Back with a vengeance!

It's been a looong while since my last post here (which is nothing new, we've already established how terrible a blogger I am). Anyway, I've now lived in Grand Cayman for almost 2 years. 2 years! How mad is that?! I've turned 28 and so am closer to the "deadline" for this list than ever. Things are going pretty well but I've been especially driven the last few weeks to get some things ticked off.

Ruthin Castle

I've been back in the UK for my Easter break, and amongst the traditional partying and visiting friends/family I've been trying to work through as many list items as possible! Starting with my stay in a haunted house (actually a castle...) Ruthin Castle in North Wales is truly one of the most beautiful places I've ever stayed. It dates back to the 13th Century and has been home to kings, princes and nobles as well as being used as a fort, hospital and most recently a hotel.

 I was there with a friend overnight and we both thought it was stunning. The gardens are magnificent and full of peacocks; the inside feels like you've been taken back in time to a luxurious home fit for a King. And the rooms....well. We were upgraded for free to one of the castle's amazing suites and it was honestly one of the best hotel rooms I've ever stayed in. But here's the exciting part. Ruthin Castle is supposed to be one of the 10 most haunted places in Britain - home to specters such as Lady Grey, who allegedly, upon discovering her powerful husband was being unfaithful with a peasant girl from the local village, killed his mistress in a jealous rage. She was then sentenced to death herself for murder, and it's said that she has never left the castle since. Unfortunately we didn't encounter Ms Grey or any of the other ghosts that are said to inhabit the castle firsthand, but we did hear lots of ghostly bumps and creaks in the middle of the night. I was convinced it was ghosts. My friend...less so. But still - an exciting stay and an item checked off the list.

I won't go into crazy detail about everything I've managed to check off over my easter break - we'll be here all day - but I'm chuffed to have managed to finally plant some trees (more than 2 in the end!) at an event in Chester, walk along Hadrian's Wall (part of it at least, it's a very long wall) and send Jemima a message in a bottle. I did this with the company NOD - with all the attention at the moment on cleaning up the world's oceans and removing plastic waste as well as glass, I didn't think sending a traditional message in a bottle via dropping a bottle in the sea was such a wise idea. NOD allows you to send a tiny scroll message in a tiny bottle to a friend in the post. Jemima loved it and especially loved the lessened impact on the environment.

Me at Hadrian's Wall

Speaking of Jemima - she and I finally went out together to to a night of pub golf! We did 9 "holes" in 8 bars along Deansgate locks and we ended up joint winners with each other! We also went out dressed as each other in Jemima and Emily inspired outfits - complete with cat ears and hair roses - and introduced ourselves to people as each other. It was a fun night and a great way to spend time with my best friend before I fly back to Cayman. However I really wish we'd done Pub Golf already when we were younger. My body cannot handle alcohol and late night McDonalds like it used to and I spent most of yesterday in bed with a killer hangover and suspected food poisoning. Ah well - at least we did it.

Me and Jemima before
our Pub Golf night out

A few other things have been checked off the list in the last year or so too - last summer Jemima and I went on a trip to Blackpool and FINALLY had our fortunes told! It was an interesting experience and I'm not sure how much if any of it was accurate, but fun all the same. I've also done a few things in Cayman such as running through the fountains (not Piccadilly gardens as originally intended but the Camana Bay ones are pretty much exactly the same so I'm counting it). And I've obviously seen so many sunsets in Cayman since living there. They are seriously spectacular.


Oh oh oh! I also finally had the time and money to go back to South Africa to visit my grandad. I'm not going to go into the trip much here, unfortunately my grandad's behaviour whilst I was there has left an enormous rift between us which really ruined it for me. But the game drives were fun and we saw lots of wildlife, including some amazing rhino, lion, hyena and elephant sightings, so it wasn't all bad.

 One thing that's bothered me about the list is the item "Go to the Dogs". I made the decision to cross this off without actually going as since making the list originally it's come to light just how bad the poor dogs are treated in the dog racing business, and it's not something I wish to support any longer.

So - 22 months left to complete the list! That's the only race I want to be a part of, and the race is on!