20 weeks

20 weeks and

42 beds slept in
25 islands visited including Ireland and Britain
4 different countries
19 ferry rides
6  hire cars
4 plane flights
10 train trips
14? bus rides
2 taxi rides
17 books read
53 blog posts
? thousands of km travelled and ? hundreds of km walked
? thousands of photos taken
2 journal notebooks filled
1 book proof read and sent to the printers

What have I learned?

That I don't like hostels and backpacks. Hotels are ok occassionally. Self catering cottages and apartments are the best home-away-from-home.

It is not possible to travel well only using public transport. It restricts when and where you can go and how long you can stay there, especially outside cities. A car really is essential for maximum travel freedom and wandering adventures. The only place public transport works is in a city.

I don't like driving in cities, or trying to park in cities. I don't like cities much at all. They stress me out after the second day, even without the stress of driving in them.

I do like travelling. I feel very at home wandering from place to place, settling in to each new 'home', exploring, learning, being inspired by all the different landscapes and their stories.

Have I answered the question I asked in the first post of this journey?: "Is it possible that there is something in my DNA that draws me powerfully back to the island(s) of Britain (and Ireland)? Is Britain (and Ireland) more my 'Country' than Australia?"

Yes and maybe. There is something essentially human and spiritually important about knowing who your ancestors were, how and where they lived, what was important to them and how that has flowed down through time, travelling around the world and passing down through the blood of previous generations and in to your own veins to influence who you are. I feel very at home in Scotland and England and Ireland. But I also feel my home is in Tasmania and I am looking forward to being back there. Somehow though, the big island of Australia feels more like a foreign land. Perhaps the milder climate, the greener countryside, the rockier mountains, the older buildings and the European trees planted in Tasmania combine to make it feel a little more like the lands of my ancestors and something in my DNA responds to that. 

So, I stand on the edge of one Country thinking about another, and at the end of one adventure looking forward to the next one. What lies out there beyond the horizon? The end of one adventure in life is simply the beginning of the next. 

All photos in this post were taken by Sheryl. Are we still friends after 20 weeks of each other, and would we do it again? Surprisingly - yes!