Epilogue/Epilblog

We have been home for three days now, and although they've been a hectic few days, we've found some time to reflect on our England, Scotland, and Iceland adventure. It was an absolutely marvelous time and it has just convinced us that vacations are good for the soul and good for relationships. To get away to where the only objective is to have fun, is just the best! It's nice to leave the stress of everyday life behind and just focus on each other and where you are in another part of the world.


Here are some of our thoughts now that we're home.

First, some awards:

Favorite:

Dinner - Me: In Reykjavik, the tortellini with Icelandic lobster
Hubby: No one favorite but he thought the food was better in Iceland than in the U.K.
Breakfast - Both of us: Edinburgh Marriott. Lots of choices, a great fruit salad, and Hubby liked the pastries for breakfast dessert.
Hotel room – We both thought the Willowbeck Lodge was the nicest place we stayed, but that’s in a different category since it’s not a hotel. For hotels, Me: The Renaissance Hotel in Alfreton, Derbyshire. For Hubby: the Hotel Selfoss in Iceland.
Bathroom – Me: the Willowbeck Lodge; bright, white, tub and shower, skylights, and beautiful appointments. Hubby: no preference, he was just happy to have a shower and a place to ponder.
Now that we’ve covered all the food and bathrooms, here are a few more favorites:
View - Me: The Glacier in Iceland.
Hubby – Every view in Iceland. He loved coming over a rise and seeing something amazing.
Day of vacation – Me: The Golden Circle in Iceland. Hubby: Tie - Golden Circle and golf at St. Andrews


Disappointments:

The Marriott in Inverness. It was certainly in need of repair and redecoration. The carpets were worn, the bathroom had mold, the breakfast wasn’t even mediocre. The lobby was lovely, and maybe there were rooms that have been re-done, but ours wasn’t one of them.
The weather in Iceland. When you only have five days, you know that the weather has to be perfect to get everything in. It wasn’t and it did cramp our style there. But now we have a reason to go back. There is so much more to see.
Traveling in Europe is expensive. We knew this, of course, before we went, and we had money set aside for our trip, so this wasn’t a big surprise, but it’s sad that because of the expensive nature of travel abroad, that more people can’t really afford to travel. There is so much of our world to see, and with the history in Europe being so significant, it’s a shame that the cost is prohibitive for many.
Our car in Iceland. After 10 days in our brand new 2007 Renault Scenic in the UK, our 2005 Toyota Avensis with 53,000 miles on it, crumbs in every nook and cranny, the big chip in the windshield, and the broken passenger door was a real disappointment.

Surprises:

The flat plains of Iceland. We both had expected Iceland to be more wooded and more hilly right down to the water. We were surprised by the expanse of flat plain from the mountains right down to the sea.
Finding family graves in the U.K. Finding the family graves in Riseley, England and Invergordon, Scotland was a big surprise. I hadn’t really held out a lot of hope for either, especially after seeing the condition of the old grave stones all over England. Many prior to 1900 were just worn away and unreadable.

Reflections on things:

Scotland: Although beautiful, Scotland is a lot like New Hampshire. The mountains, lakes, streams, and views are very similar. We really enjoyed the history there, but we feel like there isn’t a lot of need to go back. When we visited Hawaii, we knew we would have to go back, but Scotland is now checked off the list of places to visit. This time was enough. England we’ll probably go back to only because my family is there.
Iceland: We definitely would like to go back to Iceland because there is so much more to see. We only touched on the southwestern part of the island. We didn’t go to the north where we could see the birth of iceburgs, and the land to the east is supposed to be breathtaking. If we have opportunity again, we’ll go back and do the entire ring road next time.
Golf: The golf at St. Andrews was good and a lot of fun and it’s great to say that we played at St. Andrews, but honestly, we can play golf at home. We’re still glad we did it though.
History: The one thing the U.K. has is history, much longer than ours and you really get the sense of things being “old”.
What to wear: Of course, we took too many clothes! Not knowing what would be on the agenda especially during the days we visited family, I took clothes for “just in case”. I never wore the two dresses I brought, Hubby never wore a tie, and since it rained so much in Iceland, much of our hiking gear got limited use. Suffice it to say, the old adage, “Pack your suitcase, then put half of it back” is a good one. One interesting thing of note: In the U.K. with temps in the 60’s to low 70’s, all the natives were wearing their shorts and tee-shirts which to us looked silly. There were days that were quite chilly, but they believed it was summer. But in Iceland, people were bundled up with hats and gloves etc, almost like they thought it was winter already. Interesting.

On Blogging our trip:

Deciding to blog about our trip was something I thought might be fun but it really was a great idea. First, it kept everyone at home up-to-date with our trip and let you all share our adventure, but now that we’re home, we have a real travel-log of our vacation. To go back and read the early posts, I realize there are things we would have easily forgotten over time. Also, I plan to print out the entire blog and share it with Hubby’s Mom so she can read first-hand about our trip. We could never have shared that much detail after the fact. But, blogging is not without it’s downsides. First, it took two to three hours every day to get a post up and running. A lot of that time is uploading the photos, which of course depends on the upload speed of each Internet connection. Writing what happened each day takes a good bit of time too, and after just a day or two, we realized that we needed to keep a log in the car with us to write down all the things we wanted to share. That also worked well for the names of towns and road signs. Second, some nights, Hubby would be sound asleep while I was still writing. One night, I fell asleep three times at my computer and when I re-read the post the next morning I realized that there were some things that needed fixing! Blogging every day was really a commitment, but knowing that there were all of you out there, waiting for the next installment, it kept me motivated. I also loved getting your comments. Many made me laugh and all of them made me feel close to you while so far away.

So, now our vacation, and this blog are finished. Thank you all for reading and for sharing the fun we had!