Spoiled Rotten

The last two days have been great. I took the bus from London to Andover and met up with Dan and Kirsty for my first ever Couch Surfing experience. If you are unfamiliar with CS, it is basically a website where travellers congregate and offer up their couch or spare room or whatever to fellow travellers for FREE! Don't worry y'all, it is totally legit and has gotten great reviews in the media....and after my first experience I can give it a good review too...Dan was kind enough to pick me up from the bus station and his girlfriend Kirsty offered me a cup of tea within 5 minutes of arriving = FABULOUS! Because they are renovating their bedroom, the living room was being used by them as sleeping space, but Dan put me up in his caravan for both nights. He is a sculptor and built this caravan out of completely salvaged materials (see photos below)! It was like a little playhouse...everything was miniature, but it was perfect for me to sleep on an air mattress and have some privacy. So anyway, a little recap of the last few days...

Day 1

My humble abode for the last 2 days :-)

Arrived in London, took the bus to Andover. Dan and Kirsty took me to the Avebury Stone Circles which are about an hour from Andover and similar to Stonehenge. We ate at a Pub called the Red Lion, where I had an England staple, Fish and Chips for dinner :-) It was delicious. Dan and Kirsty were so fun to talk to and told me a lot about the area and its history. Dan researches crop circles and is a bit of a historian on the history of Stonehenge and surrounding areas. I went to sleep easily, which I was worried about at first, but I was exhausted after forcing myself to stay awake and beat the jetlag...great first  day!

Avebury Stone Circle

    

The Red Lion Pub with Dan and Kirsty to the left

Day 2

Stonehenge! Really been looking forward to this. I took the train to Salisbury where I walked around for a while...and then took the bus to the Stonehenge site...note to anyone who plans to visit one day: PAY FOR THE SPECIAL ACCESS before or after peak hours (sunrise/sunset)...if you go during regular business times you cannot walk among the stones, you will have to walk around their perimeter. Now who in the world would pay to go to Stonehenge and NOT want to walk among them!? I can't even believe they even do that...how anticlimactic for the unsuspecting visitor who doesn't know this! It is totally worth it, I promise you. So my visit was the special access at sunset. The last bus out of Salisbury was at 4pm so I had a few hours to kill. Stonehenge is located on a national trust historic site so the area around Stonehenge is full of burial mounds and other richly historic things. I spent the afternoon walking 3 miles around the entire site, just thinking in awe about how ambitious it was for the neolithic people to build this stuff. Some of those stones weigh 40 tons! It would take 200 people to move one, and the bigger ones had to be moved 20 miles...That is so nuts to me. I just kept thinking ''What in the world was going through the guy's head who thought this was a good idea?'' It's awfully ambitious! Haha. Seriously though, the stones are so massive. You just can't even comprehend how big they are until you are standing among them, it's pretty unbelievable. The history of the stones is pretty incredible also, if you haven't read about it, you should. I've never been that interested in history, but Stonehenge completely captivated me. I think it just fascinates me how old the land is. We are so fortunate to be here, and we shouldn't take those that came before us for granted. Their work and dedication to the land is what brought us to where we are today...

Salisbury, England

Salisbury Cathedral

                                       

So these last 2 days have been so easy! I feel very spoiled. I had a free place to stay with some really cool people who were uber kind and accomodating and everything just flowed so smoothly. I have no doubt it will not be this easy the whole time, so I will be interested to see how I handle my first challenge. Tomorrow (Wednesday 04 May) I will leave for Bath, England and will be on my own until Friday when I meet up with my friend Paul in Liverpool. I guess we'll see how I do 3 days all by myself! Below are just a few pictures from my last couple days. I plan on uploading all of them on a photo site...maybe flickr?? If anyone has any suggestions, let me know!


Love to all, until next time :-)


AnnieBoo


''It is not down in any map; true places never are.''  ~Herman Melville


Loving this song right now! So perfect for where I'm at...Have a laugh and a smile  over it :-)