February 4, 2012

Country walk time!

Greetings from Lullingstone

So there’s this guy…he’s sweet and kind and good.  I am in love with him.  His name is Brother Chittock.  He’s the one who organizes us and assigns us to our different wards around London.  He also gave us a fireside our first weekend about how important our callings are here an how to interact with the wards.  He promised to take us on his famous “Chittock Walk” around the Lullingstone countryside on a coming weekend.  Basically everyone wanted to go, but after the freezing experience we had at Oxford basically everyone wussed out except for 7 of us.  7 brave, good, valiant, dedicated, trustworthy, talented, worthy, clever girls.  We put on layers and layers of clothes, as snow was said to be on the forecast, and met Brother Chittock at the designated location.  He was there with his two brothers, his son (and his wife and son and his son’s two friends), an American man from his ward who’s here working for the Olympics, and another member from his ward.  We set off with high spirits and tight pants, as we had layered on several pairs of tights under our pants.  I now know what I would look like if I gained 18 pounds just in my legs.  Not attractive.

Standing next to ruins from an ancient castle on the walk.
Yes, it looks like I have no neck because of my dumb scarf.

This was right next to the ancient castle

                The walk was about ten miles through stunning countryside.  It was pretty chilly, but not too bad because we were moving a lot.  It was fantastic being with a group of natives to take us around and show us all the nature.  I loved hearing the brothers banter with each other (Brother Chittock kept razzing his brother who was leading, telling him if he led us up another hill then he’d have to carry Brother Chittock all the way).  They taught us cockney slang (“daisy roots”=boots, “jam jar”= car), gave us the history of the area, quizzed us on American history (which we kinda failed at I’m embarrassed to say, cause they asked us really obscure questions.  And we fulfilled the stereotype of dumb Americans who don’t even know their own country beautifully), and laughed at our enthusiasm and our constant picture-taking.  They took us by miles of lilac fields, and I wish I could say it looked beautiful and all purple, but the lilacs were out of season.  And we found out that they won’t be in season until July.  It feels like I really came at the wrong time of year to England, cause everything is under construction, closed, or not in season.  Fail, England.  It was still a fantastic walk and one of my favorite things I’ve done so far here.  Our tour guides were fantastic, it was great to be in a small group for once, the countryside was stunning, and it was great to see a part of England that we would never have been able to see.

Miles and miles of grassy hills

Best part of the walk- throwing rocks at the ice alongside the banks.
One of the brothers started collecting rocks for me to throw at the ice.  Sweet guy.

Too bad it's all basically dead and gross winter...

During July this will all be beautiful lilacs

Ugh, don't look at this picture.  This is what it will look like when I'm gone.
I seriously picked the wrong time of year.

Second coolest tree I've ever met.

When I asked our guides what these particular beasts were called, they informed me that these are
"highland cows."  Then they proceeded to point out a group (flock?  herd? nesting?  gathering?) of geese
and informed me that they were "highland geese" and the bees were "highland bees."
I'm glad I could be so entertaining to them.

I guess these are exotic "highland sheep"...

Just LOVE open fields.  Well done, England.

So I'm not sure if I like the powerful standing pose...

Or the matronly sitting pose...so I decided to include both...

The trees were just starting to bud.

You have NO idea how many takes it took to finally get me in the air.
I hope you fully appreciate it.

Lots of streams along the way (for me to throw rocks into and try stepping on the ice on the banks.
I ended up with muddy boots and slightly soaked socks...)

Too bad it snowed 5 inches that night in London or it would have been a perfect day.  I hate you, snow.