The Clips and Trips blog was put together in preparation for our leaving the U.S. on an indefinite world travel adventure which started around August of 2009 and returned us home in December of 2012. If you want to see where it all began, read our mission statement from before we left.

Friday, September 30, 2011

Brighton, United Kingdom


Visiting the beach town of Brighton in the southern end of the UK didn't take much effort. A train delivered us from London in about an hour. I had been here almost 20 years before in 1992. As far as I could tell, nothing had changed at all. The blob of spilled ice cream was still there dripping through the slats. It had that slightly gloomy feel that really old carnival piers give me. There's something nice about rock and pebble beaches, though. It's the feel of the smooth clean rocks on your skin. Laying back sinking into the rocks can feel like meditative acupressure. And you don't pick up all those particles of sand that get in between your toes. But walking barefooted to and from the water can be painful as Pam discovered.

 



Friday, September 23, 2011

Hampstead Heath, London, UK



















We biked over to a expolore a new neighborhood, which is the kind of thing we like to do on a Sunday. It was one of the warmest days during the summer and we had heard about some swimming ponds in the park at Hampstead Heath that are open all year long. They have a few pools at opposite ends of the park that are segregated by sex. A men only pool, a women only pool, and a mixed pool. It was so hot and by the time we explored the entire park we were ready for a dip. The men only pool looked really nice and turned out to be more like a gay men only pool, but Pam and I kind of wanted to swim together so we hiked over to the mixed pool. For some reason the mixed pool was really small and it was so overcrowded that you had to wait in a long line that wasn't moving. So we decided to skip it and pick up some picnic gear to enjoy under a tree somewhere. We climbed a hill to find a great view of London. Very peaceful.


Summer Cycling, London, UK



Our first summer in London was pretty dire, even by London standards. The Guardian reported that it was the coldest summer in 18 years. So the minute the sun came out, we jumped on our bikes and took advantage of the day.

The canals and marshes by our house are some of the best bike rides in London. I tend to forget that we're in a massive, busy, smog filled city when we ride our bikes along these paths.




We discovered that we live by a forest. This is Epping Forest.


The lake at Epping Forest


Summer is blackberry season and we'd often find blackberries ready for picking in any neighborhood of London. These bushes are in the marshes in our neighborhood.


Our collected blackberries


A blackberry Clafoutis, a sort of eggy cake.