Rhossili Bay, Wales (Gower Penninsula)

On the weekend of November 15 and 16, while friends and family at home were experiencing an early snow fall in Canada, we were headed to the beach!  And not just any old beach.  This is probably one of the most beautiful beaches I've ever been to.  Rhossili Bay which is situated at the end of the Gower Penninsula in Wales was voted Britain's Best Beach in 2010!

On the Friday night, we headed to Cardiff, Wales where our friends Kara and Zac are living.  Although my only photos on this post are of the Gower Penninsula, we spent the rest of our weekend in Cardiff, catching up with Kara and Zac.  We had such a good time (though we continually confused both Zack's by not specifying which one we were speaking to... sorry guys) and are planning to head back there again sometime in the new year!  

On Saturday we were given a beautiful day to take a drive out to the Gower.  Though the wind did pick up quite a bit, the sunshine was perfect.  We explored the cliffs and gazed out to what is called "Worm's head" at the very end of the penninsula.  After a decent hike, we were able to eat a late lunch on the beach, and watched the sunset as we sipped some hot tea.  Perfect day.  

The Highlands, Scotland

We loved the Highlands.  As much as we enjoyed Edinburgh, I really wish we could have spent more time up here.  It is breathtakingly beautiful.  There is something about the peacefulness of northern Scotland that I just love.  The downside of not having a car however, is that you can't get to a lot of the remote places (which is where you definitely want to go when you're in the Highlands) so we opted for a three day tour with "Haggis Tours".  There are pros and cons to signing up for a guided tour like this.  The pros being it is all planned out for you, they load you up with tons of history and stories that we otherwise wouldn't have heard (our tour guides were also hilarious), and you make new friends with others on the tour.  The cons being you are on "their" schedule (we became so used to doing whatever we pleased during our summer travels) and somehow the "peacefulness" isn't so peaceful anymore when there's 40 of you filing off a bus to take photos of the same view.  But nonetheless, we were very pleased with Haggis Tours.  It was a fairly young crowd (a lot of new teachers like Zack, because it was half term break) and our guides were native to Scotland which made the experience that much better.  The trip departed out of Edinburgh and we drove a big yellow bus (that read "Young, Wild, and Sexy") up through to the Isle of Skye.  We all stayed at a hostel in Fort Augustus (situated at the bottom point of Loch Ness) where we joined in on an intense pub quiz the first night and heard some live music the second night.  The pub quiz was a particular favourite night of ours and we found ourselves dressed in Scottish Tartan while enjoying some good ales.  Zack seems to have an abundance of random general knowledge so even though our team came in third place, I thought we did quite well.  We met some great people on the tour, and in a total of just three days we saw castles, mountains, lochs (lakes), tasted Scottish whiskey, and even went on a few short hikes.  I think the photos really speak for themselves....

Edinburgh, Scotland

"Fair and full is your honest, jolly face,

Great chieftain of the sausage race!

Above them all you take your place,

Stomach, tripe, or intestines:

Well are you worthy of a grace

As long as my arm"

- Address to a Haggis, by Robert Burns.

That, my friends, is just a small section of "Address to a Haggis" written by Scottish writer Robert Burns in 1786.  This man loved haggis so much that he decided to show his appreciation through poetry.  Scotland is full of old stories and proud culture just like this one here.  Oh- and if you're not sure what "haggis" is, well, just google it.  We ate it twice while in Scotland, and both times we were pleasantly surprised.  Though I can't say I'll be professing my love through poetry like Robert Burns.  I did take a few photos:

London, England

I've actually been to London once before.  It was a stop over on my way to Africa in January 2008.  I hated it.  First of all, I was extremely jet-lagged.  Second of all, I was an emotional wreck- leaving your boyfriend and family behind for three months is a big deal when you're 18.  My (maybe) eight hours of time in London in 2008 was spent following around a few of my friends that I had met through the program, in the pouring rain, carrying my pillow (travel rookie mistake).  I remember sitting on the tube, not impressed with how wet I was from the rain, and feeling so tired I felt that I could puke.  Looking back, I was just an immature young girl not realizing how lucky I was to have the opportunity to stop in London, England- one of the most visited cities in the entire world.  

I am pleased to say that this time around (six and a half years later), I experienced this city in an entirely different light.  I didn't really "count" my stop-over as a legitimate trip to London, so I went in to this weekend trip with excitement.  I was excited to see the famous sights for the "first" time and to immerse myself in the hustle and bustle with my partner in crime by my side.  From Cambridge, it only takes 50 minutes to get to Kings Cross, if you catch the direct train.  So we packed some food and a change of clothes, and off we went.

Peak District, England

    

Saturday is usually a sleep-in day.  But not last Saturday.  No sir, last Saturday we were up bright and early.  Adventure was calling us!  Last Saturday we took the long trek out to one of England's greatest hiking destinations: The Peak District.

From Cambridge, it's about a three hour drive.  We are lucky to have made some friends since being here, and that some of those friends just so happen to have a car.   We are also lucky to have made friends with people who also think it's a grand idea to wake up early to drive a decent way across the country for a day of hiking and adventuring!  To give you a visual of just how far we drove for this one day, I've added a map showing where Cambridge is in comparison to the Peak District:

A day in Oxford, England

We've now been living in Cambridge for one month.  And for one month, I have not left (other than a few bike rides out to some small surrounding towns) Cambridge.  It's crazy how in just one month, I've really found a sense of "home" here.  I have grown to love this place already.  So much, that a day trip to Oxford made me feel a sense of pride for my new home.  As many of you may know, Oxford and Cambridge are home to two of the most prestigous Universities.  The rivalry between the two University towns will always be ongoing.  I was excited to discover what Oxford was like and create my own (biast, obviously) opinion.  But far more importantly, the reason I woke up so crazy early in excitement to get here, was because I was meeting an old friend from Canada, Kara. :)

Kara has been living in Bristol for a number of years (5, maybe?), and is now living with her husband Zac in Cardiff, Wales.  Oxford seemed like a great half way point to meet up for the day.  It is such a great feeling to see a familiar face from home!  I've known Kara my entire life, as our families were great friends from church, and we also attended the same high school.  I remember Kara helping me fix my uniform on the first day of Grade Nine-  just like a big sister would do.  Being two years older, she was much more informed of the "cool" way to wear your uniform, haha.  Our day in Oxford flew by, as we shared many laughs and shared our experiences of moving to the UK.  It was nice to hear about her perspective of the small but unavoidable cultural differences between Canada and the UK.  Just like the first day of Grade 9, she gave me some great insight of things I can expect this year being a new-comer from a different country.

Seven European Food Experiences

We love food.  Trying new foods, cooking new foods, talking about food, I even love pictures of food.  In fact, there's probably not a whole lot of time throughout my day when food is not in the back of my mind.  I count myself very lucky to have married a guy that actually loves to cook.  Though I am doing most of the cooking since Zack started his job, he tells me I am his greatest and worst critic...  I tell him it's just "constructive critisism" :p.  But really, I do love his cooking!  He introduced me to a whole new world of vegetarianism that I never knew was possible.  This summer however, we decided there were no limits.  We wanted to embrace the food of everywhere we went.  We were really excited to "eat our way" through Europe.

Let me clear one thing up before I get into this post.  We were travelling for 2 months, not making any money, just using what we had saved up for the summer.  So as you can imagine, we were forced to be quite frugal in the way we spent.  So how could we afford to eat our way through Europe, rather than just eating beans and rice? (haha, though those were two of our staple foods at times...). We made up a few simple guidelines: