Day 88: St. Andrews

I woke up at 3 am. Not on purpose. Greg's snoring was out of control. I laid in bed contemplating whether or not I should just get up and get ready because I thought that I'd never be able to fall back asleep. Just kidding.

I woke up 15 minutes after the alarm began at 8 am. The alarm was actually playing music which my mind must have ignored due to it being..music..and not so annoying sound that every creature in the world must hate.

I jumped in the shower and got dressed. Greg and I then made our triumphant stroll to the course. We were taking pictures on the way and were surprised and how mild the weather was. It was cold under normal circumstances, yes, but this was Golf-at-st-andrews-day and nothing could have stopped us. We arrived to the course and inquired about playing at the Old Course which was our main goal anyway. We were told that due to frost, the course wasn't open and we'd have to wait until 9:30 for George (the starter) to give the okay. We waited and were told to check back at 10:30. We walked around to the different golf shops and got to see some clubs from the 1800's. One costs 2,750 pounds. No big deal, I guess. We went back to the course and checked the status. It was still closed. We waited around and George told us to go ahead and check out the clubs and he'd try to put us in as soon as he could. We checked out the clubs and went down to the locker room. It was sweet to be able to sit where all the greats have sat.

We went back upstairs and back to the first hole of the Old Course, which is about 400 yards away (and we walked back and forth between about 3 times by now). Finally at about 11:30, George let us begin.

At last, what we've been waiting for! We tee'd up and swung away. Greg's went straight as an arrow and mine... not so much. What made things so much better was the fact that the sun came out and it was truly a perfect day for playing. We battle through the first few holes until we both became loose. Greg shot 4 pars in a row and I had a few pars myself. We had a great time and both shot pretty well considering it was the Old Course. So much history and intimidation comes with it, yet the course didn't seem to be so terribly difficult.

After golfing it was nearly dark. We turned the clubs in and headed back to the hotel. We stopped there for a while because they had provided us with the password for the internet. We talked to both of our Mom's and filled them in on what we've been up to. We headed back to the hotel briefly and then made our journey through some less familiar streets. We found the castle and heard the sea water hitting the coast. He could only see part of the castle walls because of how dark it was but both agreed to come back the next day to see more. We also saw the ruins to the Cathedral. We continued on walking and came across a haunted building. We can't say much about why it was haunted, because it would scare you guys, but just know that it was, indeed, very scary. We headed out for lunch to a place called Little Johns. We both got cheeseburgers and fries again and they were unbelievably delicious. Probably so kind of weird Scottish Cow or something. It was at this point that we decided it would be a perfect opportunity for a pub crawl. We would go to the pubs that we passed and try some beers that we would normally drink. We ended up having 3 different kinds: Amstel, Fosters, and Tennents. We then headed back to the hotel because we were ridiculously stuffed.

We hung out at the hotel and wound down for the evening. Greg got in the shower and within minutes I was sleeping.