Posts tagged Yorkshire
Of rainbows
The sea was calling to us so we ate our lunch at Waihi Beach in sight and sound of the sea. And what a sea! It was high high tide and some waves rolled in with so much energy we had to clamber up the bank to avoid getting wet feet. All that energy boiling away in the sea made for an invigorating walk.
On our return we were rewarded with a magnificent full scale rainbow which reminded us of another spectacular rainbow which Ross captured on Anzac Day, 2012 from the top floor of New Zealand House in London.
As photographers do, Ross likes to have foreground interest in his photos. Here’s another of our favourite rainbow photos - this time on Penhill, looking down Wensleydale towards Leyburn where we lived for 6 months in 2016. Ross captioned it with “I’ve found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”
I just rewatched an inspirational clip of Maya Angelou speaking of God giving her rainbows in her clouds.
Goodbye 2016
2016 was one of those years that turned out quite
differently from how it looked a year ago.
For us it was a year of transitions, as we lived in Myanmar, moved to
Yorkshire and finished out the year in sunny New Zealand.
We had some wonderful family times in Myanmar, Cambodia and Bangkok early in the year and in Scotland and Yorkshire later on.
Ross and I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary in early February. The hotel staff at the Park Royal in Nay Pyi Taw where we lived at that time, were so very kind to us and helped to make it a wonderful celebration. We had decided long ago to take a longer trip to some of our favourite places in honour of this significant anniversary. Our trip began before Easter with a few days in Venice, followed by 2 weeks of walking in Malta, 2 weeks of cycling in SE and NW Sicily and a week exploring volcanoes. We finished up with a week with Rebecca and Jean on the Isle of Skye.
By May we were heading back to Myanmar to say goodbye to our many dear friends, write final reports and pack our belongings. We had put down a lot of roots in our three years in Myanmar and it was hard dragging them up.
Fortunately we had something to look forward to, as we were going to live and work in Yorkshire for 5 months. Our jobs as Assistant Managers at Eastfield Lodge were better than we had ever dreamed. We loved looking after the guests and the house, and the work-life balance that gave us time off most afternoons to explore the beautiful Yorkshire Dales on foot or by bicycle. It was great to be in the same time zone as Rebecca and Jean and we enjoyed time with them both in the Dales, as well as in Edinburgh.
Our year has finished on a high note with a NZ odyssey of walking and cycling in the NZ summer. We have fallen in love with our beautiful homeland all over again and loved finding new delights in places we thought we knew well already. At year’s end we are in lovely Te Anau, surrounded by high mountains and wonderful rain forest.
World Wanderers
We are often asked about what the drivers were for our choices about the way we live.
Back in 2011 when we began our journey to a nicer life we focused on:
• Relationships with family and friends
• Improving our health through increased fitness and reduced stress
• Meaningful, worthwhile, challenging work whether or not it paid well
• Travel to interesting places
We began to live in a much smaller space, and to concentrate more on experiences and a whole lot less on material possessions. We worked together a lot of the time, and undertook a range of assignments in NZ and abroad because they interested us.
Five years later, the key focus areas have remained the same for us. We have refined our travel goals, and choose to travel more slowly most of the time -cycling or walking so that we interact with the locals and absorb more of the smells, sounds, and sights around us. We tend to return more often to the countries we love and explore new regions.
A key driver for us arose from family and friends who had died or contracted serious illnesses before their time. We worried about running out of health before we ran out of money, and not having enough energy to enjoy any retirement years together. We wanted to ensure that we did the active travelling while we were able to really enjoy it. We had always dreamed of living and working in another country to learn more deeply about another culture.
In the past 5 years we have lived and worked in Christchurch, Myanmar and Yorkshire in the UK. We have travelled to many parts of New Zealand, Lebanon, Cyprus, Bangladesh, Scotland & London, Finland, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Vietnam, UK, California, Singapore, Thailand, Laos, India, Malaysia, France, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, Namibia, Japan, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Malta, Italy, Laos and Lesotho. Some of those trips were work, some to attend conferences and others to cycle or walk or just to experience the people and places. While we lived in Myanmar and Yorkshire we travelled extensively, exploring the cultures as fully as we were able.
Family, friends and health goals remain at the top of our list. We will continue to spend time and energy on keeping in touch with family and friends and work at keeping in excellent health. We are unlikely to travel quite so much in the future, but are not ready to hang up our travelling shoes just yet. What 2017 will bring in the way of interesting, challenging, worthwhile work is as yet unknown – for sure, something will transpire to inspire us