Beer, Stonehenge & Bath

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During our first week back in bleak Essex (the first three days of summer consisted of nothing but rain and grey skies), I was delighted to discover that around the corner from our house, the annual Thurrock Beer Festival was being held. My delirious delight stemmed from the fact that I was struggling to come to terms with the fact that I had to work in such a soulless part of the world again. 'Just think of the £'s' I keep trying to remind myself. Anyway, we had so much fun there on the Thursday night (with about 100 beers to choose from, all brewed by small breweries from around England, how could we not have fun?) that we all decided to make a day of it on the Saturday. I couldn't help but notice the number of 'serious' and 'dedicated' beer drinkers who were at the festival, as evidenced by their disproportionately rotund bellies.

I think we threw a spanner into the works when we took it upon ourselves to stage a 'Dance Off' between the guys and the girls in our drinking party - in front of all those in attendance at the festival. I must admit, the girls totally annihilated us, but we all had fun (especially me with my toy Indiana Jones whip, having acquired it earlier that day at Burger King). The next day, however, was not so much fun, with me spending most of it horizontal, trying to dull the effects of a cruel hangover.

This past weekend marked the departure of two of our housemates, who are heading home to Brisbane via Egypt. Of course, this meant that we had to farewell them in style by venturing to our local pub on Friday night, before venturing to the nightclubs in nearby Basildon (the area where the clubs are located having been coined 'Basvegas'😉. I have never seen a nightclub set up quite like this one, as there are numerous clubs, five of which are linked with interconnecting corridors. It is like a mini city of nightclubs, each having their own style of decor and music. One of them even had a replica Saturday Night Fever illuminated flashing dancefloor (including all the classic disco flashing colours and many a John Travolta wannabe)!

After three hours sleep, I made my way to the bus stop on Saturday morning to make my way into London to meet an old friend of mine for a day trip to Stonehenge and the city of Bath. When we both saw each other at nine o'clock, we both had a chuckle as we were obviously in the same state as one another, due to the events of our respective Friday nights. We were blessed with blue skies for our day of sightseeing and we both thoroughly enjoyed seeing Stonehenge with our own eyes, as it is one of those places that you seem to have grown up seeing images of all throughout your life. It was an amazing feat to actually transport the stones to the site 4,000 years ago, as they are from a site many miles away (some even coming from Wales). What we realised when we were there was that they really have absolutely no idea why it was built and what its purpose was. I did find it interesting, however, that it can be used as a calendar, using the location of the sun as it shines through the gaps in the structure. This weekend is actually the summer solstice, which is the only weekend of the year (unless you can brave the winter solstice) that you can actually touch the stones and camp amongst them for the night. They are expecting around 20,000 people for this event, so I'm glad I was able to see it without other people obstructing my view.

For our onward journey to Bath, we were forced to take a detour due to a weakened bridge further up the road. This proved to be a blessing in disguise, as we wound our way through quaint villages and roads which were essentially green tunnels with dappled sunlight, due to the overarching canopy of the surrounding trees.

Bath itself is the most picturesque city I have visited in England thus far. It was first settled by the Romans (the original baths can still be visited) some 2,000 years ago. Many of the buildings are from the Georgian era and one can't help but feel a sense of history and culture that is missing from somewhere like, say, Grays (the place of my abode in Essex). For example, Edgar, King of all England (around 973 A.D.) was crowned at the site of the Bath Abbey. The city is built on the crater of a volcano, with the surrounding green hills dotted with the occasional stone house or cottage. As the sun was out, many people were making use of the parks and gardens or simply wandering by the River Avon. After wandering around the city for a few hours, it was time to head back to London and wonder why anyone would choose to live anywhere else in England except Bath? It's a mystery to me!

We rounded off the weekend by going to an institution called 'The Church' on Sunday, which is basically a makeshift club in a concert hall (The Forum) that provides all of its punters with three and a half hours of debauchery (starting at noon), and has been doing so since 1979. It has an obvious Australian flavour, as they sell Arnott's Shapes (Oh, how I have missed them), Twisties and Australian Beer, which they sell to you three at a time and you carry around in a plastic bag! We all got dressed up in ridiculous outfits for the occasion and made a day of it, as it was the last time we would see our departing housemates.

Okay, better get back to work.

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