Culzean Castle (The Z is silent :D)

Today I got to tour Culzean Castle (the z is silent :)) as part of the Scotland trips they offered through the international orientation program. I did not know anyone but thank god a student from DU was on the tour. On the hour long bus ride over I sat next to a Chinese student, Helen, and we discussed the differences between our two countries. It was very funny. We both argued that the other person's country was the big super power. It was an eye opening bus ride. As soon as we arrived to the country park we were given a tour of the castle.

Culzean Castle

Culzean Castle belonged to the Kennedy family (not JFK's family, they were Irish :D). Robert Adam was the architect who, in the 18th century, molded the castle into a "neoclassical mansion". It was a beautiful castle with many victorian designs. Only half 2/3 floors of the castle-mansion is shown to visitors and there were no cameras permitted. However, we got to see the drawing room, the kitchen, the library, a few bedrooms and powder rooms, and the kitchen. The whole time I kept thinking of Downton Abbey and how cool it would be to live in a mansion like that.  For those of you who don't know, Downton Abbey is a British tv show shown on  PBS which follows the lives of the aristocratic Crawley family and their servants in the early 1900's. If you don't watch it already, you should definitely watch it!

It also reminded me of the movie Dark Shadows or The Woman in Black because it is a empty castle on  a hill right off the sea. Coincidentaly, it does have a supernatural history. First, the castle was used in the 1970's British horror film, The Wicker Man. It is also apparently it is haunted by previous members of the house, but then again, what castle isn't "haunted" in Europe. They have such a deep history that anything is possible :P.

Walled Gardens

After the tour, we were free to walk around the castle grounds. Like I said, the ground had a spectacular view of the sea. So the guy from Denver (Steve) and Helen went to lunch at the only cafe there, a cafeteria. Then Helen met up with her friend so Steve and I wandered around aimlessly and ran into some other international students. We met Dan from Brown, Maria from Denmark, Kerena from Germany, and another girl from Pennsylvania. We decided to go as one big group to the beach.

A Scottish Beach

Before the beach we walked through the walled gardens and went to swan park. The park was pretty and, of course, was home to many swans . The beach was amazing though. It looked like the typical English country side beach. There was a pretty island and a beautiful jutting cliff, which we actually climbed. The only downside to hall of it was that I got sand in my shoes but it was worth it. Then we headed back to the castle, got on the bus, and left.

We got back around five but I was so tired from the day that I've just been hanging out in my dorm room since then. It was definitely a good day. Until tomorrow!