Well I've been in England a month and a half and a month of that time has been in my new job and house.
So as you know, I got to England and stayed with Bridget and Russ. It was lovely staying with them and catching up. We had loads to catch up on after 6 years! But usually it just ended out with us drinking a bit too much wine.
I left them for a few days and did a bit of the touristy thing. I hired a car and checked out Stonehenge. It was a gorgeous day when I headed there. Although cold, the sun was shining and the birds were singing and I was generally pretty chuffed with life. I won't mention details about these places I've seen since you can all come over and visit if you want to do the touristy thing over here.
I left Stonehenge and headed to Salisbury to check out the cathedral. As usual for cathedrals it was beautiful. And as usual for an Australian, I was amazed at its age since there were tombs there of dead people from 1200s (even though I had just been to stonehenge and may have been walking over people who died 2000 or so BC!). It is the site where one of the original four of the Magna Carta are and I quickly had a look at it before I ran back to the car since my parking was running out. I luckily didn't get a ticket (Salisbury isn't as bad as Melbourne obviously where I have got a ticket twice for being only 3 minutes late) and I drove off. I soon got lost since I had no map of Salisbury and my navigational skills are next to useless. I thought I'd stop at a walking track and have a bit of a walk on the way out of town and despite my disastrous navigation, luck had it that I had (Luck always seems to find me when I can't find anything!) found a place called Old Sarum which is where the original Salisbury sat before the cathedral was built and Old Sarum was destroyed. There were beautiful views of Salisbury from there.
From Salisbury I went via another old castle set back from the main road. It was unfortunately closed when I got there but the drive to find it was so pretty and off the beaten track. It was on that road that I saw my first badger (roadkill unfortunately but I was nonetheless excited that it wasn't a kangaroo) and I saw my first grey squirrel (alive and not roadkill which most Brits would probably say is unfortunate but for which I nearly crashed the hire car in my excitement to see it).
So from there I headed to Bath and fell in love. Bath is absolutely stunning. I checked straight into a hostel. The hostel was up near the university with spectacular views of the city. From my room the city lights were beautiful. I met two girls from Sydney and we had dinner and drinks in the hostel before hitting the town. Bath was also fun, except I piked early due to upset tummy.
The next day I checked out the Roman baths of Bath and I would've gone into the abbey except there was a funeral on and so tourists weren't allowed. I thought that was fair enough and didn't try to muscle my way in!
I headed home to Bridgey and Russ's via Andover to visit Dino, a friend from uni. I stopping on her work. She has found her niche in and exotic pets clinic and I'm so happy for her. It is just perfect for her. It was just lucky she rang me in Bath and we realised she was only a short detour on my way home.
I got lost (again) on the way to the car hire place and was nearly too late to return my little Vauxhall Corsa. Really, one wrong turn in this country and you're stuffed. I stopped three times for directions. Sometimes people didn't even seem too sure themselves of where they were. There are so many roads!!
So by the time I got back, I was exhausted.
The next day I said goodbye to Bridgey and Russ and went to Susie's place in Oundle. Her parent's made me so welcome and I felt really at home there. When Susie (Snooze) got home from her course we were reunited after not having seen each other since December 2005 when I left Rarotonga. We spent the weekend walking around the district and going out at night and seeing the market and driving to check out houses that Snooze might buy. She led me astray with wine and we had lovely chats about times spent together in Raro and future plans ahead. It was a great catch up and she lives in a beautiful area.
On the Sunday before I was to start work, Snooze drove me across to my new home where I met my boss and she presented me with my house (which is really a good set-up) and my car (which, although it won my favour by being red, it was an absolute s*#theap. It now works fine after a day in the Mechanic the other day. Yay it doesn't stall in the middle of intersections with oncoming traffic anymore!).
More on the next blog which will arrive soon since I am a month behind and lots has happened!!!
