Camped Above St. Ives - Cornwall England

Houston to London. Arrived on a Sunday morning exhausted but not too tired to enjoy pints with fellow Bayou City Road runner Lauren at the Cutty Sark in Greenwich. She just happened to be in London for work. Monday walkabout London and a visit to the British Museum. Tuesday morning the tube to Paddington then a five hour train ride to Penzance in the Cornwall region to meet up with Debs who I last saw in Bangkok 6 months ago. She immediately had me backpacking along the Cornwall coast. More pints and a world cup game in a Porthleven. More backpacking and a late camp. All of this and more in 4 days since leaving Houston. Fifth day, today, woke up with a pesky cold and sore throat. Time to stop. I just got too run down with jet lag and all. This time I didn’t get away with it.

I’m currently camped at a campground above St. Ives. Today I walked around town with a nose similar to a leaky faucet. Fortunately the weather is fabulous. Sunny with temps in the low 70’s. St. Ives is a lovely old fishing village turned beach resort. It has a lot to offer. Nice sandy white beaches, crystal clear water, charming shops, buildings and cobbled streets but also plenty of tourists. However, it’s not too overrun with people right now. The campground I’m staying at is very nice with 5 star toilets. It set me back 10 pounds ($15 USD) for a night but its summer in a touristy area. Needless to say, after traveling Asia all last fall, England seems exorbitantly high priced. Well, I guess all of Europe is going to seem that way unless I head over to the eastern bloc countries.

England is a lovely place, especially when the weather is nice, but this time around I feel like I’ve already spent enough time here during past travels. It’s now all quite familiar and I crave the unfamiliar when I travel. I’ll likely move on to another country quite soon. My French is really bad so the language issues with France should keep things interesting. However, right now I need to shake this cold and catch up on some rest before I do much more. The next country I plan to visit is France. I’ve spent some time there but very little. Part of me wants to do some extensive hiking but another part of me just wants to look around and check things out. I originally thought I’d want to do a long walk here in England but now it’s clear I’d rather move on.

Where’s Debs? Well, she left me with her cell phone number and said she and her father would return on Saturday later in the morning. She’s somewhere marching along the Cornish coast with her dog Jake. Not sure how much more of her I’ll see while in Europe but it’s nice to cross paths and catch up since our travels through Asia last fall. Had I not caught this cold I’d be marching along the coast right now as well. Nothing is much fun when you’re not feeling well.