Blogs from Herefordshire, England, United Kingdom, Europe - page 4

Well, a month from now we'll have begun our adventure. We have made lists, spreadsheets and even a risk assessment so nothing can possibly go wrong. Elaine and Alan have already started and are currently languishing in Greece, we'll meet them in Sussex soon for their son John's wedding before going off. The plan is to cross at Calais and pootle down France where we'll stay at Carcassonne for a week, then we hope to make Barcelona for the 'Festa de la Merce' at the end of September. After that it's a very leisurely meander round Spain and Portugal and return home sometime at the end of October. The only major risk on this trip is , as our friend Andy charmingly puts it, they'll be all 'Sally'd out' after a week or two. I can ... read more

Wednesday 14.4.2010 day 182 6 months (in a leaking boat?) We have been on our round the world trip for 6 months now. We are ½ way there. We are so excited to get out of the UK and to the next part of the trip next week. We sent some extra things back home and went to Dean Forest. There was lots of sheep everywhere we also found an Inage mine that we had a look around. ... read more

Sunday 4.4.2010 day 172 Easter Sunday We woke up and turned on the TV to see the Formula 1 in Malaysia as we have been to that track only about 6 months ago it was fun to see it again on TV. It was also good to see Mark Weber come second and Red bull get one and two. Today we had a look around the area that we are staying we drove to Herford which is our closest big town everything was closed for Easter but the streets were busy. We needed a few things so we stopped at a servo and got things and then went home. When we got home we did some washing and started to pack up a bag to send back home as we will not have a car for ... read more

England is a strangely backward place, where people say ''Nice Day'' even if it is raining. The English invented the rules for every major sport, yet rarely win any international awards - football, tennis, even cricket. We despise foreign places even though we had an empire that circled the globe - today, the most popular dish is an Indian invention of Chicken Tikka Masala. The English never say what they mean, preferring to say the opposite as a joke and hope you will understand - they will be overpolite to people they dont like and rude to the people they love. Even the weather can't make up its mind here. Summers are notoriously damp and cold, the winters rarely shudder with snow or storms. And so somewhere in between these wet summers and warm winters lies ... read more

‘Why exactly did I choose to come here?’, I ask myself as the solemn sounds of a gong wake me from slumber at 4 am. I crawl out of bed, have a quick wash and shuffle to the meditation hall in the dark, rain dripping down my face. I find my place in the dimly-lit hall and settle down for a two-hour meditation session before breakfast. Today is my first day at a Vipassanameditation centre in Herefordshire, and I am about to start a ten-day course of silent meditation. The first time I heard about the practice of Vipassana was about four years ago, when a friend told me that he was going to attend a course that involved meditating for eleven hours daily. He talked about 4 am starts, strict silence, no reading and writing, ... read more