Being home after five months away was weird. We flew home early from Argentina because we’re flying out to Australia earlier than planned because I messed up the dates on the visas. Whoops. We landed on the Monday morning and were out of Gatwick and on the road with a McDonalds’ breakfast within half an hour of landing! Something that’s unheard of! I was expecting lengthy delays, but no, straight off and straight through, bags collected and in the car. Oh not before my brother got us lost about four times in the car park because he couldn’t remember where the car was parked! It was funny.
On the way home we pulled in to surprise my mum at work and then dropped Nathan off before the laborious task of unpacking and completing six loads of washing and hoping it would all dry by the time I’d be going back up to Gatwick to fly to Florida on the Thursday. Quick turnarounds were needed!
The whole concept of being home was just bizarre. Whilst we were away I didn’t really miss any home comforts except the feeling of having properly clean clothes. Aside from that I was loving every single minute of being a travelling bum and living life doing what we wanted when we wanted.
Then you find yourself back home and realise that life has just carried on as normal whilst you’ve been away. I felt like an alien in my own home. We’d gone from eating out every night to now having a whole house of food to choose from. Too much choice as I couldn’t figure out what I wanted to eat. A silly concept perhaps but still, something you don’t think about whilst gallivanting round the world. Walking down the road and hearing people speaking English, again just felt so odd as we’d been in predominately Spanish speaking countries for about two and a half months. The lack of honking horns around on the roads, it felt so quiet. The cost of drinks, seemed so expensive. We’ve been used to spending about £3 max on a glass of wine or a beer and no more than £5 for a bottle of wine, especially in Argentina, yet back home that’s what you’d pay for a small glass of wine! (Thanks to my BFFs and Rob for picking up the bill!!!)
I mean, you can surprise your best friends totally unwittingly as they lay in bed casually in the morning, or just as they finish work, and the surprise on their face is possibly one of the best feelings ever…the sheer joy (is how I interpreted it, so of it’s anything different, shhhhhh) that they haven’t seen you after that many months, and you’re reunited, when you would usually see them daily/weekly depending on the work scenario…
And then once you’ve caught up with friends and family, again, the surprise on faces is just priceless, the realisation of just how much you have missed everyone and everything about home, hits you like a tonne of bricks. I consider myself very stubborn and ‘hard,’ as my mum would say, so for me to be feeling, ‘lost’ and almost dreading the thought of going away again, was extremely alien to me. Travelling is something I have wanted to do for my whole life, planned it twice before and now it really was third time lucky! One of my amazing friends, (she knows who she is) spent the afternoon with me before I left, where I was possibly the worst hostess, but she listened to me bleet on about “feelings” whilst I had the best cuddles with her beautiful daughter and then….after spending the morning at home with my mum, getting some antibiotics for my disgusting sand fly bites that are still bugging me nearly six weeks later, and a good kick up the arse, which was very much needed….I was driven up to Fleet services to meet Nathan and his family to begin leg two of this adventure.
Florida. We didn’t visit Florida during our two months in the states and it would be our 45th state visited. We were staying at the Hampton Hilton on the Thursday and flying at 1045am the Friday. Lunch would be at a posh looking pub just down the road from Gatwick and then it was card games before bed.
The flight would only take 9 hours or so and I mean I had Harry Potter and the Hobbit to keep me company so I was totally set. Throw in some decent plane food and it was even better. Oh and don’t forget the hour nap!! We landed in no time and getting out the airport seemed to take longer than the flight from the UK to Orlando! That was due to the lengthy queue to get through immigration and then grabbing cases, then onto the rental car…where the company we’d gone with appeared to have the longest queue.
Anyway. The car was got, by our own choosing in the mid range RV section so we went with our trusty Dodge Minivan. Something Nathan and I were familiar with. Not that we were camping but still. The car was gooood. We were soon on our way. First stop was the rental agency for the villa, then Walmart. I hate shopping with a passion so after a long flight I was more than reluctant to traipse round this bloody shop.
Nevertheless, we grabbed some pizzas to put in the oven and got back, ate and pretty much fell asleep. Saturday would be the day we get a Taco Bell breakfast…long awaited I must add…and then we would go to the mall down the road to pick up some Skechers and other bits and bobs before returning to the villa for a dip in the pool. Having a pool at our backdoor was amazing. The temperature over in Florida tipped into the 30s so it was amazing being able to come back from wherever we’d been and cool off.
Sunday was very much a lazy day spent chilling in and around the pool. It was bliss. After having not much chill time whilst we’d been away, it was so nice to literally do nothing, spending all day by the pool. The only thing we stepped outside the villa for was Sonny’s BBQ pit for dinner. The next few days would be spent at theme parks…
Until next time…