Wednesday/Thursday—

I traveled to Edinburgh a day early with my parents; all went smoothly. Flights were easy and on time, so there was no stress adjusting to the time change here. We walked around the city on Wednesday and explored graveyards with headstones dating back 500 years, which was slightly creepy. It’s still weird to cross streets because traffic is all backwards… You’ll look to the left to make sure no cars are coming, and all of a sudden, one comes zooming past from your right! Austin, my teammate, has almost been hit more than once, haha. The food here is really good and we’ve noticed that potatoes and tea accompany every meal. I think my new favorite thing to say is porridge— their version of oatmeal. We walked up the Royal Mile, from our hotel to the castle on top of the cliffs. There was a chapel within the walls from the 13th century and the chambers where Mary, Queen of Scots, resided. There was also a dog graveyard, for officers’ dogs, next to the jail holding cells. I thought that was neat. We finished up the day with dinner in the hotel and a team meeting— super awesome day so far!

Saturday (race/post-race)—

We woke up early Saturday morning to get a good breakfast— a gluten free bagel with pb&j, oatmeal, and coffee for me— and eat before our race at noon. It was rather chilly, but the athlete village had a heated tent so that wasn’t an issue. A few of us warmed up together; it was nice to have that “team aspect” even though we were converging as teammates for the first time. The course was three laps and included a part with hills and two narrow river crossings which were totally unique to this course and really captured the European cross country feel. Not to mention the mud! The race started fast and the competition from Great Britain went out hard— they have in each of the international races I’ve been in, so it wasn’t too much of a surprise. I went into the race with a really open and positive outlook, knowing I’d just come off a long season and taken some off time in December to be able to have a long track season. Overall, the race went well and it was really encouraging to have all the U.S. girls running next to me. After the race, I had the best white chocolate hazelnut porridge I’ve ever had; so, needless-to-say, I will be attempting to recreate it at home!

After, Judy, Austin, Peter and I went to this awesome pizza place and got to hang out around town for a while. Later that night, we witnessed Phillip teaching the GB boys how to “Hit the Quan”— which was nothing short of a miracle. The girls and I went to the “most sinister and chilling” dungeon tour really late that night and learned (and experienced) the chilling ghost stories of Edinburgh first hand… The tunnels were super spooky but you could hear loud music from the clubs above so that may have lessened the effects. Overall, the trip was exciting, unique, and an experience I’ll never forget! 🙂