I had the great opportunity to learn from and know more about a great friend of the EMC, John Cohn, over the past several years.  One of the stories John shared to us a while ago told touched our hearts.  In short, pulled from his website, this is the short story:

Sam was an exuberant boy with a 1000 watt smile. He loved his friends, family, dog, and bird deeply. Sam was passionate about guitar, snowboarding, lacrosse, and having fun. Yes, having fun was important to Sam.

Springtime meant lacrosse for Sam and a time to play hard with his buddies. Ultimate frisbee at the park were memorable times for Sam and he would come home with a big smile on his face and grass stains on his body. Summers you could find Sam floating down the rivers, swinging from a rope swing, biking, or just hanging with friends. A summer would be complete with time spent at Camp Abnaki and jamming at Burlington Rock Camp. Fall would be the season Sam would try and stretch summer out a little bit more until the snow started to come. That time was then spent at Bolton Valley Resort on his snowboard. He enjoyed ariel tricks and hitting the rails. Mostly he enjoyed just hanging with his friends and little brother Gabe.

Sam loved music and was always plugged into some song. Guitar was second nature to Sam. He could play “Asturias” on his classical guitar to heavy metal on his Gibson. He enjoyed playing bass and wailing on the drums. His favorite times were when he would jamming with one of his friends, or his big brother Max.
It is hard to capture Sam’s true spirit in a few paragraphs. He taught us so much. Mostly he taught us to have fun, ease up, and to be there for each other. He is a true best friend to many and deeply missed.

Sam was born on May 28, 1992. He was hit by a car on November 20, 2006 in Florida while visiting friends. His beautiful body stayed strong long enough for organ donation. He gave his heart, liver, kidney, and kidney-pancreas so that four others would live. His spirit continues on through them and surrounds us today. Sam lived his life to its fullest on this planet.

To help with Sam's passing, John and his family create what are called SamStones.  Here's a short description, found on his website, of what they are:

SamStones are made with love by Sam’s friends and family. Our intent with these stones is to pass on some of that love.  If you have found a SamStone please feel free to keep it, move it or pass it on. We hope that you will pause and feel the love that is being passed on to you. 

If you would like to know more about Sam Stones, you can find out more here:  http://www.samestone.org/.  Corinn and I wanted to contribute, so we were given a bag of stones from Diane, John's wife, and will now bring them on our McBe Adventures.  My goal is to, as accurately as possible, track where I placed them with a photos of the location and to document that location within something like Google Maps.  So if you see future posts of SamStones, you'll know that we've traveled recently.  Below is our first map of where we placed many Sam Stones while in the UK.  Click on each marker, as the map is interactive, to learn more about the location we placed the stone and a short story of the site.  You can even change the terrain, move the map around, and zoom in and out!

Below are photos where we visited with Sam being part of the shots.  We tried placing Sam where we though he'd have a great view of the locations we visited.  Some shots were difficult to obtain while others we though were really great.  We figured this would be good to compliment the map above as a way to visually see more of where we traveled with him.  Hope you enjoy them! 

Today was Day 2 in Edinburgh, and we were lucky enough to have gorgeous, sunny weather - very un-Scottish!  After another quick train ride into the city I dragged Ray out of the train station, across Waverly Bridge (all of about 10 yards) and booked us on a terribly touristy open top bus tour!  The Edinburgh Tour promised us an hour out in the sunshine (and wind) with views of the highlights of the Old Town and the New (mind you, New Town was built in the 18th Century, so everything is relative.  Highlights included some great views of the castle...

...the new Scottish Parliment building on the Royal Mile (the "gun" shaped objects are meant to be curtains pulled back from the windows - the Spanish architect wanted these to symoblize the transparency of the Scottish government.... everyone thinks they look like hair dryers, screw guns or hand guns)... ...Grassmarket, where the executions and hangings would take place (X marks the spot)... ...and the school that inspired Hogwarts! Our lovely tour guide kept telling us to "look up" - and we are glad we did - the architecture in the city is amazing, and the amount of detail work in the buildings is inspiring, you can almost miss 90% of it, unless you "look up"! This warning appeared on our tour bus, as the didn't want any of the passengers falling out with a quick start or a low hanging branch.  Our tour guide did inform us that there was one exception to the rule: English passengers should be certain to stand up, on the off chance we happened by a low hanging branch!

After the bus tour it was lunch time - hard to believe, right?  I had a small list of things Ray was required to eat before we left the country: Haggis, Irn-Bru and a deep fried Mars bar, all Scottish by invention.  Today we fulfilled the haggis requirement.  In the off chance any of you clicked on the haggis link in yesterday's post, you will understand why trying haggis was a big chance... I don't think they can be imported to the US as they may have been deemed "unfit for human consumption", but the Scottish are a stubborn bunch, and resourceful.  I had accidentally ended up in a situation during my semester abroad where I was required to eat haggis.  Actually not bad... tastes a bit like a spicey sausage... a good haggis should be peppery and have a good deal of whisky in it, I've been told.

So we headed off to The World's End pub for some pints, haggis for Ray and fish and chips for me!

Ray had a pint of Guinness and I had an old favorite of mine, a pint of cider with black currant.  It was a bit pinker than I was expecting, but just as tasty as I remembered. Ray's haggis was served with it's traditional sides, neeps and tatties!  We paid the extra pound for the whisky cream sauce, which made all the difference!  Ray loved it, an plans to sample it again!

