Views from the Slow Lane

We are into the final days of panic before our trip to England. It is Thursday; we leave Monday morning. I packed our hiking things two weeks ago. I ordered new jeans for both of us, new shirts for Steve, new underwear! We are going in style.

I have printed out all kinds of things from the web and made a binder to put everything in. Usually I have a file folder, and last time tried a set of colored folders that you can tie shut - but that all just gets messy, so I am trying the binder this time.

I have spent the last two weeks getting work finished for my few remaining web design clients (I am shutting all that down), writing my May 2005 England trip report (which is great because it makes me remember what a great time we had), getting travel notes posted on SlowTrav (still more to do), avoiding posting vacation rental reviews (will either get to that or have Kim or Chris do it for me), organizing a small remodel to be done while we are gone (new sink, counters, dishwasher in the kitchen, secure storage area built in the garage).

We spent a day research GPS systems and ended up renting one from AutoEurope for the trip. It arrived yesterday (Garmin).

We even did major garage cleaning - got rid of a 4 Runner load of old computer things (special day at the dump for this - we had 10 year old broken computers in the garage!) and another load of things we don't need. We needed to do this to convince ourselves that it might be possible to get ourselves organized enough to do a year in England starting this fall.

So here I am, in full blown panic mode (interspersed with weird periods of calm) as I am before every trip. Today - finish my 2005 trip report (I am almost done, just on that last sad week in Devon when our cat Butch died at home), send out a marketing mailing for the Slow Travel Classifieds, post some travel notes, get a haircut, wash all the screens and put them on the windows.

But Monday night we will be on the plane to England and then I just forget about everything.

Click here to see our full itinerary.

Click here to read my almost done England 2005 Trip Report.

Just a quick post to say we are in England and having a wonderful time. I am working on my journal and will post more details soon. We had a nice 3 nights in Bath and got over jetlag quickly. Then we got our rental car and went to a cottage in Wiltshire, near Trowbridge. The last few days we have been doing lots of walking/hiking and exploring the area.

We had one day of pouring rain, but the rest of the days have ranged from useable to wonderful - sunny and warm.

More later - we are heading out now to do an easy walk along the Kennet and Avon Canal because my whole body is tired from yesterday's countryside hike.

Yesterday the weather was very good - a bit overcast in the morning, but sunny and warm in the afternoon. Today was sunny and hot! We spent the afternoon walking around the town of Devizes - walking along the Kennet and Avon Canal, walking around the town, getting some sandwiches and eating them on a bench beside the canal (because all the pubs stopped serving lunch on the dot of 2pm and we are always running a bit late).

Hot and sunny all day. We came back to the cottage and watched the 6pm BBC news and weather. The weather showed big thunderstorms in the southwest, but we looked out the window and it was still sunny and lovely. About 20 minutes later, the skies darkened, the wind started and now we are having the most amazing lightening and thunder.

May is such a wonderful time to be in England.

Our week in Wiltshire is over! Tomorrow we check out and drive up to Windrush in the Cotswolds and check in to the next cottage. This week zoomed by - great weather, lots of good walks, great exploring. Many hours walking along the Kennet and Avon Canal. Today was HOT!

I uploaded a bunch of photos since we have a high speed connection:
Photos - England May 2006

Tomorrow we will have slow dialup access.

Don't you hate how fast time goes when you are on vacation?

We are having a lovely time in England, but just can't find the time to post. I am keeping a rough journal on the computer, plus notes in a notebook I carry around. And lots of photos (although last weekend when I was fiddling with my camera with Richard, I set it to low resolution photos, so have a weeks worth of photos that will be okay resolution, but not great).

I am going crazy using this dialup connection and sitting on the most uncomfortable chair at a little tiny desk - other than that our cottage in the Cotswolds is lovely.

The weather was perfect in Bath and for the week in Wiltshire, but not as good for our first week in the Cotswolds. Overcast and cool for much of the week, which was fine, but then rain all day long on Friday and again today. Luckily, both days we were visiting with friends. Visited Jonathan and Philippa on Friday at their house in Stroud (they made us a lovely lunch) and today went to see Felicity's cottage near Chipping Campden (the cottage was FABULOUS - www.sansomecottage.co.uk - we hope to rent it this fall - I will post a review soon).

I think we have cooked at home every night on this trip, except for the first few nights in Bath, but we have had some lovely pub lunches and tea room lunches. The Cotswolds remains our favorite part of England. We have done several walks and hope to do more this week. Funny to think of us here with polartec vests and jackets when at home in Santa Fe it is sunny and in the high 70s.

We have just over a week left. Last week we had almost talked ourselves into staying longer, but then realized we have things to do at home, so are going home as scheduled. But it was so tempting to think of staying longer - the Hay Festival starts the weekend we leave, Van Morrison is performing in July at the Westonbirt Arboretum, etc.