England
Streatham
We stayed with Will, from our DTS family for a week with Serena, Rapha and Ben (who we met in Sicily on our DTS). It was such a blessing to be able to chillout for a week after the course and say goodbye to everyone gradually. We said goodbye to a lot of people in Harpenden and it was a bit of a shock and pretty emotional.
We went into London and saw a few sites - watched the changing of the guards, visited the London Eye and chilled out a lot. I met Nicky Gumble! He’s one of the guys who helped start running the Alpha course outside the church. It’s running in a lot of churches for those who are interested, intrigued or want to get to know the Christian faith better, in an environment that is open and basically everything is up for discussion. It’s brought many to know what the Christian faith is all about, highly recommended. Even I did it and learnt a lot from it.
Ipswich
We stayed just under a week at Mikey (who I met in Wickham back in the day) and Michelle’s. Loads of people wondered why on earth we were going to Ipswich. We were looked at weirdly as we walked down the street with our backpacks – I don’t think they expected backpackers to be trudging through Ipswich…or it could have been Dan’s bright orange pants!
We went and visited Grime’s Grave flint mine which is “5,000” years old. We weren’t able to go too far into it. We got down in to the shaft and waited for the woman to come down and unlock the gates…nup. It’s not “stable” enough to be crawling around. We laughed cause we expected to be able to…let’s say it would be an unfair comparison to the caves in Margaret River.
We also visited Framlington Castle. It had the surrounding walls still standing. It was pretty cool to see such an old structure. It was a audio-guided tour and the history was pretty cool to listen to.
We then visited Orford Castle which was really amazing! It was tall and slim-ish but had all these little rooms you could go into - some were toilets. The spiral staircase was really cool. We went for a walk around the town of Orford and had some local smoked cheese – sooo really tasty, nothing like smokey burps! We also walked around a graveyard surrounding a church. It’s kinda eerie over there, many churches in England have graveyard surrounding the church within the fence.
We went for a walk around some woods in Ipswich and we were, I reckon, five minutes from seeing the birth of a calf on one of the farms! The mother was licking it down and Dan saw it eat the umbilical cord (if I had’ve I think I would have puked). I waited for like 10 minutes to see if the other cows would give birth. I don’t really know what I would have done - freaked out, tried to help pucked – but it would have been awesome to see…in a way.
So, I totally lost my return train ticket and we had to buy another one. I was spewing! The public transport system over here is very complex and awesome, but pretty expensive also. I was so annoyed at myself. But, I guess we learn from these things…Dan now holds the tickets. I have yet to create a filing system.
Ireland
Back to the Euro’s!
Cork
Made it to Cork in Ireland after my hand luggage was strip searched and violated because they detected “baby food” jars in my bag. They basically took EVERYTHING out and wiped down my stuff with this drug/explosives strip-thing. They took away my Vegemite I was going to give to Mama Rosa in Sicily and my almost-finished Promite. Liquid my butt!... and Dan gets away with having bubble soap mixture in his bag! Anyway…
Spent two nights in a cute little lodge just out of the centre of town. Awesome breakfast with yummy Irish yoghurt. I don’t like the black pudding much, but white pudding is nice (you’re right Michelle!). We went to the St Patrick’s Day parade which had some interesting floats and people in it. We didn’t do a lot in Cork, we relaxed a bit and caught up on some Bible reading. Acts is going well – for Lent (“40” days before Easter – a time to remember the temptations Jesus endured in the desert before He started His ministry) I am reading through Acts thoroughly, and I’ve given up coffee. It’s going really well and I’m getting so much out of it. Paul was an amazing man to go the places He did and be the man he was, so different to how he used to live before he met Jesus…literally.
We caught the bus to Dublin, which I was told was only 3 hours. When 5 hours had passed I got a little impatient and anxious to get off. So, what does one do when one is agitated? One sits up and uses the abs to keep one stable…and there you have it - an abs workout! Hmmm…
Dublin
I have to say, I wasn’t overly impressed with this place. It costs a bit to stay and be entertained. We had an awesome Mexican meal – so tasty. We visited Christchurch Cathedral, which we had pay to see so we didn’t go in. I can understand why they charge, the maintenance cost on the massive and hard-to-reach places must be enormous. We went to a huge park and rode on hire bikes. There where deer grazing on the soccer field and a cute little castle with grass hedging which reminded me of running around the bush amongst the spinifex. Oh, them were the days - innocent, easy-to-please, imaginative fun.
