The Edinburgh Experience: Summer is over already

Well summer flew by and now I am back on rotations already!

Over the summer break I spent 3 weeks back home in Canada. I spent a fair amount of time at my dad's veterinary clinic gaining as much experience as I could. I got to place quite a few catheters draw blood and do a little bit of surgery. They use a surgical laser (a laser beam is used to cut in place of a scalpel blade) which I had never used before. To practice I tried burning some lines into a tongue depressor. Unfortunately the surgery where I was going to be allowed to use the laser cancelled but I will be ready for the next time!

My straight(ish) lines to mimic incisions and writing my name to practice accuracy

The rest of the time was spent catching up on life in Canada and spending time at the lake.

Sunset by the lake

Mars in his "natural habitat"

I also had some fun with the dogs. When I graduate and get into my working life I would love to set up a side pet photography business. It would combine my love of animals and my love of photography. So I decided to try some fun action photos with my dogs using some bubbles. I got some mixed results!

Mars loved the bubbles

Jenny not so much...

After three weeks at home I flew back to Edinburgh. My dad came with me and we went on a nice vacation.

We started out trip with a ferry to the Isle of Arran. Arran is described as Scotland in Miniature. It in many ways mimics the landscape of Scotland but just in a very small scale. The day we arrived we headed over to our B&B which had an incredible ocean view. We then toured a little bit and headed back to Brodick (the main town) and picked up take away fish and chips and sat on a picnic bench overlooking the water.

Our dinner view

Nice sand beach near our B&B

The next day was our hiking day. We started with a hike to King's caves. The hike started through a forrest and then the ocean came into view. The weather was incredible. Luckily I had bought some sunscreen before (I have never ever applied sunscreen my entire time in Scotland since it is pretty much never needed) or we would have been badly burnt!

Our next hike was to see Glenashdale Falls. In the hot weather we were feeling the climbs but it was definitely worth the views.

After all our hiking we decided to have dinner in Brodick on the picnic benches again. I had deep fried sausage. The Scots will deep fry anything! Hopefully all the hiking counteracted all the fat in my dinner, regardless it did taste amazing. After dinner we headed back to our B&B and went for a walk along the beach.

Both my dad and I were looking at a rock thinking it was a really odd shape. As we got closer we realized it wasn't a rock at all. It was a seal. There have been a few places in Scotland I have visited that are known for seal sightings and every time I have gone I have never seen one, so I was pleasantly surprised to come across this one on our walk.

Basking in the Evening Sun

The next day was our last on Arran. We toured the north of the island which is known for its mountains. Unfortunately it was misty so we didn't quite get the full benefit! On our way to the north part we passed the ferry terminal and noticed that the ferry wasn't running. There was some sort of technical error but it was supposed to be fixed by noon. We figured no big deal since we weren't planning to catch a ferry until 5pm. While we continued on (including a stop to the Arran cheese shop) I kept checking the ferry. And every time I checked another ferry crossing was cancelled. Eventually it said that they were sending in a replacement ferry and the first crossing would be 2:30. So my dad and I decided to head back to the terminal a bit early because we figured there would be quite a line up. And we were right. When we arrived just before 3 we found the first crossing for the day was going to be 3:45. Oh and also the replacement ferry only held 12 cars instead of 25 like the normal one. I did some counting and it looked like we were going to be there a while. Almost 5 hours later we headed across to Kintyre on a ferry that had seen better days. Something was wrong with the steering and the captain couldn't keep the boat in any sort of straight line! Luckily it was a nice calm crossing.