Remember Canada? (Who could forget?) You may also remember Scott. (He is Canadian. He, with kate, kalee and kat, saved me from the clutches of Seba Beach and returned me to that place. Little did she know that while she stirred her cauldron in Linden, I was dwelling in the countryside in the house of Graham. Lovely folk reside there.) Kate is somewhere near Scotland. Scott is in Wales. Well, he is now. He was here. On the isle. He came to visit, with the intention of staying to work. Evidently, when they said there would be work available, they lied. Something to do with alleged French people. Drat those French people. Drat them indeed.
This is the story of our little adventure in the south. Having heard that a school group was going by coach to Sandown, I requested that we hitch a ride. So we did. Having not been to Sandown before, I wasn’t entirely sure of anything when I arrived. But then, when am I ever? We walked left to Culver Cliffs. I guess I thought that there might be some fossils there. Apparently there are. Ammonites in fact. We found none. No trace of anything even remotely ammonite like. So we turned around and walked back. We investigated the option of bussing to Shanklin; £2. Ha. We walked. From Shanklin esplanade we took the Landslip track up the hill and over to Moncks Bay where we planned to take the Undercliff track but took a wrong turn and ended up wandering through Bonchurch instead. Eventually we ended up in the rather Mediterranean looking Ventnor with it’s richly coloured flint pebbled beach and hillside architecture. Spying the passing time, we caught a bus back to Little Canada and the adventure was complete. Scott estimated that we walked about ten miles all up. Needless to say, we hurt a bit the next day. Scott got the most extreme sunburn I’ve ever witnessed. Silly Scott.
If you don’t have a decent map of the isle of wight and you want to see where I went – take a look at multimap.com (note the funky aerial photo button...) click this link to see an aerial photo of little canada. if you see the four red buildings, go left from the top one over the two sports courts, up over the trees and you'll see a white blob in the shape of a lowercase d. the vertical bit fo the d is where i live. neat huh?
are the comments broken? or does no one have anything much to say anymore? oh well.
scott is here at the moment. scott from canada. we're trying to get him work here. then were going travelling later, like, september. kate too. remember kate?
lately i've been wandering around a bit - oft alone on journeys of thought and reflection, occasionally with one or more others just talking aimlessly and listening to all the things you can't hear. I've seen some local things, much to the delight of two old ladies i came across on new road one day. They thought it was lovely that a handsome young man (sic) was spending his days investigating the islands treasures. On that particular day i was with pascal, heading for Quarr Abbey. It's an odd place. Fully functioning establsihment with monks and all, and a tearoom. Oh, and a giftshop. No english spot would be complete without a giftshop. The Cathedral is open to the public for perusal purposes. I'd never been in a catholic cathedral before. It had one of those little confession booths like they have on the telly. quaint. we didn't stay long; pascal doesn't like churches. we went to the ruins of the original abbey built in 1132. We thought it was a bit dull and drab really. Just a wall. However, then we discovered that we'd strayed off the path and we were actually looking at a wall built to protect the abbey some few hundred years later. silly us. Mind you, there wasn't a lot left of the abbey either. Evidently they'd pulled it apart to build other stuff. Oh well. We came back along the beach for dinner. pascal thought we'd be late. pascal was wrong.
the beach is lovely at the moment. gets all nice and pink in the sky as the sun is setting. nice still waters. nice happy people. Sometimes when your'e standing on the beach it looks like england has gone. fog plays funny tricks with your eyes. a lot of people don't like fog. makes things hard to see they say. but have you ever stopped and noticed how fog makes everythnig closer seem so much sharper? fog is good. not bad. people are silly.
there are bats. loads of them. they're unlike any bats i've seen before. they're little. but they dont' flap very fast. they're kind of chilled out and a little bit graceful. nice bats. as i walk around at night, coming home from the beach, they flutter around above me. i like bats. and dragonflies too.
it's been another of those school leader weeks where i work rediculously long hours and end up totally exhausted and longing a day off only to find that i dont' get one and then i cry and wish that i wasn't here until i remember how much i love it and i forget about how tired i am. yeah. nothing really interesting in any way has happened anyways - well, nothing thaty i want to write about, oh, other than that i had my first high ropes session today - sitting fourteen metres up on a little platform in the sun, sending kids down a zipwire... life doesn't get much better than that.
oh, and i AM getting a new roommate now - erhm. yeah.
the room: wasps tried to make a new nest on the flag. stupid wasps. i stopped them pretty quick. mr hitchcocks birds are harrasing me on my way to my room too. stupid birds. not so easily stopped. currently investigating options. umbrella? helmet? tennis racquet... ahhhhh. (insert evil raising of eyebrow) and new photos are now installed on the wall above where my bed will soon be positioned. yes, that's right, i have the room to myself, so some blatant rearranging will soon be taking place. photos will follow.
a house called: They try and make excuses, they tell me dawdling stories referring the blame, but the fact remains; English people name their houses because they want to look posh. Admittedly it’s kind of quaint to see a slightly dilapidated old cottage with a little wooden panel, nestled in amidst the ivy, with some kind of name like “Daisy Meadows Cottage” scribed intricately into it’s surface. However, I think it’s a bit daft that every single house in Wootton is named in the same manner. They’re not even very good names; Kayleigh, Pink Gin, Blue Skies and a variety of other clichéd names like that. Personally, if I were naming my house, I’d call it George. For that’s a good name for a house.
“Get off my land!” is a rather well known phrase over here in England. It aptly symbolises the territorial nature of the English people. This evening Mareike and I decided to go out for a walk. Given our available time, we decided against Firestone Copse and instead, headed for Wallishill Copse. There were several paths leading in to the forest, so we weren’t overly worried if we missed the first one. A gate, with a large sign attached saying “Private, No Access,” blocked the first road heading in. Oddly enough, the second road in contained a similar sign, as did the third and all subsequent roads. Evidently, the owners of Wallishill Copse don’t much like visitors. We decided to search instead for somewhere else to go, but simply found plenty more of those signs, everywhere. We then decided that going into business producing “Private” signs would be a lucrative business venture. The beach seemed like a good idea at this point, yet even the beach was apparently “Private.” Luckily, we’re still allowed to walk on the roads, well, until someone buys one of our “Private” signs.
home alone: It’s official, I will not be getting a new roommate anymore.
ropes in the sky: It's official, I am now a qualified High ropes Instructor.
captured on ccd: I've had my digital out a lot lately, pointing it at everything trying to gather in loads of my own visual interpretations of this environment. That's the joy of digital, in some repsects, that you can be less paranoid whilst taking pictures, and take seven instead of just one, ensuring that at least one will turn out. But on the same note, it does mean you're less pedantic with the specific techinical issues. Whatever the case, I'm getting some spectacular shots, some of which i hope to have posted shortly.
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