends.

The obligatory dog photos

Mars waiting to play fetch

One of the few moments where Jenny was stationary on the standup paddle board

My parents flew to Edinburgh with me.  My mom was a little jealous of the photo tour I did last year so we decided to do a private photo tour with Iconic Tours.  Our tour guide Will was fantastic.  I cannot give him enough praise.  He managed to make the tour relevant to all of us, even though two of us were using DSLR cameras and my dad was using his iPhone.  I think some of the coolest tricks I learned were actually on my iPhone!  He took us around the Royal Mile area and told us lots of really interesting stories and showed us lots of little details I have never noticed before.  I have already put my birthday present request in with my parents, for a night time photo tour with Iconic Tours!

It is supposed to be good luck for University of Edinburgh
students to rub David Hume's toe

"Ghosting"

Harry Potter trivia - Victoria Street is the street Diagon Alley is based on

Buddha in the Scottish National Museum

Scottish National Museum

Greyfriars Kirkyard

The day after the tour my parent's and I left for the Faroe Islands.  And I think I will save that for the next post!

Home for the summer

So it has been a couple months since I posted.  I guess life got busy and blogging slipped my mind!

Lots has happened since my last post.  I finished up my EMS placement.  While I was there I got some pretty amazing experiences including scrubbing in for an equine colic surgery, including putting in some sutures, some more cat neuters, helping with bull calf castrations and lots of other cases.

After my EMS I had a few days at home relaxing before heading back to Edinburgh for the final six week push.  I took the dogs to a leash free dog park.  Jenny had the time of her life when she found a giant mud puddle.  I thought no big deal, her feet will be a little muddy.  Well she decided to sit down.  I felt like the rest of our time in the dog park all the other dog owners were judging me for how dirty my dog was.

 

When I got back to Edinburgh it was pretty much just lectures, practicals and studying.  The highlight was spending three hours at the Edinburgh Dental Institute with the human dental instructors teaching us how to safely clean teeth and all the different instruments we might encounter.  After four weeks of lectures it was a week and a half for just studying.  Studying for 12 days straight was exhausting.  I had one final exam which covered all of cat and dog medicine, which was all the material I had learned since January.  It seems pretty crazy that we can have one three hour exam for all the material that I theoretically need to know for cat and dog practice.  I have to wait until the middle of June for my results.

After my exam I spent a few days relaxing in Edinburgh.  I went on a hunt for some nice pictures since I hadn't gotten out as much as I had wanted to since my photography tour.

Cherry Blossoms in the Meadows

Edinburgh Castle

Edinburgh Castle

Scott Monument and the Balmoral Hotel

Dean Village

The Water of Leith

After my few days relaxing I flew back home for the summer.  Since arriving home I have been mostly just hanging out until I start my clinical placements.  I went to a Toronto Marlies playoff hockey game (which they lost but was still pretty fun), spent lots of time walking the dogs and yesterday we went up to the property on Lake Huron to check it out.  The dogs were in for a swim.  While it was unseasonably warm, the water was still a little too chilly for me to swim!

Group Swim

Staying true to his breed - Swimming and retrieving!

A happy dog post swimming

I have one more week off (but am working some for my dad) and then I start the first of my clinical placements.

Back in the Homeland for Easter

It's Easter!  Which means I have four weeks off from school.  Last Easter on my break I went lambing.  This Easter I decided to come home and do 3 weeks of clinical EMS placements.

I flew home last Saturday after an exam on Friday.  I brought my camera home because I wanted to try and see if my new learned techniques from my photo tour would help me get some nice pictures at home.  So as always, my dogs were my models.

Finally a picture of Mars with his eyes open!

They stopped mid play to look at me - notice the wild hair from rolling in the grass!

Sunday I drove to the Ottawa area with my mom.  We stopped in at my Grandma's for dinner.  I then carried on and left my mom there so she could spend the week visiting.  I headed over to a cousin's place where I am staying for three weeks while I complete my placements.

For the first week of placements I worked in the small animal hospital.  The week started off quite exciting getting to see a caesarian section on a cat.  As the week continued on I got to see a lot of really interesting cases including a foreign body removal, a couple hit by car cases and lots of different x-rays (one of which I successfully positioned and imaged myself).  They let me do quite a lot of hands on stuff as well including TPRs (Temperature, Pulse [heart rate] and respiration rate) on anesthetized animals, put in a couple catheters, take blood samples, 1.5 cat neuters and most excitingly scrub in and be an extra set of hands for the foreign body exploratory surgery.  

Since it is now officially spring I didn't think about the fact it might snow and didn't really bring any winter gear except for a pair of mittens with me.  Well that was pretty silly because Wednesday morning we woke up to quite a nice layer of snow!  Although it has pretty much all melted now.

My Wednesday morning greeting

For Good Friday and Easter Sunday I spent the time with my Grandma, my mom and my dad who drove up for the weekend.  It was nice to catch up with everyone.  I also went around and took some pictures of the barns and house at my Grandma's today because the weather was beautiful.

Monday morning I start my large animal placement for two weeks.  I get to start bright and early with a big dairy herd health visit.  So I am off to review my cow reproduction notes from last year so that I hopefully have some clue what's going on!