galmc2Report

It is our last day in Greece and tomorrow we will head to England. I see this adventure of ours in 3 stages:

Stage 1 – Bali, Vietnam, Thailand, Jordan, Morocco. (Paul would divide this stage into 2 separate ones – SE Asia as 1 and Jordan&Morocco 2). For me, this stage involved travelling through countries that were very different from home and might take more effort due to language, culture, food and transportation.

We experienced SO much in these countries. There were some challenges (but not many TBH) and so much beauty, so much history, relaxation, beaches, cities, busy touring and many wonderful people guiding us and helping us out along the way.

Stage 2 (stage 3 for Paul) was Portugal, Spain, France, Greece. During this stage we travelled a little differently – we experience our first multi-day bike trip, we settled down in 1 spot for 6 weeks, we met up with a friend, had visitors and even a family reunion.

Europe is a bit more familiar to us but there were similar but different challenges due to culture and language. I appreciated the beautiful architecture, the history, the food, the people, the art, the landscapes, and being able to practice and use my french.

And soon we will move on to stage 3 (4 for Paul). The UK. We will be visiting family to start and then we will venture on our own into new territory – Ireland and Scotland. I am anticipating a deep appreciation for the history, natural beauty and friendly people. I expect the challenges to involve mostly transportation and possibly some language difficulties when we can’t believe we are apparently speaking the same language.

Although I have a lot of love and a new appreciation for Greece, I am ready to move to the next stage. I am feeling a little language weary from the past (almost) 6 months and am looking forward to being able to communicate my thoughts more easily in my first language.

I do pause as I say that I’m ready to move on, as I realize that it also means our trip is closer to the end than it is to the beginning. But as I reflect on it, I realize that I’m okay with it. At the beginning of this adventure, we decided our goal for this trip would be to “be present” and live “in the moment” and have reminded each other to do so almost every day. I think it’s worked out pretty well so far!