Adam Mallon Photography

Dec 31st MVTB#20 – The Voyage Home

Friday, May 25, 2012
London, England, United Kingdom

It’s just past midnight here in London, and in twelve hours time we’ll be on a plane bound for Canada.  One long, last travel day, with a visit planned in Toronto with a friend, and then we will be back on Albertan ground, 10 weeks to the day since we flew out.

As much as we’ve enjoyed our trip, we are both really looking forward to getting back home, seeing family and friends again and maybe even telling a story or two from our time on the road.  At some point I’m going to have to sort through the few photos I’ve taken on this journey.  I’ve been really bad at uploading even highlight photos, despite my best intentions, but back home, on a computer with a little more brain power than this little laptop, I hope to be able to post a few soon.

Our last couple of days in London have been more of the same – great.  I think I’m running out of superlatives to describe our experiences, but almost every day has brought something stupendous, awesome or incredible.  Yesterday we walked to the top of the magnificent St. Paul’s Cathedral, finally got our African souvenirs sorted out (never trust the shopkeeper who switches from offering to pay the shipping to COD in the negotiations), and met up with five of our group from our 2009 vacation.  It was amazing to catch up on what’s happened in the last three years and just a really fun evening, reminiscing on that adventure.  Today we spent much of the day at the awe-inspiring British Museum and still left many rooms unexplored there before deciding last minute to do one more musical before leaving London.  We saw Billy Elliot, one of my parents’ favourites.  Absolutely stellar show, with some fantasticly talented kids.

So now all that’s left to do is catch a couple of planes (here’s hoping there’s movies…we haven’t had individual televisions on any flight since Dubai – we’ve really been roughing it on this trip!) and try to stay up late so as not to fall victim to the vicious cycle of jet lag.   Oh yes, and to play a song!

There are no shortage of songs about homecomings, but for this trip, our song is “Since I’ve Been Around” by the Australian band the Waifs.   – “I take a deep breath and smile, and kick a stone along the ground, it’s been so long, since I’ve been around.”

You might think that’s the end of the playlist, but there’s two more songs yet to come!  No worries, I’ll find a way to work them in!

To all of our friends new and old that we met along the road in this trip, thanks for helping to make it so incredible and to everyone at home: we’re on our way!  See you soon!

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