london - not being a tourist

i had a good relaxing time in london.  tried not to be a tourist but was willingly taken anywhere my friends wanted to go.  had some great food - fantastic thai, impressive pizza and yummy veggie burgers.  i did two of the mueseums... the British Museum because i wanted to see the Rosetta Stone [amazing] and the Royal Academy of Arts because they had a Monet exhibit [like the Art Institute of Chicago].

London is so massive [8.5 million people!] it's a 45 minute [minimum] subway ride anywhere and forget using a Uber - just too much traffic.  i'm a small town girl and the closeted air of the underground was claustrophobic for me.  also, with the shadow of the Brussels attacks just a few days ago it makes a person wary to be in a crowded public place.  

i had a chance to go up to Cambridge and it was nice to get out of the big city and see the old colleges that are so often referenced in the US.  

when i landed it was warm and sunny but mostly it's been spring weather here.  rainy, cold and overcast but the spring flowers and trees are blooming everywhere.  there are thousands of dafodils blooming - i can hardly believe there are any left for the rest of the world. 

mostly it was great to spend time with one of my closest friends who i had not seen since 2013 and meet up with some other UK friends.  

takes my breath away

no, it's not big ben or a bridge or any of the other landmarks around london.  i was multitasking, dressing to go out for the evening and talking to someone on the phone when i looked out the window of my friends apartment.  i was literally speechless for a moment as i saw the laser.  my friend has an awesome apartment across from the royal navy observatory where they mark greenwich mean time and at night there is a laser that marks GMT line.  

that's pretty cool right?  because there's only one of those in the world and the rest of the world's time is based on that laser.  0 degrees longitude!  awesome

landing in london

i had barely landed and logged onto a wireless network when my phone lit up

with messages and news alerts about the terrorists bombing of the airport in Brussels. 

in the aftermath Belgium has been ripped to shreds by the news agencies.  some calling Belgium a failed state.  others just calling out their security services as pathetic. 

whatever the case, these attacks will gain the terrorists nothing.  not a great start to my stopover in london to visit friends for a few days.

last american face

my brother has been so supportive of all my travels and even took me along when he climbed Kilimanjaro ten years ago so it seems appropriate that i spent my last weekend in the US with his family before i am off on my next adventure - living in the shadow of Kilimanjaro.  it was a great couple of days and he did my final pack to get all my bags within my 23kg allowance.  plus cooked up some amazing vegetarian enchiladas and served up smores by the fire under a clear, star filled sky with an almost full moon.  meanwhile, my nephew and i decided on matching tattoos... 

last day in colorado ... big spring storm of course

getting closer to africa

yeah, i think you can find it

last week i was texting a friend who i was going to meet at one of the parks for an afternoon walk.  it was someplace i'd never been before and she was giving me some vague directions and finally said, 'you seem to find your way around SE Asia just fine so i'm sure you can find the park in your own city'.  i get so little sympathy from my friends.  navigating cities in Asia is really hard.  if the street has a name it's a bonus but they the idea of house/building numbers is pretty alien.  

giggling like schoolgirls

i had plans to meet up with one of my neighbors for a cocktail and i chose one of the well established restaurants on Gaylord Street.  it's next door to a marijuana dispensary.  as we sat outside on the patio drinking our wine i started playing a game in my head.  which of the well dressed passerby were headed to the dispensary?  i brought my friend into the game and soon enough we were chatting with our server about the implications of legal dope smoking in Colorado.  you know where this is going right?  

yep, my friend and i end up over at the dispensary looking for something to help up sleep better at night.  seriously, we weren't looking for some buds to smoke or a high but an edible that would have us sleeping like babies.  i told the greeter we'd never been in a shop before and go easy on us because we were newbies.  the guy [well dressed and middle aged] who walked in right after us laughed and commented, 'oh you ladies are going to enjoy this'.  after checking our ids for age and residency we are admitted into the shop where a budtender [yes, that's what they call them] was standing in front of a bar with shelves of product behind her.  molly was very helpful.

it was like walking into a high end chocolate shop.  lots of different choices and pleasant, knowledgeable staff willing to answer our questions.  we'd been warned off the chocolate and both our server at the restaurant [who had way more experience than she was admitting] and our budtender recommended we try the gummies for an easy night of sleep.  we were in and out in less than 10 minutes which included some additional browsing so kudos to Lucky Sky for making that a great shopping experience.  wish i could say the same about the Whole Paycheck in Cherry Creek where it might take longer and cost just as much to get a few slices of cheese.

we left with our black sealed bag of edibles and laughed all the way to my car where we split up the goods.  my friend started opening the top which is the typical childproof cap for drugs in Colorado.  not understanding her strength she gave up and passed it to me.  i put my hand on the cap and it fell off.  this sent us into another fit of laughter and we blamed it on a contact high from being in the shop.

we divy up the goods and here's my half of the purchase.  we talk about how much take and agree we should cut the dosage in half as recommended by the budtender for 'nonsmokers like us'. unlike my few experiences with smoking pot when i was growing up there was nothing that felt dirty or shameful about buying our gummies.  total investment $24 for the bottle.    

the next day, after a good night of sleep, i wondered, were we supposed to tip the budtender?

counting the days....

next adventure starts NOW!

my next trip came as a surprise even to me.  i thought after my time in Asia i would spend some time in Central America but life doesn't always take you where you plan.  i was invited to join an amazing organization doing fantastic work with the farmers in Tanzania.  so it's off to Africa for me for the next year or so.  i couldn't be more thrilled and excited about this opportunity.