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On the 25th of August, eight MSc students and IMAU assistant professor Lu Zhou found themselves in IJmuiden, ready to board the ferry to Scotland for the Climate Physics master’s excursion. Even before leaving the harbour, we were greeted by the signature Scottish weather. The rocking and swaying of the ferry couldn’t bring the mood down and we enjoyed a nice dinner before calling it a night.

The following day, we took the train from Newcastle to Edinburgh, where we spent the afternoon on a treasure hunt organized by Lotte. The next morning it was time to travel to Stirling where our afternoon was spent at the local university (Figure 1). Several professors, postdocs and PhD candidates enlightened us with their research, all related to water, using remote sensing. It was particularly interesting to hear about their studies of their own neighbouring ‘loch.’ Despite Stirling being rather quiet during the summer break, we still managed to enjoy a lively evening in town.

The next day, we returned to the ľ¹Ï¸£ÀûÓ°ÊÓ of Stirling to attend talks as part of a United Nations Water Quality Conference. The variety of topics discussed during the morning session was enriching. Afterward, we cleared our minds with a hike through the woods to the iconic Wallace Monument.

The last stop of our trip was Oban – a charming and famous whisky town on the west coast of Scotland. Its attraction to tourists became immediately obvious, as the isles surrounding the town turned out to be stunning. We were fortunate to visit the Isle of Kerrera, which captivated us with its natural beauty. The following day, we visited the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS), the UK’s oldest independent marine science organization. There, we enjoyed a lecture about the basics of oceanography, followed by a tour around the campus and the robot laboratories. It was a lot of fun to see some of the -very expensive- gliders in real life (Figure 2), instead of only using their data for our models! We were, however, also impressed by their other work, and their efforts to upcycle certain materials (kayaks, for example) into robots for taking measurements. After a lunch with professors, we bade farewell to SAMS and capped off the day with a whisky tasting, fully immersing ourselves in Scottish culture.

We finished our trip off with a beautiful scenic drive through the West Highlands, a hike near Glencoe (Figure 3), and a final night in Edinburgh. The perfect way to end our study trip to Scotland! We had an amazing time with our small but enthusiastic group of master’s students and supervisor Lu!

On behalf of the travellers, Julia Vriezen