fez

The two days in Fez were such a great vacation! It didn´t hurt that I went mid-week, so it felt like I barely worked that week at all. But also it just felt so exotic and different. I´ve travelled a fair few places, though in general I go and live somewhere and haven´t done the backpacking routes that a lot of people have, but I hadn´t been anywhere like Morocco before. The crazy tiny labyrintine streets of the old city, the chaotic market stalls, the cats, the donkeys (ok, Mexico had donkeys, but not on the same level, not delivering gas and water). The people who seem to speak any language you could think of, so long as it´s to sell you something. The smells, of leather tanning and mint, the coloured tiles, the exquisite woodwork, the mosques we couldn´t go in, the coffee shops, the street life and the tucked away courtyards where the noise of the street doesn´t penetrate. The Barcelona Football Club paraphernalia. The impossibility of reading street signs. The haggling the taxi down from $10 to $1 and knowing you´re still paying too much. The honey cookies.

I loved it!









This was how narrow the street to get to the hotel/riad

mint tea and couscous

Last week I went to Fez, Morocco, for a grand total of two days (flights were cheap, I´ve been wanting to go to Morocco forever, etc. etc.) It was amazing! I´ll show you monuments and street views tomorrow, but meanwhile, enjoy some of the tastes!

Freshly squeezed orange juice for less than a dollar, tagine, coucous, breakfasts in tiled riads, honey cookies (can´t believe I didn´t get a picture of those), fried egg and potato sandwiches, street stands with delicious fish and sandwiches and hungry cats, hungry cats everwhere, fresh fruit, and mint tea with sugar, sipped while gazing into the hustle and bustle of the ever-moving marketplace.









tagine!


There were also a bunch of cats inside the restaurant on the second floor, they came in via the balcony and no one seemed to want to kick them out.

electronic picnic

I feel like a broken record going on about my long absences all the time, but in this case it´s my laptop that´s broken - for real this time - which is making everything from blogging to writing to talking to my family on skype a total pain. To fix it or to replace it... I still haven´t decided.

Anyway, these photos are from the electronic picnic, and event that takes place every Sunday of the summer in a park in Barcelona. There are DJs and electronic music and you bring your own food (and in our case, vermouth smuggled in as Coca Cola). For all that, it´s a child friendly event; there are lots of families. The day we went it threatened rain, but we camped out under the trees for the duration of the shower, and then climbed the trees, and then went to dance with everyone else. You can also play volleyball, or badminton, or simply pass out on blow-up mattresses, but the tree climbing was probably my favourite part!





P.S. Skirt by Family Affairs and top by Q´s Daydream

the hols

Summer has finally arrived in Barcelona, so I feel the need to finish up the England pictures quickly and consign sweaters to the dust-bin of memory. Actually, they've all been sent back to Canada, so it's just as well it decided to get warm here.

Anyway, Whitby and surroundings, home of stunning sea vistas, giant Yorkshire puddings, Goth Weekend, and the peculiarly Yorkshire sense of humour.

It looks like this up close:


And like this from afar:




Giant Yorkshire pudding with gravy:


Enjoying Cornish Pasties with Mo and Sho in York




Goth Weekend! I don't think I'd ever been before. Basically Goths and Steampunks come from all over the country/world to get dressed up and parade through the picturesque streets.


The only people more in evidence than the goths are the photographers and their big lenses.




My dad celebrated his birthday in famous local restaurant The Magpie Café




Where I had the best Halibut of my life.


We went for a walk in the woods and found a ruined castle




And night fell, and then we went to Glasgow for two days but I didn't take many pictures because I was too busy visiting old friends and eating bacon sandwiches and dying my hair red. :P


Outfit post coming, long-suffering fashion readers!

moorland ramblings

Ok, after saying I was back, my computer died (temporarily, it seems to be doing ok at the moment) and now it's getting ridiculous how old and unseasonal some of these pictures are, but I'm going to post them anyway.

These are from walks in Yorkshire with my family. My sister Morna and I were gearing up to do an 8 day chunk of the Camino de Santiago in Northern Spain afterwards, so were trying to get our legs used to walking/break in our hiking boots in my case.

Every time I write about my dad's corner of the world I sound like a broken record but, in brief, the scenery is just my favourite ever, and I love rambling through the sparse but complex landscapes. My only complaint is the wind, which really takes a chunk out of you sometimes, but we lucked out weather-wise, not much rain and fairly pleasant temperatures. Actually, the last several times I've been to Yorkshire we've lucked out... I'm beginning to think all this complaining about the English weather is a conspiracy...

updates

Oh hello again. It's been at least two weeks since I last showed my face around here. In part, this is because I've been walking with my sister through Galicia for over a week, and a laptop definitely didn't make the cut for things I wanted to carry around on my back all that time. But in truth, I haven't known what to say around here much at all the last few months (note my dismal lack of posts).

Life got in the way. My relationship of five years ended, and I've been torn on posting, not wanting to hurt various people (which didn't work). It was a hard few months for everyone involved, and sometimes it still is. I was glad to disappear with my family for over a month, although I didn't have any epiphanies while away from it all. Instead, in the time-honoured tradition of newly-separated women, I dyed my hair (the above colour is the sensible compromise--I was initially thinking pastel pink).

Anyway, I'm back! And have some catching up to do...

canary

These photos, the best of a bad bunch, just barely conceal the multitude of sins of my recent existence. Apart from the fact that I was cold (we've had good weather in the UK, but Yorkshire always does have that icy blast of wind) and tired from being out all day, I've been on a three week long bender with my family. Every time we get together, I eat too much, drink far too much, and don't sleep enough, and I've often noticed that I look about five years older by the end of a family vacation than I did before, with a pinched, dehydrated face. I think it just shows that we actually enjoy each other's company and just want to party all the time... but there is always that scary point when you find yourself seriously thinking that the last vegetable you ate may have been a week ago. If I were really a canary, rather than just canary-legged, I would have long since died down this mineshaft!