Covered by Volcanic Ash OR The UK (furlough part 2)

The original plan was 9 days in the UK. We were going to spend both ends in London and the middle in Scotland. Little did I know...

The first (planned) part of the trip was fantastic. Cathy (below) is a friend from South Africa who is working in London at the moment. She has an awesome house in Canada Water (near Canary Wharf, overlooking the Thames) and they had a spare room so I stayed with them. It was so fun being back in London again. That has got to be my favorite place to be a tourist in the whole world. There is never a shortage of things to do!

I spent the first few days going around town (mostly shopping!) and meeting up with friends from university over lunch or dinner. I even got to see Victoria who was volunteering with us here at the baby home. Even my friend Nadia, who is studying up in Nottingham, made a special trip down to see me! Reconnecting with everyone was great and it reinforces the friendships, especially when you are a poor communicator like I am!

Then Cathy and I went up to Scotland - it was her first time, so we did a lot of touristy stuff, in addition to seeing all of my friends. We stayed in Edinburgh, St. Andrews, and Glasgow. Being back there was strange, especially in St. Andrews. A lot has changed but the general feel of the town is still the same. I even ran into people I knew in the street - quite remarkable for having been away for 3 years! We went to all of my favorite haunts - Jannettas, Fisher and Donaldson, Tesco's :-)

Cathy and I made it back to London and, on the spur of the moment, decided to go see Wicked! I was very happy to continue my West End tradition. Cathy was very kind and treated me to the tickets. In theory, the next day I was going home...

I had packed my bags, checked in online, and was out having coffee with Nadia when Cathy called and told me that ALL air travel had been shut down. It was fascinating to see everything grind to a halt and meet so many people over the next week who had also been stranded. I was very lucky to have somewhere to stay - many of them had spent all of their savings on their holiday and were now expected to pay for another week in hotels.

It was a very odd time because no one knew how long the ban on travel was going to last. I think it was a good wake up call to many people. So many of us believe that we can get our way no matter what if we just try hard enough or make a big enough fuss. However, with a natural disaster like this, sometimes you just have to sit down and wait for things to be resolved.

I decided to make the most of my enforced holiday and did things I probably would not have done otherwise. I managed a trip to Wimbledon to see a friend, shopped on the high street, walked along the Thames and even played wheelchair rugby (below)! That last one came about because a friend of Cathy's is in a wheelchair and the "wheelchair games" were on at a hospital outside of London. Since she knew I didn't have anything else to do, she invited me to go with them. It just so happened that the day we went was "try it yourself" day and we got to try out shooting and then wheelchair rugby. Apparently I am much better at sport when I only have to coordinate 2 limbs :-)


Eventually I did make it out and, after getting stuck for the night in Denver, made it safely home.