A New Year, A New Town

We like to get dogs in January; we like to move in January. Not really, I'd like to stay put for a while :) But last 3 Jan, we were headed out west to Spokane thinking that might be our next home. This 3 Jan, we were signing our lease for our home here in Ely, Cambridgeshire, UNITED KINGDOM. Still trying to wrap my head around the fact that we live in England, I guess. And that this cathedral that was built 1,000 years ago is in my backyard.

Ely Cathedral

Inside the Cathedral

I love getting to a new place and exploring. I love trying new food. Yup I was even excited to try all of the "terrible food in England." NOT. I discovered Chicken Tikka while we were still living on base and that blew me away. Every time I see Chicken Tikka on a menu now, I have a hard time looking at anything else. When we got to Ely and didn't have our household goods yet, we used that as a "good" excuse to try as many pubs and restaurants as possible, I guess. Kabobs, a burger with goat cheese (I really think we ought to just slap a slab of goat cheese on our burgers in the U.S.), wild mushroom risotto, curry, chips, chips, chips & more chips! I'm a sucker specifically for the chips at one of the several pubs within a 5 min walk from us. And pints. I've had some good beers at several of the pubs, but one of my favorite places is a place called the Liberty Belle (also a 5 min walk...awesome/no good) that always has 5-6 microbrews on tap, all Ales. Well, I'm a sucker for Ales so they got me. They also do boat tours on the river in the summer. Sunday Roasts are also a tradition here; you can get a roast at most (or many) pubs every Sunday. We enjoyed our first Sunday Roast last weekend at the Royal Standard (the place with the crack chips).

The Sunday Roast. Does this look bad to you? 

Chicken Tikka! Boom.

p.s. that chicken tikka came with basmati rice, chips, naan (a type of flat bread) and a poppadom (see Wikipedia for that one). Who needs that many carbs?! :) But YUM. I ate them all.

Now that we have our stuff I've started cooking more so we don't balloon up. Amazing, soon after sleeping well and eating better I felt like I had energy to run again. It's all so crazy how the body works :) But it is unbelievable to be able to walk everywhere....the bank, the post office (Royal Mail! Didn't think I would use this much but have already had to go a couple times), several grocery stores, the Thursday/Sunday market, the Ely Cathedral, the river, the dog parks, shopping...pubs. I only need my car to go to base. I'll come back to that.

Since cooking at home, I've discovered that grilled cheese and sloppy joes, both of which I consider to be American foods, are amazing with British cheddar. See what we can accomplish with our allies? ;-)

There are some things you just have to embrace when you get to a new place. Because you aren't new for long. Like, I wish I had a video of myself walking through town looking lost and trying to read every store sign to figure out what store/restaurant it is, then trying to decide if I should go in or just keep it in mind for later. This thought process is all going on while I'm about to walk directly into a sign or a pole or a person. Because of course I'm looking left and right and up and every way except in front of me. Then there is the night I decided I should figure out how to get to the train station before we left for London a couple days later. It was about 5:30 and already dark, but I knew the general direction so just started walking. I noticed a bunch of commuters walking toward me (you can just tell which people got off the train after a day of work or school). So I decided to follow where they were walking from and wa-la! There was the train station. So I went inside and bought my discount card/pass, and as I was about to leave I SWEAR I saw Prince Harry. I swear. It couldn't have been him but WOW. The spot in this picture is on the short walk from our place to the train station:

A walk down the river. Ellie wants that swan. 

I know. That was a random photo of my cute dog by the river.

During my first couple of trips to the different grocery stores, I was always asked if I "needed bags" by the cashier. Uumm, am I a dirt bag if I say yes??? So, they are big on their reusable bags here (and you also bag your own groceries. I honestly think this is sort of a good idea. I always feel awkward standing there while the cashier rings everything up and the baggers bag...I need a job!). So, on one of my next trips I decided to bring my reusable bags. The only ones I had were from Trader Joe's and Dillon's. Yes, a reusable bag is a reusable bag but as I walked home with my overflowing Trader Joe's bag and a new British spec toaster oven, I wondered if I screamed "newbie." :)

Now we have all of our stuff and we're getting settled. But of course there were the moments of frustration when you are still trying to figure everything out and don't have the Internet at your fingertips. Example- I realized I was getting calls but had no clue how to access my voicemail. Seems like no big deal now, but it just felt like another little tiny way I was cut off when I was trying to figure out a million things and be home for deliveries of appliances, etc. Going without most of your stuff definitely makes you realize what is a necessity vs. a luxury, and that is actually really nice. But wow...the Internet. That hurt a bit. Free WI-fi isn't a thing here. I found it at the local library, so now I'm a library member which was another small step to feeling like I belong :) Before that, I did get really used to taking screenshots of websites with information I needed for later. Gotta get creative.

I also consistently battled with two feelings for a couple weeks....there was a part of me that wanted to just get out and explore, and another that felt so hesitant. I never really figured out why I was hesitant, being that I was so excited to be here, but now I'm in the comfort zone of living in Ely so it has passed. I guess anxiety of the unknown can be sort of powerful.

Oh, there is the day I really wanted some rubbing alcohol to clean a cut. Yeah, they don't have that here. I could have gotten some huge bottle of antiseptic...but I just wanted some rubbing alcohol. Such a simple thing, right? Dave got some on base that day.

I will say, to this day, having access to base is pretty amazing. We didn't want to live on base because there are so many other cool places to live and we wanted to experience England. But when I do find myself on base about once a week, I feel....comfort.  It's where you can get a lot of things you can't find locally (Jen in Germany-don't hate;-). It's fun trying local products, but it's nice knowing you can get some rubbing alcohol if you need because everything else is new and different and you just want what you know.

Of course at the end of the day for most of January, there was the comfort of sitting on the floor of the empty living room with the dogs and drinking wine with Dave out of red Solo cups.  That's kind of how we ended our time in Kansas.

The dogs are settling in just fine.

We love it in Ely and have made some great friends. And we had a great time in London, our first trip! TBC. But here is a fun one.