The Summer I Became A Wanderer (2 - Stonehenge/Alicante/Guadalest)

The Summer I Became A Wanderer (1 - London/Guildford/Arundel)

Good afternoon, from stormy Campbell River where I am currently residing in the chilly winds of Autumn, the warming comfort of earl grey tea, and the persisting sandpaper struggle that is tonsillitis. Today, after being home for about 3 weeks, I have decided it's time to write what will inevitably be a long post about my summer vacation. For those of you that are visual, you'll enjoy that I'm essentially just going to attach a ton of photos and call it done - there's so much to cover that happened over the course of 15 days, so without further ado let's just get started!

We start at 4 am on Friday, August 4th. I flew out of Campbell River and landed in Vancouver to discover my international flight didn't even open their counter until 10:30, so realistically I didn't need to be as early as I was. The benefit was that I could sit and chill out for a bit with some breaky and do a bit of reading before I was even able to check my massive suitcase. That was okay; I am too paranoid about being late to these things so I would always choose being 4 hours early over half an hour behind.

The international flight was roughly 9.5 hours. By the time I got onto the plane and wasn't even out of Canada I had been up for 12 hours straight. 

One of the views from our plane flying over the Rockies.

I tried sleeping on the plane, I really did. You may or  may not know this about me, but I have difficulty sleeping at the best of times, let alone sitting up, around strangers, far too high up in the air with a small child behind me who screeched words seemingly at random whenever he felt he needed to break the silence. So in short, I had no difficulty being tired or drowsy, but barely caught an hour's worth of light naps over the course of the trip, so eventually I gave up and just kept watching movies. By the time I landed safely in London Gatwick, by my calculation even though it was 7:30 am there I had been awake more or less for 18 hours straight. Once I cleared customs and everything I managed to get completely turned around and the lovely people that were picking me up had to basically direct me back through the airport and back to where I'd started. Once we finally met up and got back to the hotel my friend (we'll call her Kit, which is an old nickname but I don't want to publish her actual name here just in case) had stayed at the night before with her family, I was able to shower quickly, refresh and wake myself up. Going on hour 20, but not wanting to waste the day in London, we organized parking for the other friend (let's call him Spanglish, which really is an affectionate nickname, I promise xD)'s car and headed out for the train station. What surprised me the most about London is that it's very similar to Vancouver, just with obviously British citizens and British quirks, but essentially it is very close to other major cities. The train system was kind of nuts, to be honest, and if I didn't have Spanglish with me who knew a little better how to connect on them I would have been hopelessly lost. 
We got into London and the first thought was exploring. We ended up at St Paul's Cathedral, which is in it's way spectacular. We spent easily about 3 hours inside. You aren't allowed to take pictures in there, but outside you can.

One of the views of the massive and beautiful cathedral

First look at St Paul's Cathedral

 What I didn't know about St Paul's is the stairwell. Well, that's not true. I was told that you can walk up to the top and see the views of the city. I was excited about that - by this point it was roughly 2 pm in the afternoon. If I had been up for 20 hours at "breakfast" (the other two ate while I had coffee as my stomach was turning enough to give me no appetite for greasy, meaty British food) around 9, it was now going on 25 hours with no sleep. So I was following like a tired sheep and we started walking up the winding staircase to the top of the cathedral. What I didn't realize is how narrow, winding, and simply long the staircase was. It wasn't the physical effort that this took that winded me (our legs were all jelly when we did get down eventually!), it was the enclosed space, people boxing me in on either side; it was one-way, you had to keep going. There was no option to escape. By the time I got to the top I was winded, dizzy, and on the verge of tears. It sounds silly, but any of you out there who suffer from claustrophobia will understand what something like that will do to you. Aside from anxiety and generalized panic attacks I am also claustrophobic. That makes cramming into a bus, or subway train, or making my way up narrow, enclosed, stone staircases very difficult for me. I sat down at the top and thankfully was with the two people that understand my claustrophobia and panic - and they wanted to keep going. There is a top part that goes outside the tower and you get to see the city. I wanted so badly to see these breathtaking views - but now I was to the point that if I didn't sit down and breathe through it I was going to have an attack. So I sat, I shook my head, and I said, "I can't. I just can't go up there." They understood - they went up to the top and said they'd be back soon. I instead sat and gazed at the saints above me, the sheer size of the dome that held them, and occasionally, bravely, leaned close to the edge protected by a wrought iron fencing to peek down at the cathedral below. Time passed and they had yet to come back down. It took me about 20 minutes of sitting and calming down before I realized the path heading up was probably also a one-way, and they wouldn't be coming back into this area. I started making my way down and they met me part way, thankfully, and reunited we headed out for some much needed dinner.
After dinner, more exploring...

