Ello England!

Ello, ello, ello.

Or allo, allo, allo.

I have spent the last week in England and I have really enjoyed it.

I spent a few days banging around London then a few more banging around Brighton and I've had a ball!

Ba hai religious text in British Library

I was pretty lucky because I caught the last ever train from Disneyland Paris to London. One day later and I would've had to have gone to Paris then London, and I really didn't want to faff about.

The last time I was in London was about 10 years ago with some Uni mates and it was January. And it didn't make a good impression if I'm honest. The people were rude and it was fucking freezing and expensive.

Awesome Buddhist text for the illiterate

This time around it was only one of those things. My god I lucked out with the hotel I stayed at, was a very basic place but it was also a very affordable one, and it was clean and on the ground floor (thank fuck). It is so bloody expensive in London it made Disneyland Paris seem like Kmart!

I can not even begin to tell you how great it felt to be back in an English speaking country. I didn't have to focus on communication, I didn't have to translate or attempt a different language. I got off the train and immediately felt a lot better than I had been feeling.

Tower Bridge not London Bridge

The travel fatigue had hit me hard and I am probably the only person to ever have been recharged and refreshed from being in London!

The first day was fun. I did a couple hop-on, hop-off buses and went to the Natural History Museum. I'll be honest I didn't stay long because I just couldn't people. Then I went to a nice English pub and enjoyed a couple beers and I finished my night with a West End show.

I would so live in London just to be able to enjoy everything that the West End has to offer.

That night I saw Wicked and it was amazing!!!

I loved the book and I have wanted to see the musical since it came out. I may or may not have got a bit teary. And the musical is actually much better than the book! It was fucking fantastic! So much so my tight arse bought a Wicked jumper.

I have actually been letting myself buy small souvenirs. My tight arse is slowly starting to unclench in that regard.

And the next day I visited the British Library, the Platform 9 3/4 Souvenir Shop at Kings Cross Station, the aquarium, the Tate Modern, plus a nice long walk along the River Thames.

The first thing I saw when I walked into the Tate Modern was an art peace replicating the Aboriginal Tent Embassy. That was a nice surprise.

Then I caught up with a friend I made at the Nepal volunteer program and we had a really nice traditional English dinner - Indian curry!

Then I caught the train the Brighton.

I didn't do much in Brighton but that was really the whole point. It was a perfect place to do nothing. Really nice pubs and a laid back feel.

Brighton is a seaside town, a place people go for the beach, and the beach is pebbles.

Like all pebbles!

I thought there'd be some sand at the shoreline at least but nope. All pebbles. It was so strange to see.

But then we are very spoilt in Australia with our beaches. I actually don't think I've seen any beaches to rival ours in all my travels. Even Fiji beaches are kinda average in comparison but the ocean is magnificent.

God I sound like such a snobby beach bitch.

Yesterday I took myself on a nice hike along the coast and it was on this hike I wrote a poem in my head... that was new...

Now, going to be brutally honest for a moment, I have been really struggling with loneliness lately. Not just the travelling solo loneliness (mostly I love solo travel) but that really deep, crippling, invasive loneliness that can feel like that's all there is and ever was or will be.

That feeling of cold black hopelessness that coats your soul like thick tar.

Yeah, that awful, suffocating, physically painful loneliness.

While I was hiking in the very hot English summer sun (it can burn btw) and trying to not to get dragged into a place I can't climb out of, a poem weaved itself through the rats nest of my thoughts. And I shifted from feeling the loneliness to trying to describe it.

It wasn't a miracle cure at all, I was still fucking hurting. But it helped more than my other tools were helping.

I find this really bizare because I don't like poetry. The only poem I like is The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe and that's because we studied it in school and I could understand exactly where Poe was coming from.

I made a good effort to try and get into poetry, wanting to be a writer since I was a kid I thought it was a rule to love poetry. But I just don't get it. I wish I did but it feels too hard basket and I don't understand what they're on about.

And I'm sorry but I find a lot of poetry to be pretentious. Or maybe I just don't get it. I mean, you have to get it right. Or it's just a bunch of words that don't make sense. I'm looking at you, Shakespeare!

Anyways. Yeah, it actually helped. The loneliness was less oppressive after I wrote it down on a peice of paper. Go figure.

So in conclusion, next time you're feeling overwhelmed or depressed or lonely or just at your wits end maybe try that. I have no doubt my poem is shithouse, but it's mine and it comes from a real place and that was enough to ease the pressure valve a little.

Or watch these cute fishies and turtles, God knows they help!

But enough about that, this isn't Caitlin's Self Help Blog.

Literally all pebbles!

Oh speaking of, I met an Irish bloke in Toulouse at the aerial retreat - champ bloke went all in too - and he told me my name is an Irish name (knew that) and it's pronounced Cortlin (did not know that!).

I think Cortlin sounds much prettier than Caitlin. I'm going to try and remember to introduce myself as Cortlin just to see what it feels like.

Ta ta!

Ps. I am in a good place. Life is made up of ebbs and flows and the flows far out number the ebbs these days 🙌🏾 😌 ✨️