Injury? What injury?!

I pulled a tendon in my foot at the end of August, at the worst possible time.  They take a notoriously long time to heal - a couple of months even if you're letting them rest properly, which I... did not.  I had no time for that so I resorted to a lot of sports tape and sensible shoes.  I had places to be...

Stone'enge

At the end of August my youngest sister and I went on a little roadtrip.  We visited our grandparents in Dorset, our other sister in Bristol, and then made our way back sightseeing historic National Trust houses through Hampshire and Surrey.  However, with a small detour into Wiltshire, we got to see something neither of us have ever seen before...

To be beside the seaside - North Norfolk Coastal Path part 3

We're back at the beach! Yaaaaay!

Cromer to Mundesley - 8 miles

A Land of Ice and Fire - Day 5

It's our last day!  We had to be out of the apartment in the morning, so we packed up the car and then went down to the Harpa, Reykjavik's concert hall.  In a country of dramatic yet minimal landscapes, it makes sense to me that their sense of design would have that same simplicity and stark grandeur.

Photo from www.blog.icelanddesign.is/

A Land of Ice and Fire - Day 4

Today we did a day's tour of the south coast by coach.  Normally we'd have taken ourselves, but actually the coach trip turned out to be really informative, and of course everyone got to look out the window rather than having to drive.  So much to see!



After heading out through the familiar mountains around Reykjavik, you drop down onto the coastal lowlands (passing Selfoss, the ice cream making capital of Iceland).  There are lots of small firms dotted about here - we pass a microbrewery on the site of what used to be a women's prison.  It just looks like a little house in the middle of nowhere!

There is a mountain range though, to our left (north).  Up there are the glaciers, and the active volcano Eyjafjallajokul, which erupted in 2010 producing enough smoke to stop air travel across most of Europe for an entire week.  It seems calm today!

We're also going to see a lot of waterfalls.  Here's the first; Seljalandsfoss.

A Land of Ice and Fire - Day 3

After yesterday's excursion, we had a very lazy start today.  Dad was a bit ill, so it was a slow breakfast and sauntered out of the house at 11am, heading down to Reykjavik harbour.

A Land of Ice and Fire - Day 2

It is Wodin's Day - Wednesday!  Drove out of Reykjavík to persistent light drizzle and persistent heavy wind!  There are no trees here to stop it, and large areas of flatness that the wind charges over.  It's still the tail end of winter here, but we came prepared.  Layered up and waterproofs on, we went out into the authentic Icelandic weather experience!

Our first leg was to drive past Lake Þingvallavatn to Þingvellir, the site of the alÞing. (You pronounce the 'Þ' like a 'th', by the way).  This is the original Icelandic Parliament, which recently celebrated its 1100 year anniversary.  Each year all the clans in Iceland would march across to this wide river valley to exchange news, reaffirm the law and deal with any national issues.  It's right on the edge of the National Park, so when we weren't busy trying not to be blown away by the frankly ridiculous amount of wind, the views are lovely.  You could spend a really long time just wandering the many easy paths around the valley if you wanted to.

A Land of Ice and Fire - Day 1

Stepping out of Keflavík airport in Iceland, the first thing I'm aware of is a very faint scent of something like egg.
Sulphur.

Iceland is a young island, relatively speaking.  Younger than Scotland, and igneous almost down to the roots.  It is the result of lava pouring up out of a crack between the American and European continental plates, eruption after eruption forcing land up out of the sea.  It feels like it too, as we drive the hour to Reykjavík - me, my parents, and my youngest sister Emma.
It looks a long way on the map, but takes us only an hour, which gives you some idea of the size of the island.  It's big, a similar mass to England, but still not as big as I assumed, and startlingly spare in terms of foliage.  The wind whips across moorlike spaces that would seem bleak if not for the sun rolling out every so often to spotlight particular parts of it.

Across the bay towards Mount Esja

The Solfariđ (Suncraft) sculpture.  I love the shapes in this thing, and immediately had to go climb on it. 
It's public art, you're clearly meant to do that.

Highland Fling! - 2 of 2

Day 5 - CairnGorm and Loch Morlich

You can get the Funicular Railway up the UK's 6th highest mountain, CairnGorm, but for some reason we decided to walk between the two stations along the very aptly named Windy Ridge.

Le grand voyage Francais!

The other big trip that I did this summer was to the Loire Valley in France with my family.  It's a region famous for it's beautiful chateaus.  We stayed in a small gite (a cottage) near Chaumont sur Loire, surrounded by fields and fields of sunflowers.  The point was to relax but we're quite an active family so we'd regularly walk the half hour into town, baking hot in the cloudless sunshine, to fetch bread.

And of course we visited a lot of chateaux.  How could we not!  

The great UK tour!

When I'm away from the blog for too long, it usually means I've been on a grand summer holiday, and indeed I have!  Probably the most significant thing that happened was I went away for work.  We did a massive tour on UK universities and it took almost a month.  This was what my schedule looked like (red days was when I was away on tour, blue days I was away for some other reason):

It was manic.  That said, there were some very good things about it, one of which was the sheer amount of country I got to see.  It's been my ambition for a while to explore more of my home country, and this was a very convenient way to start!  Part of my job was to film things for the company website, but since I had a camera I inevitably ended up taking some footage that was only interesting to me!  I've put it into a reel - my memories of the trip from Plymouth to Newcastle.  I cut it as short as I could make it, but still it's 10mins long!  I also avoided my usual instinct to put music on there.  All these places sound different, and that's part of my memories too.  Most intoxicating of all was the sound of the sea, whenever we reached it, and I'm slightly preoccupied with the idea of the ocean even now.

It's interesting to me that in the biggest cities, I always wound up finding the quietest places to film.  I'm not really a city person, I think, so I'd always seek out a haven or find time to just sit and watch something still for a while.

When I get a chance, I'll attach a map to the bottom showing our route.  It's all very well naming places, but if you can't see where they are then it doesn't always sink in.  My geography has certainly improved since going on this adventure!

A map drawn in water

I've been away.  Where?  Everywhere!

As part of my job, I'm required to spend a month going round the UK.  We're doing some marketing with the companies we want to work with, and the university students we'll be working to help.  It's just me and my colleague Paul, and I've got the task of planning the entire thing, from where we'll park right down to where we'll sleep.

This is both hugely stressful and inconvenient (as will be away from my home for the best part of a month, and doing lots of work in the evenings), yet also very exciting.  It appeals greatly to my sense of adventure, and I'm intrigued to see the parts of England I haven't thought to visit before.

This sculpture at Roker is based around the idea of navigation.  The centre encircles the lighthouse, while the constellations are picked out around the outside.  Appropriate.  And good to sit in.

 We're travelling the length and breadth of Merrie Englande in an obnoxiously orange MINI which I, being a few weeks shy of the age needed to go on the business insurance policy, don't have to drive.  This suits me fine as I'm a terrible city driver anyway (I'm too polite) and it means I get to look out the window a lot.

Although most of our stops are whistle-short, it's often enough to get the taste of a place.  What I'm enjoying most so far is seeing the different geographies of Britain.  Since I don't have to drive I can stare out the window a lot.  There's so much variety, but one commonality in it all...