After lunch we marched ourselves down to the bottom of the hill to visit The Palace of Holyroodhouse.  The oldest parts of the palace date back to the 12 Century and to this day it is still the official residence of the Royal Family in Edinburgh.  The Queen arrives every July, on our way up to summer in Balmoral, and is annually presented with the keys of the city and pledged the loyalty of the Scottish people.  She also holds a garden party for 8,000, so you can imagine the lawn. 

There is also the ruins of the old abbey, which I believe pre-dates the palace itself, that was included with the tour.  We weren't allowed to take any photos on the inside, but it was a series of stunning rooms, full of portraits, tapestries and furniture older than any of the buildings in this country! The garden was quite lovely, and backs right on to a large park, which includes views of Arthur's Seat. Here Ray and I both point to the highest peak - where we had been just the day before! Our day ended with a bit of shopping and a rainy ride by bus out to the airport.  We had to pick up our "hire car" as we depart on our road trip to the Highlands in the morning.  The Nasmyths also leave for their holiday in the North of England.  Charles and Mary will be sharing their holiday with their youngest son, Richard, and his daughter, Skye.  As a special treat, they flew Richard and Skye up to Edinburgh this evening so we could see them briefly before we all part ways.

After the excitment of Edinburgh Castle and our educational stop-off at The Scotch Whisky Experience we grabbed an uneventful lunch of panninis, which were eaten strolling down the Royal Mile.  On the way down we stopped off at St. Giles Cathedral; St. Giles is the patron saint of Edinburgh and I remembered the lovely church from my first visit to Scotland, 13 years ago.  I also remembered being told a very interesting story about the heart, laid out in the stonework, in front of the church, and the requirement of spitting on it.  While I seemed to remember the "point" of the story, I can't recall why spitting on the heart was so important, but had been reminded that it was in part for good luck.  So I made Ray spit on the heart, after great protest, and then he decided he needed to take a photo of me doing the same.... sorry for that... We made a quick stop off inside and Ray took a few photos of the lovely Thistle Chapel. At the bottom of the Royal Mile we met up with Charles and Mary to climb Arthur's Seat.  I was under the impression that this would be a casual stroll up a bit of an incline to get some great views of Edinburgh.  After all - you get to drive half way!  While I was seriously mistaken about the incline, I was not misinformed about the views - a panoramic of the entire city and the Firth of Fourth. The wind was unbelieveable, but the view was worthwhile!  Here is an amazing panoramic photo Ray composed!

Prior to us visiting Scotland, Corinn and I did a lot of planning.  On Corinn’s list, one of the major “things we must do while in Scotland” was to visit the Scotch Whisky Experience.  She’s done this tour 13 years ago and recalled it being much fun, suggesting that I wouldn’t be disappointed.  In fact, she was right.  Not only was it a tour, we road in a whisky barrel for an “immersive” experience!  In fact, from my point of view working in the interactive field, this tour was top notch in design, visually and mechanically (of course, if you trust my experience that is ). 

 

To start off, a virtual, ghostly gentleman took us through the process of making a batch of whisky, something I never really understood prior to visiting Scotland.  Next on the tour, we sat in a tasting room where we learned way more about the subtleties in the whisky varieties that made each distillery unique.  We also discovered that where you obtained your malts and distilled your spirits actually does make a huge impact in the tastes and smells of the whiskies produced!

 

There are five main areas where distilleries are found in Scotland, however, the fifth area has not produced as much as it used to (21 distilleries in 1886, now down to 3): 

• Highlands (flowery, sweat, smoky, fruity)
  
• Lowlands (vanilla, light, finishes dry)
  
• Islay (peaty as all heck, salt)
  
• Speyside (smoke, leather, apples, honey)
  
• Campbeltown (peaty, oily, salt, spice – also the antiquated area)

Hopefully this gives you a quick reference of what to expect from whiskeys produced in these areas. Sometimes the “nose” does not exactly represent the “taste”, but the experience is what a whiskey drinker looks for.

 

Even though this was the “tasting room” we didn’t get to test a whiskey of our choice from one of 4 regions (Campbeltown was left out) until we entered the world’s largest whiskey collection, which was FRIGGIN’ HUGE!  A Brazilian whiskey lover, Claive Vidiz, collected ~3,400 bottles of whiskey over 35 years, of which is now owned by the Diageo company, and it was on display in all its liquid glory!!!

 

While in the room, we finally got to test the whiskey we picked. I tried the Islay region while Corinn tried the Lowlands.  I believe Corinn coughed when she tried the Islay and made a face that clearly informed me how she really felt about the taste; I enjoyed both regions and I did notice the big difference!

 

In the end, the tour did not at all disappoint!  We left to the shop and I bought a couple bottles:  Glenfarclas 21 Year and Glenmorangie Astar.  These will probably last my lifetime, but will be much enjoyed.  I hope to share with my good friends and family when over.  

P.S. - THANKS CORINN FOR BEING AWESOME!   

As the forecast had indicated sunny skies in the capital, Ray and I took the train from Dunfermline into Edinburgh for some site seeing. Our first stop of the day was Edinburgh Castle, at the top of the Royal Mile (so named as the Castle is at the top and Holyrood Palace is about a mile down the hill at the bottom).  The castle is one of my favorite spots in Edinburgh, and it impressively sits on the top of a volcanic mountain in the center of Edinburgh's Old Town. The oldest part of Edinburgh Castle dates back to the 11th Century, and it offers some of the best views of the city's Old Town. Ray did seem rather interested in the cannons.... We also stopped by the Castle gift store, and Ray had his first run in with haggis, a traditional Scottish meal! We may save the real haggis experience for another day!