I have to say. The whole Ireland and Northern Ireland travel has been a little difficult for me. We, or I because this is travel I wanted to do, haven’t done too much investigating of the countries. We basically stayed in city/large town areas and didn’t get to see the countryside. We’re really rushing through these areas as we need to be in Italy for an Ultimate competition Dan is playing in, for early April. I am mixed in feelings – I feel like it’s been waste of time and money, and I haven’t done enough to see the place or work out what we can do and see. We’ve basically had one whole day in each, which has been difficult. So we walk around the city. I’ve struggle with the concept of wandering around and not having a purpose or mission, which those who know me will understand the frustration. So, I’m trying to work that out and be okay about the whole thing. The other thing is the atmosphere, in Ireland mostly. It felt kinda depressing. It was almost as if the only thing travelers did was sightsee, shop and get drunk, something that doesn’t interest me anymore. There are pubs everywhere! I feel kinda purposeless right now…
Northern Ireland
Back to the Pounds!
Belfast
We stayed here for two nights, but still only had one day to do anything. We did a “Black Taxi” tour, which basically took us to the Prodestant and Catholic sides of Belfast. The story is quite sad and nothing to be proud of if you are of faith in Christ Jesus. It totally goes against what Jesus intended for His church to be. Human error and pride, and giving God a bad name kinda irritates me and NOT what God is all about! I’m not perfect at this either…Anyway...during the tour we visited a part of the Peace Wall that divides the two denominations within the area. Dan and I both wrote on the wall, there were loads of Aussie’s who signed it.
We then took a ferry, two trains and walked heaps to get to our accommodation in Edinburgh…never again. My advice – FLY. It took like 7 hours travel. Or you could use the time to…read or something. I guess if you prepare your mind for it, it would be okay. Once again I underestimate the size and distance of these countries.
Scotland
Edinburgh
Well, we spent 3 nights in Edinburgh and saw the city a bit. We visited Edinburgh castle which we did not pay to go in…I was kinda over castles by this stage. Dan tried some haggis, which my stomach could not handle at the time. The older I get the less I can try in terms of food. After Sicily, the thought of pizza or pasta makes me feel a little queasy, me thinks I overdid it on outreach…or maybe it was the all-you-can eat restaurant when we got back to the base. That’s right! We had lunch at the restaurant and I OVERATE, then that night I was…well, let’s just say “not well” and I think the body remembers the last thing you ate when this things sort of happens and it rejects it in future…even if it wasn’t the cause. There was sickness going around the oval at the time and it was pretty nasty.
We went on a 3-day tour to the Isle of Skye (you were right Peta – beautiful!). I loved it. It’s spring over here - snow-capped mountains that were melting, with little, and sometimes very large, waterfalls running down them. We did heaps of stops and had history lessons along the way. We had to wait in a town for over 20 minutes as we picked up some more people for the tour and I was glad cause we got to visit a MacNaughton shop. Twas so cool. Different spelling, but eeright.
We had pretty good weather the time we were in Scotland. On the tour there were times when the weather was shocking while we were on the bus, then when we stopped to get off and wander around, it was decent - less rain and bearable. The sun came out to say hi a couple of times but the wind just stole it’s warmth. The day we left and caught the plane was SHOCKING! It was freezing cold with rain and wind as we waited on the tarmac. We were looking forward to Italy…and maybe some sun…
For me personally, I am trying to focus on not having any regrets. Scotland was better as we got to see the country. I am learning a thing or two about myself, and situations are bringing to the surface some stuff I don’t like, which I want to improve on or get rid of, period. I think I process, plan and analyse too much and don’t “just do it.” I may be hard on myself, but I think sometimes it’s necessary to get my butt into gear.
I stressed out – again – about organizing travel. I’d spent hours on the computer trying to figure out what we were going to do between Sicily and Turkey – which is probably going to be Greece (Athens) for 4 days. There is so much to do and see I couldn’t decide, especially with costs and logistics with getting to places. I completely freaked out and poor Dan was doing his best to make me feel better. I get this way when trying to organise things I have no experience with, I can’t visualise or don’t have any knowledge of the place we’re going - I’m out of my comfort zone. That night, I put into practice “walking in the opposite spirit” and it definitely works, hard but it does work. Die to self – especially emotions that are not positive or helpful.
Oh mum (Laurel), I’ve been listening to the pre-marital counseling talks you sent a long time ago :o) They are long but sooo relevant. It’s been a little strange because at times I’ll be going through something and it’ll speak right into the situation. I think I might start taking notes to help me remember. Thank you for them!
I hope you are all doing well. I try and keep updated about things happening in Aussie but we’re totally out of the loop. So feel free to let us in on stuff and send me an email or FB me about yaself and what you’re up to. We may be on the other side of the world, but we haven’t forgotten where are roots are and who we love.
xoxo
Lizzie Mc
lizabef777@hotmail.com
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