I'm not going to write a day-by-day of the last month or anything, just hit some of the highlights of the more exciting things that have happened over the last month. I'm not sure if my writing will be as fluent as usual - I have had a cup of particularly strong coffee and now my mind seems to be jumping from topic to topic all over the place.
One sunny afternoon, we decided to check out Camden Town with one of our new friends. Camden is an odd place known for it's... interesting shops and alternative products. Camden was a blast because as we walked through, we got to see a huge street market. In this market was vendors selling every type of food imaginable as well as some funny merchandise. There were pacman icetrays, gothic boots and clothing, glow in the dark everything, t-shirts that lit up to the beat of music... All sort's of interesting things. We spent the afternoon going through all these odd -shops, including Cyberdog just to see all the neat and interesting items, try on some funny hats and just have a good laugh. The description I have just given Camden does not do it justice!
Another morning, I woke up and decided to surf the web before tending to breakfast. I was looking on Gumtree (The UK's Kijiji) and stumbled across something interesting- Cirque Du Soleil tickets! Matt and I bought them for half of what they normally sell for, and that same evening, we were watching the show :) The acrobatics were amazing. People were stacked on top of people who were stacked on top of people who were stacked on top of people :) They were spinning and climbing and swinging through the air. The stage had sections that could move around in order to alter the scenery. There was amazing lighting and visual effects, some of which made it look as if the people on stage were actually swimming around underneath some water. It was stunning! I will say though- when looking at the performance of the actors alone and ignoring the fancy props, I do believe that the acrobatics show I witnessed in Beijing last summer was slightly more impressive.
Another highlight was seeing Alestorm in concert. For those who haven't heard of them, Alestorm are a Pirate Metal band from Scotland. They have high-energy music about sailing the sea and drinking rum. In concert, they sounded just as good if not better than they do on their CD's. Matt and I spent the time of the concert hanging out with a friend from Metal Warriors. This friend and I both dressed up as pirates (my Halloween costume was a pirate, Matt didn't have pirate clothes) and all 3 of us had a great time singing along with our own glasses of rum.
After the show, we all went to a bar called Slimelight. It was a gothic/industrial club with multiple rooms playing different types of music. There were glowsticks everywhere! We fit in just fine in our pirate outfits, although we didn't stay too long as it was getting late. Matt and I ended up with memberships (because they were almost the same price as a nightly entrance fee) so now we are part of a prestigious club where you need to know people to sign you in as a member. Whether or not we go back at some point, that is pretty cool. All we need to do is pick up our membership card once it's in.
Stanmore park was another interesting place we visit. Although Stanmore is only 15 min away or so on the tube, we had to take part of the ride on the tube and then 2 busses because it was out of zone. It was worth the journey though because it was the first proper part we had been to since we got to London. Rather than being a football field like the last park, this one had all kinds of trees and paths to explore. Matt and I definitely want to go back for another walk there at some point.
This past Saturday, we woke up and decided to go to the Hellfire Caves in West Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. We mapped it out and it turned out to be about 3 hours away, 2 tube rides and 3 busses. That was just fine, so we got ready and were on our way out. The tube portion of the journey went exactly according to plan. The first bus was right on schedule, although we were only on it for 1 stop. Had we realized that we could have walked.
The 2nd bus however took nearly an hour to get there, and when it did we found out that our bus passes were not accepted since the bus belonged to a separate company. We got our day tickets for that company (because the bus after that would be with their company as well) and hopped on anyways. The bus got stuck behind a huge truck and couldn't go anywhere for a good while. When the bus driver tried to go around, he scratched a car, creating lots of paperwork and a longer wait. This caused the people on the bus to start laughing, see the humour in it and talk to the people around them. I snickered to myself finding it amusing that it took all that for people to say hello to the person next to them.
We eventually arrived at our stop and looked for the bus stop for our 3rd bus. Eventually we realized that this bus didn't run on Saturdays at all, and started looking at other options. No other bus went where we wanted to go. One went part way- but it was a 3rd company, so we had to pay again, bus 10 min, and walk the rest of the way.
It was a relatively long walk, especially towards the end where it steeply headed uphill. We walked and walked and eventually reached the top of the hill, only to ask for directions and find out the caves were down by the bottom- where we came from. It was worth going up anyhow as the view was fantastic!
Back at the bottom of the hill, we finally got to the entrance. We were told they had run out of food (which we had already paid for with our cave ticket online) and were given substitutes. They were not worth the value of what they ran out of, but it was still tasty.
The caves were not natural caves like we had envisioned. They were dug out of the hill and heavily processed, giving even the real rocks an artificial look. Within half hour or so, we had seen the caves and were ready to go home. Home involved walking 1 hour to the 2nd bus stop to carry on our journey.
It may sound like this day was a disappointment, but it was anything but that. Matt and I were laughing the entire day, making the best of it. We thought of it as new sights, good exercise, and a lesson in our planning. Overall, a lot of fun!
Yesterday we have been going over the details for the end of the year tour. We have picked something out- a 24 day budget tour by coach which hits 11 different countries. Now we are saving out money, and trying to find ways to earn a little extra, in order to put a deposit in and raise the money for the rest of the trip. Lori is planning on coming to visit in June, which I'm looking forward to- I think she will love it.
Living with Matt has been fantastic. We plan everything together, get all our house work done together and are always finding new things to see and explore. Sometimes, it seems we are in competition to be nicer to one another. We recognize every nice gesture that we do for one another, and try to continue doing anything that makes the other happy. I'm pretty sure that this is not how a normal relationship goes, because we still have never argued over anything, but that is ok by me. Soon we will be sending out resumes and cover letters again, with the hope of finding something close to home where most of our friends and all of our family are.
Hope everyone reading is having a decent Monday. Cheers to a great week (and fantastic weekend) ahead!~
