Welcome to the first post that will cover my fishing escapades in England!
Tag: Travel
“Actually, the best gift you could have given her was a lifetime of adventures . . . ”
–Lewis Carroll
Virginia has some of the most diverse farming in the country, and I was able to witness this as a volunteer at a local flower, herb, and seed farm.
I volunteered on one of over 43,000 farms in Virginia. This herb, flower, and seed farm has allowed me to gain a massive amount of awareness and knowledge about the land and plants. Here are those lessons . . .
With small farms being the backbone of Virginia, I return to a volunteer at a local herb, flower, and seed farm.
Agriculture is Virginia’s largest private industry by a vast margin, and I had the chance to live a dream by volunteering on a local Virginia herb, flower, and seed farm.
No doubt we will properly celebrate our wedding and journey somewhere new for a true honeymoon, but until then these mountains of West Virginia welcomed us and gifted us tranquility.
“I’m so happy we eloped,” one of us said — It doesn’t matter who because we both felt that way. Eloping meant this — him and me, intertwined fingers, talking and truly seeing one another.
Canada is wild and fresh and breathtaking. Canada is alive and vibrant and has an energy you can feel as it courses through your veins. Canada is adventure and serenity mixed in this bundle that is hard to describe but easy to experience. Canada is not rumored to be the words “friendly,” “open,” and “passionate” but instead it lives by these definitions. Canada is pure freedom in the most beautiful and simple way that can only be experienced underneath those grandfather trees or by the shore when filling your lungs with air as you breathe in. Canada is all you need and yet still finds a way to brim with the ‘more’ you only found you needed when you arrived. But finally, Canada is also puppies in taxis and let’s be honest — Is there anything better in the world than all of this?
When we tell people about our British Columbia kayaking with whales trip, I’m continually surprised at their response: “Surely, that didn’t happen,” they tell us through laughter. Maybe they say this because they cannot believe we both made it out of Canada — not only alive but together. I like to believe, however, that they say this as a compliment — That the only way they can fathom our magical trip is by believing I simply created the entire story . . . .
It was Day One of our kayak adventure when Andrew asked loudly, “L, is this yours?” We stood in the middle of the charming Paddlers Inn, a floating lodge off of a remote British Columbia island. Go figure he would be showcasing only this for my entire new kayaking group to see . . .
“I cannot believe we made it,” Andrew and I kept saying, verging on tears and hugging each other. Against all odds, we did made it to British Columbia’s unbelievably gorgeous Telegraph Cove. Here was the start to our whale kayaking and wild camping adventure . . .
“Expedia cancelled all of your flights,” the airline representative told us the day we were supposed to travel to Canada for a week-long whale kayaking and wild camping trip. “This happens often with people that book through Expedia. If I could say not to do one thing in the future, it would be not to book through Expedia.” And was only a glimmer of our nightmare travel due to Expedia’s mess-up.
I plunged my paddle into the water to fight back but my kayak did not move forward. Instead, I was pulled into some type of slow-swirling whirlpool. And this is a small glimpse at what our first kayaking adventure looked like . . .
Welcome to New York where people hustle on the sidewalks faster than the cars on the roads and where the sounds of horns, exhausts, advertisements, music, more explode in the air. New York, an alternate fairytale where skyscrapers are enchanted and stretch so tall that they become invisible in the clouds and where colors — loud and sharp — blur to create a vibrant energy all its own . . .
Here I finally have a chance to explore Sheffield, Andy’s home, though he hates it when I say that. So maybe Sheffield isn’t his home currently but it is his first home — the home that made him who he is, and there is something powerful to be said for that.