St Bartholomew's Hospital; it's seen better days

 I don't know why this retired hospital spoke to me. Something about the smashed and patched up windows, the cobwebs, the eerie "has-been" feeling about it stuck. 
Walking a little further brought us to an eerier section - the Priory of Bartholomew The Great - a house wedged between more modern buildings, and just past it a massive church.

Front view of the church

Area next to the church. A plaque on the wall dictated that this where many a hanging had once taken place.

 Part of what made this area creepily fascinating was that there were unmarked tombstones all around. There were a few under the church, and a few against these trees. There was no way to know how long they had been there, or if they belonged to those that were put to death under these trees. 
After the church we wandered a little bit more; came across some more abandoned buildings that looked to be factories in their heyday. It was interesting to see this off-the-beaten-path history; everything in England was so aesthetically interesting and drew my attention. I spent a lot of time trying not to trip over myself as I was gazing aimlessly at the architecture that surrounded me. On our way back to the main section where St Paul's was, we headed to a footpath bridge called the Millennium Bridge. It was extremely busy, being seemingly the simplest way to cross the river in this area, so it was tricky to get good photos, but it was still such a pretty way to access the other side of the river. 

View of the river from the other side of the Millennium Bridge

 On this side of the river was Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, which was very exciting to see, being a literature nerd as I am. Once we'd called it done for the day, and taken the long series of trains back to Gatwick to the hotel for the night, I calculated I'd been up almost 32 hours straight, and the three of us had clocked around 16 km walking! It was a really great, but full day, and I can tell you I slept for 9 hours straight once we got back. Sleep deprivation does things to you, for sure. I am happy to have so many pictures to look back on because I don't remember that day in particular clarity.

Day 2

The next day was another adventure in London with friends. We took the train in to meet up with one of Kit's friends, one she's actually known longer than she's known me! The four of us get along great. The first stop was your quintessential parliament buildings and Big Ben. We also passed by the London Eye, but did not go on it because a) it cost 40 pounds to go on PER PERSON, which is roughly the equivalent of about $80 Canadian! and b) the London Eye is huge and very tall. Apparently once you get on you're on it for about 45 minutes and it moves very slowly. The idea of being that high up for that long simply didn't appeal to me.

Day 2 and we may have this train thing figured out yet.

The parliament buildings and the classic Big Ben!

Not our best selfie work, and not that you can tell, but selfie in front of the parliament building

As touristy as this was, the clock was incredible.

 From there it was on to the National Gallery which had a huge fountain in front of it. We stopped here for some lunch and water, as it was uncharacteristically hot this day in London. We'd already done a bit of walking so we needed a sit-down for a second. The fountain managed to get all of us soaked, which was shocking at first but then kind of nice, as like I said it was a hot day. Once we'd caught a breather we then wandered past the Canadian Embassy to the infamous Buckingham Palace. It is essentially a tourist trap, but I'd be a poor tourist if I didn't at least come close to it. You'll see in the photo that there's a massive crowd around it, and I'd never get a good picture with that many people standing around anyways, so this is the best I could do.

Tourist trap  Buckingham Palace

The BC crest on the Canada gate

 Past the palace there was a Canadian gate with crests for each province. I requested we get a photo underneath it, to "represent" as it were, and accidentally ended up underneath the BC crest. I didn't even realize until I looked closer that there were crests for the provinces and territories, and the closest pillar to us just happened to be our home province! Too perfect.
Next we walked through the trails outskirting the palace to the next train station to try and catch the British Museum before they closed. 

