Anticlimax

Wait.

Aren't I supposed to be in England right now?

Drat that visa. *growls*


Anyway, since there were only two days in which to take photos, I went a little mad. ^^ These have all been (shrunk?) significantly. Yay for Windsor Castle.

Windsor Castle! Just assume it goes on forever, and you won't be far wrong. :-P It is huge, ancient, beautiful, like a thing from another world. These people have castles!!!

And, just because: even the Queen uses light bulbs.

For Jessie: James Bond trading cards. ^^

Ascot Raceway, a very big deal in horse-racing circles. I'm definitely going to the races when I get back. Anybody want to come with me?

The house of my Great Aunty Moy, looking like it fell out of a magazine. She is wonderful. :-)

Baguettes and liquid pancake mix! :-D

A very English house.

A very English shop, lol: I picked this just because of the 'Windsor'.

Big Bens, double-decker buses, flags, post boxes, plates... All lovely and souvenir-ish. ^^

Home

ChristChurch Cathedral

Chalice, Cathedral Square.

The view from Aunty Lauren's home in the Port Hills.

One of many views of Canterbury farmland. ^^

Otago coastline.

Dad's farm, golden in a Canterbury drought.

Beginnings!

Have to get this written, or else I'll be looking back in a month and laughing at myself. Oooh, good news: there will be gale-force winds for our takeoff tomorrow night. Over the Pacific in a cyclone!

So, for an update on plans, itineraries and suchlike: we have none. Well, I have none. Three months in London with just NZ$1000 to start, no qualifications (except Level 3 NCEA, roughly High School Certificate) and...

Oh, this is impossible. Not surviving in London, but talking about it in a way that makes it seem like anything other than the greatest, the most exciting, the most (what's a way to say 'has a lot of potential'?) promising experience of my life so far. I won't be alone: I have family, two or three wonderful great-aunts and great-uncles who looked after my mother when she did her OE twenty years ago. I won't be destitute, or at least I won't be hopelessly poor: I have funds to start with, and subsidised board and food. This is a very good thing!

The wonder of it all hasn't yet sunk in. I'm trying to conjure the 'wow, you must be so excited' attitude, but something is eluding me... This is just too perfect. It's a dream - I would say 'a dream come true', but to travel with Dad always seemed inevitable. Maybe it's my naivety or a youthful sense that everything will work out, but there it is: this wasn't a dream, it was a hope. And now it's here, with passports, travel visas, bank accounts, train tickets, weight allowances, power adapters... It's here, and verging on overload. This isn't too big for me, not quite... But almost!