Final Week in the UK

We have arrived back in Portsmouth to make our final preparations before we ship off to Perth, Australia. It's really getting exciting now. When people ask us when we are going, we used to say '29 November'. Now, we say Thursday. It's starting to feel very real. And the good old British weather is giving us a proper send off with storms and rain and wind every day. We've sold the car and now we are just going through the last bits and pieces.

We are not nervous or uneasy about the move in any way. This just feels so right for us. I've been out to Perth six times, and Nick three times so we have a fair idea of what to expect. And having spent almost 10 years apart from my parents and little brother I feel like I'm going home, even though I've never lived there before myself. They have just bought an awesome new home, which we are all going to live in together. We have spent all our savings on our adventures over the last nine months so we need to get some jobs to build some funds up again but we will be going on camping adventures whenever we can.

But we are now having to face the only hard part of the whole process - leaving our friends and family behind in the UK. These days with things like Facebook and Skype, the world is really getting smaller and smaller and we will stay in touch with everyone easily.

And of course this blog will continue to document what we do and how we do it (although we may rename it..... any ideas let us know!).

We held a farewell party at the weekend and we had an awesome time, so many people turned up to wish us well. It was emotional at times, which is inevitable I guess when you have such a close, amazing group of people around you like we have.

But we strongly insist that it is not a goodbye. It's a see you later, a till next time.

Chelmsford; my home town

We drove down from Norfolk, to Essex, where we are staying in Chelmsford with my brother James and his girlfriend Jo.

Chelmsford is where I was born and spent the majority of the first 18 years of my life. It has changed so much since I left it to go off to uni, and I'm not sure all the changes have been good.

But I wanted to go and visit all the places I remember from my childhood a final time before I head off for the other side of the world!

New bars and restaurants have sprung up from nowhere while the old historic buildings of Chelmsford have been forgotten. We went out for dinner one night and I thought it quite telling that we avoided all the multiple chain restaurants in the town centre and drove for 20 mins to eat in a traditional country pub.







While staying with James and Jo I painted a mural for their nursery (they have a little baby girl on the way).

We have come to the end of our UK travels. Tomorrow we drive back to Portsmouth, where we begin making our final preparations for leaving. We've got a leaving party to prepare for, and we need to figure out how to squeeze our remaining possessions into four suitcases.

We've seen some amazing sites, Britain is a truly beautiful place. I think you would need several years of travelling to see it all.

But we're ready for what's next: a period of staying put. I miss proper cooking, my sewing machine and having space to paint. Nick misses his tools and a workshop to potter around in. We've run out of money and need to start earning more, but we don't dread getting jobs in Australia, we're so excited about this new start.

Norfolk

Maybe we made a mistake, but Grimsby and Skegness didn't sound like nice places, so we skipped on down to Norfolk after we had finished in Yorkshire.

We drove in via Kings Lynn, and Norfolk is what they all say, ridiculously flat. You can see tiny trees and pylons and buildings right off in the distance. And the whole place smells of cauliflower and cabbage as there were thousands of them growing off in all directions.

But after we had driven through Kings Lynn and up to the North coast of Norfolk, the earth definitely got more undulating so it's not all flat as a pancake.

The villages round here are absolutely beautiful. All the houses and cottages are covered in flint and made from natural materials. The only way to tell the new houses from the old houses is that the new ones are straighter. Every village has a church and/or windmill. And all the villages have there own individual colourful plaque or sign with their name on. It's a shame that so many of the cottages are now holiday homes I think.

We stayed in the small village of Burnham Deepdale, and explored along the coast until we got to Cromer. Near where we camped, Nelson was born, and the creeks here are where he learned to sail. So a nice little connection to Portsmouth and the Victory.

Poor Cromer is looking a bit sorry for itself, lots of boarded up shops. Best to stick to the villages I think if you ever come here.

We ate mussels harvested literally metres away, they were delicious. Unfortunately we couldn't find any fresh Cromer crab while we were there.

We also frequently heard thousands of geese passing us overhead in various 'V' configurations.

York

From Whitby we drove down the coast to Scarborough, then onto York. We only stayed in Scarborough for an hour, although it was a lovely sunny day we didn't particularly like the place. I felt sorry for the donkeys on the beach and the place was full of tacky arcades.

So we drove on to York, our next stopover. We decided to devote a whole day to it, so got the park and ride in. It rained almost all day so we spent the first hour and a half in a coffee shop with free wifi and caught up on some blog posts, before going for a stroll.

The plan was to try and find some free museums to shelter in but we couldn't find any that didn't charge a small fortune.

We really liked all the cobbled streets and old buildings, and quite a lot of the streets were pedestrianised so you do kind of feel like you are stepping back in time. I imagine it would be a festive place to come and do your Xmas shopping once all the lights are up.

Although it has it's fair share of chain stores (I think we counted three Greggs?) they are mingled in with antique shops and independant stores so you don't mind as much.