One of the exhibits that allowed photos

We only ended up spending about an hour in the museum before they were getting close to closing, so after a quick stop at the gift shop we headed out for a refreshment before going back to the train station to start the long journey back into Gatwick, and the car ride into Guildford where Spanglish lives. 

Day 3

Time for a road trip. Over the previous two days we clocked 31 km of walking and our feet hurt. The first stop was a beautiful country road that hides a cemetery and chapel - started by Mary Watts, and therefore named Watts Cemetery.

The chapel was beautifully detailed.

 Our resident Spanglish took this great fisheye photo of the two of us inside the chapel. It seemed very Irish/Celtic in design and decoration. Is it odd to find cemeteries and chapels like this, hidden away in the woods, to be soothing and intriguing? Does anyone else go see cemeteries and walk quietly past the headstones, reading about people long since gone, reading what's been inscribed about their lives and their families? Well, if you do, England is the place for you. There's churches, cathedrals, chapels, cemeteries, everywhere. And everything in this corner of the world is steeped in history. 

The incredible celtic-type chapel

 Running ahead, as we do, Kit was behind us by the road at this point with her zoom lens on her camera and said something at some point that made us crack up. Unbeknownst to us, this is the result. While I don't normally like photos of myself with my mouth open, because of my horrific crooked teeth, this one I like. While it seems backwards to be laughing in a cemetery, I feel it is beneficial. While there are people interred here who suffered there are also those that lived good lives and should be remembered in light and not consistently in darkness or sadness. This is why I am largely in favor of celebrations of life rather than wakes or funerals. It's more important to remember the good, the happy memories, than the sadness that they have left us. 

Laughing in a cathedral - altruistic?

 Alright, after the chapel we took to the road again, this time heading towards Arundel. What I didn't know at the time is this would be my favorite castle that we saw on this trip - and believe me, there were a few! 
Arundel was possibly the largest and best preserved of the castles we went to. It also was more self-guided, so you could wander within the walls and view the rooms in your own time. There were paintings and ornate pieces of furniture at every turn; exposed rock from the original castle and sections that had been patched. Every area had something written that you could read that told you about how things were laid out, what the items were, and what they meant to the people at the time, with dates. These are the "museums" I love the most - the ones that are organized in their original setting, more or less, so you feel as though you are transported back to that time. Of course, you are not allowed to take photos inside the larger, newer part of the castle, but we did get some outside and in the grounds around it. 
Outside the older part of the castle awaited. This was referred to as the "keep", or the medieval fortress section of the original castle that was still standing. What was incredible was just to put your hand on stones that had been used by so many at one time, and had been standing for so many years. It's incredible what we can preserve in this modern world. 

Outside the main gate into Arundel castle. In case you couldn't tell, this trip I became braver with clothing choices. Baby steps.

How do I put into perspective just how big this is?

The stairs heading into the keep, facing down to the newer part of the castle

After spending at least 2 hours within the castle and seeing the keep at the top, and the incredible views, we finally went back down to the grounds to explore. There were 6 or 7 gardens, of which we only had time for 2. We could easily have spent another 2 hours there, but by this time we needed to get back to the car and get going on to the last stop of the day, which was about an hour down the road. I didn't get the names of these gardens, but the one pictured below was past a church next to the castle. There were ivy covered archways, gardens surrounding full of lush flowers, and this large cathedral in the distance. Again I neglected to get the name of it, but it was so beautiful. All the architecture in this area was splendid to see. Historically I learned that years and years ago, before the plague, if these buildings were standing they would have been painted. The art on the sides and within would have been delicately painted in color. After the plague the gothic style of architecture became more popular and has stuck since - so sculptures and decorations on these buildings would have been very detailed, but left in stone or simply adorned, rather than intricately painted in the times before. 

