Back for the New Year

It's been a while! Life has been pretty crazy since I last posted over the summer, so let me bring you up to speed for the new year.

I finished out my summer the perfect way, with everything horses!

I spent 2 weeks doing EMS at a racing yard down in Yorkshire, which was absolutely amazing. With around 300 horses, there was a lot to see. I got to spend my time doing a little bit of everything, including grooming, moving horses, learning how to swim the horses in the pool and run them on the treadmill, riding, and even going to the races! Despite working with horses my whole life, I feel like I learned so much on this placement, and look forward to going back in the future for clinical EMS with their vets.

On my day off from the horses, I had the chance to visit Middleham Castle as well. Thought to be built around 1300, all that remains now is a beautiful set of ruins.

After working with the racehorses, I headed to Birmingham for the British Equine Veterinary Association annual congress, for which I was the head student steward. I got to spend the weekend helping run the conference, as well as meeting a lot amazing people in the veterinary field from all over the world! It was such an amazing experience, and I look forward to this year's congress in Liverpool.

I also took another trip down to England to visit my friend Jenny and her lovely pony Jack! We had a great time riding and went to see the international horse trials at Osberton.

The last bit of horsey updates was our first shows for the Glasgow Team! We did an inter-teams competition to start the year, then had our vet school competition against the Edinburgh vet school for Dick Day, then had our first real competition of the year against Edinburgh, Strathclyde, and Stirling universities.

I've also gotten a few hikes in, going up to Loch Humphrey and summiting Beinn Narnain. The hike to the loch was during the summer with about 90% humidity, so it was quite the sweaty hike! The hike up Being Narnain was quite the opposite on a nice misty morning, which was nice until we reached the top and couldn't see anything! We also didn't follow the path back down, and ended up scrambling down the side of the mountain which was quite the adventure. We of course ended the day with a stop in the local pub for some Guinness!

Another fun adventure this semester was going to my first rugby game! I went with Brittany to see the Scotland v Japan game over in Edinburgh, and we had an amazing time cheering on the winning team!

Our big adventure this year was going to Germany for a weekend! We stayed with my flatmates parents in Düsseldorf, and spent the weekend going to the Christmas markets and drinking our fill of gluhwein and altbeir. It was an amazing time with so many great memories!

And finally to end the year, I spent Christmas and New Years here in Scotland with my mom. After Christmas in Glasgow we headed over to Edinburgh and then down to Northumberland to visit Bamburgh Castle, once owned by our ancestors. We then came back to Glasgow to spend New Years, though it was quiet with all the new restrictions coming into place in Scotland.

Looking forward to all the new adventures this year!