England

We flew from Istanbul to London and our trip went through a bit of a metamorphosis. We returned to an English-speaking country, so a little less work for our brains in that respect. However, once we landed in London, we went straight to the rental car company to pick up our reserved car. H likes to drive so he has been prepared to drive us all over the U.K. and South Ireland over the next 3 months. While we were mentally prepared to drive on the opposite side of the road than the U.S., it was quite an adjustment. 45 years of experience of driving on the right side of the road and from the left side of the car... a true brain bender. I'll just say there were some tense moments!

Although we absolutely loved London when we visited in February, our itinerary did not include any time to stay again and we drove straight to the Cotswolds, spent a couple of days there, Bath, Newquay, and also in St. Ives.

There are so many adorable towns to visit in the Cotswolds. We just visited a few. Tons of photo opportunities, cafes, boutique shops, and beautiful, welcoming churches. If I lived and worked in London, I would definitely come here as much as possible to unwind and enjoy nature (if you go, be sure to look up some walks/hikes).

Bath. Something about Bath made us want to add it to our mental "visit again" list. I believe it would be a 2-hour train ride from London. Next time we visit, we'll delve into more of the history there such as the Roman Baths but this time we simply enjoyed walking around. Plenty to see, plenty of options for dining, and everyone seems to be in a good mood here (locals and visitors alike!).

We spent several days near the coast in Newquay and St. Ives. The temperatures were mild with many cloudy days. I was not upset by this at all as we just had a lot of sun in Greece. I did not need any more sunbathing beach days.

The World Cup started in North America while we were here. I got a kick out of social media posts of Europeans' experiences in America because we were making the same observations from over here. For example, the Europeans joke about the abundance of ice cubes and the concept of free drink refills. Meanwhile, we've joked about H's struggles to find ice cubes in most cities and how he is truly overjoyed when he finds a market that sells bags of ice or restaurants that will give him more than 1 or 2 cubes in his glass.

I've noticed since we left home that I have a hard time finding in the markets a sugar-free, caffeine-free soft drink. And then I saw a social media post from a European in America who was in amazement walking down the soda aisle and the abundance in selection of soft drinks (How many different Dr. Pepper flavors do we need?!).

And... admittedly there were a couple of days (we were here in the month of June), that I missed air conditioning. The Europeans in America were remarking how wonderful it is that air conditioning is everywhere in the U.S.

I also saw on social media that someone said that "the World Cup is just the U.S. having a giant sleepover with the cousins we never get to see because our parents hate each other." I loved that comparison!

There are a lot of things the Europeans do WAY better than Americans but I won't go into that now. I was just glad to hear that so many were enjoying their North American visit!

From St. Ives, we will left England to visit Wales for about 2 weeks then returned to England (Liverpool and Manchester) before heading to Scotland.

In Liverpool and Manchester, our theme was MUSIC! In Liverpool, we took a Beatles tour, visited The Cavern Club, a Beatles museum, and Beatles statues. And as soon as we arrived in Manchester, we visited the Salford Lads Club. We weren't the only people visiting and taking photographs posing like The Smiths' album cover from 1986... yes, from 40 years ago!

We met music fans of all ages from all over the planet. It's impressive that bands from 40-60 years ago can still today bring strangers together. And SPORTS - with regard to the World Cup this year. Nice to see and experience that in a time when the state of the world and things that divide us are so pronounced.