Incredible cathedral in the distance

Back to the cathedral, the view of the courtyard and ivy covered tunnels

After leaving Arundel we started the journey to Bournemouth for dinner and some beach time. I think I'm still finding sand in my shoes from this - we watched the sun go down on the beach which was beautiful but also very sandy and very cold! All I could think was how much my little red dog would love this beach - it was almost all sand; there were a few stones here and there but nothing like our west coast. If it hadn't been so cold I would have dipped my toes in the ocean just to say I did. Looking back now I totally should have! Just being by the ocean made me feel more at home. I could never live somewhere without my favorite naturally occurring source of peace and tranquility. 
After 3 long days, we made the long journey back to Guildford to drop Kit off at her friend's house. They were leaving very early the next morning for a flight to Paris! Meanwhile, Spanglish and I went back to his house to get a much needed rest - he'd done so much driving in one day, and more to come the next - because the next day would be the long-awaited Stonehenge! 

Alright, that's days 1-3 of my trip so far. I hope it's not horribly boring for my general lack of readership; but it's nice to be writing again, even if it's a simple blog post that leaves everything to pictures. Depending on how tomorrow goes I may be back again with the next part. 
Love you for reading! 
 


 


 

Self Love & Shaved Legs.

This is going to be an odd one, but please bear with me. 

Inspiration strikes us at the strangest of times. For me, that's when I'm drifting off to sleep, emotionally unwell, or more often than not, in the shower. I think a lot of you would agree that the shower is one of the most relaxing menial tasks. The infinite struggle of "I don't want to shower" and then "I don't want to get out of the shower" is ever-present, and the feeling of having to commit to an involved routine is sometimes daunting. 

If you, like myself, are of the female persuasion, that could mean any number of things and any number of types of showers. There's the "I just have to get clean" shower, where you essentially scald yourself in the hot water and soap trying to clean everything while shampoo sits in your hair and half rinsing while conditioning said hair, then drying in 30 seconds and struggling to put jeans on over wet legs. This is not my favorite of showers, but it's more often than not the kind that I end up taking. "Just get it done" is a common mantra for me, as I am often behind on other things, and have other chores or things to attend to.  There's the "weekend shower", or as I like to call it, the "I have time" shower. This one is nice. You can take your time, enjoy the warm water, shave, deep condition, exfoliate, and use that special body wash that you love so much but don't have time to use during the week. Then there's the "pampering" shower. If you girls out there are like me, you have certain treatments you like to give your face, hair, and skin now and again to make you feel special and pampered. Let's face it, life is stressful, so taking some time for yourself is always lovely and it makes you feel so relaxed and happy. The issue is some of these things take a good amount of time, and we often can't be bothered or simply aren't able to do them. This mentality got me thinking.

Even when we're rushed, tight for time, stressed or anxious, even doing something as simple, overlooked or inconvenient like shaving our legs is a form of showing ourselves some love. It's something we do to take care of our bodies, present them the way we choose, and give ourselves a sense, albeit small sometimes, of accomplishment. Those of you that suffer from anxiety and depression as I do and have done understand that sometimes just getting out of bed is difficult and facing your day seems impossible. Despite this, somehow we find the energy to get up, exfoliate, scrub, and shave to care for ourselves. We brush our teeth and hair, some of us apply makeup, we get dressed, we face the world. We put our best foot forward - sometimes that foot is a little more forward and sometimes it's a little more reserved, but it's the best foot we have at the time, and we're bravely setting it out into the world without fear. 

I suppose my point to this whole post about showers is that despite how we may feel, or the day we may have had or the troubles we face, we still bring ourselves to love ourselves first, we may just not realize it. So love yourself a little more, be brave, and take it easy out there. The world's a pretty scary place.

 

My Wisdom Tooth Experience

This may be another long one, so grab a snack or a cup of tea (or hot chocolate, if you're me) and get comfy. 

First of all, it's literally been storming here since Wednesday night. I can count on one hand how many times it's stopped raining since Wednesday, and the hours is less than that. Everything is flooded downtown and even taking Maia out for a pee is an ordeal! My water dog is a total wuss when it comes to wind and rain. The power has flickered but thankfully has not gone out where I am, at least. I know more rural areas have lost power, which is no surprise. I'm hoping work hasn't lost power, but I'm not there right now anyways, so I guess it doesn't matter too much. I just worry about our patients and supplies - a lot of which are refrigerated or frozen. 

Anyway...

If you read my last post, you would know that in October my wisdom teeth started coming in. The timing was impeccable - you can read about it there for more whiny details. On November 10th I went down island to see the specialist about booking an appointment. He discussed everything with me and long story short I needed to get 5 teeth removed - the four wisdoms, plus one my wisdom tooth ruined. The quote was not as bad as I'd thought initially, and he elected IV sedation and local, not GA - which was both relieving and terrifying. On one hand, I was happy not to have an ET tube down my throat and longer recovery from the anesthetic, but at the same time I was so worried that because I wasn't going to be right out I would hear everything and simply not feel it. The idea of surgery was panicking me enough; having the prospect of that horrifying experience hanging over my head was not doing me any favors. Everyone I talked to about it was shocked that I wasn't being put right under as they had, and that I was so brave for choosing that. But I didn't choose IV sedation; my surgeon did. He stated that GA is "overkill" for wisdom teeth and that he is a "good read of people" and was sure I'd be "perfectly fine with IV and local". All I could think for the next month was you'd better be right, Mr Dental Specialist.

As it turns out, he was.

***

I had put this away into "drafts" for the better part of the last 2 months, and am finally picking it back up and trying to finish it. Are you ready? Here we go...

I went into the office with extreme apprehension. They walked me into a quiet albeit clean room where the nurse made me lay down on a stretched out chair, taped my head down with this big stretchy headband type thing so I couldn't move, then laid a blanket over me and started slapping the back of my hand. She said she was trying to find a vein -  which made me laugh, because I have cat veins and they're tricky to hit without bruising me. She managed it though, and the poke of the IV needle was actually the worst part of the whole thing. She made me breathe through this plastic tube and patted my knee, saying the doctor would be in shortly, then left. I was stuck there for about 15 minutes, just staring at the ceiling, listening to my heart rate go up and up and trying my best to get it back down so as not to panic. Then the surgeon came in, announced he was going to "give me something now" which I didn't watch because I was still trying to forget about the fact that I had a needle in my hand, and that was it. Next thing I know they're wheeling me out and I'm next to another girl who's sitting up sipping something from a small paper cup. I tried to get up, but the nurse near by ran over and pushed me back down. All I wanted was to get up and go home, but she wouldn't let me. I laid there for a while until she asked if I wanted to sit up. I nodded, cheeks filled with spongy cotton, and she let me sit up a little bit, then left for a while again. Then she came back and let me sit all the way up, told me to take the cotton out of my mouth and gave me some ginger ale - which I found a tad odd, seeing as my homecare instructions stated not to have anything carbonated for 24 hours after the operation. 
By the time I got home, the freezing was still in effect, and I basically sat on the couch drooling and icing my face for the rest of the day. My mom stayed with me to make sure I was okay until my housemate came home from work, at which point my mom got the hell out of dodge and left my friend to care for me.
Really the hardest part was not chewing. Basically you aren't allowed to actually chew anything for a week, nothing chewy or hard for 2 weeks, and no seeds or kernels of any kind for a month. Re-routing my whole eating plan for a month sucked.
For the next few days I was significantly drugged up, sleepy, and sore. Doing a salt rinse after each meal really sucks, but I followed my homecare instructions to a T, and never got an infection or dry socket - thank goodness.  I had about 4 days off work to let the swelling go down, and when I did get back to work it took about another week for my face to look normal again and for speaking at length to be not painful. 
Now, I'm happy to say that things are all healed up, I have no jaw or tooth pain anymore, and was going to go in for my cleaning but got a bad cold and had to reschedule. So we'll see where that's at in about 2 weeks when I get the cleaning done. I'm expecting cavities - that's just the simple truth when you haven't had a cleaning in years because you can't afford it. Hopefully with the benefits I have through work it won't cost me an arm and a leg to fix them all. I'm dreading the time off work to get them done, but at least they offer some evening times. 
That's all for today, I think. I don't think that was as much as I could have ranted about, but it's all I have for you for now.
Take care of yourselves, and don't catch the cold I'm suffering with right now.