Hello there dear followers! I hope that you all had a lovely Christmas! Happy New Year too! I’m determined to get back on track with regular blogging in 2023 and what better way to start than with the annual “travel roundup” post?
I’ve managed to bash one out every year over the past few years, so if you’re interested in giving those a read I’ll link the posts below:
2017: Travel roundup
2018: A travel round-up
2019 travel roundup
2020 travel roundup
2021 travel roundup
Anyway, onwards to 2022! I actually offered a rare half-year post this year so some of you will already know what I got up to in the first six months of 2022 but for the rest of you, fear not because I’ll do a little recap right now to catch you up!
A wedding in Washington State – March & April
The first trip of the year was the big one! After postponing our September 2021 wedding we moved it to April of 2022 and so come March I was ready to head over and finally get married!
Covid restrictions added a new level of problems for travel planning over the last two years but having Covid restrictions wreak havoc with a wedding trip? Yeah, that’s stressful! I’d avoided Covid entirely for two years so I was waiting for the inevitable, something to go wrong just before I flew out to Washington.
Fortunately my immune system held out for two months and I didn’t catch Covid for another couple of months. I was good to go!
I will write about the trip in more detail at a later date but the wedding went swimmingly. It was a great day and absolutely a highlight of 2022. All the waiting and stress beforehand was worth it and as much as I’ve always loved a wedding, enjoying your own is another level of joy that I can’t really explain.
10/10 – would do again (same bride.. don’t worry, jeez.)
Honeymooning in Oregon – April
The uncertainty of Covid traveling, plus the cost of a wedding meant we only really planned a small break after the wedding. We decided we’d head from Walla Walla out to Portland for a few days and hopefully squeeze in a little time at the coast too.
Alas we made our Westbound drive and the weather took a turn. The rain was hammering down with rain on our drive to Portland and sure enough the next morning we woke up to snow – not quite what we’d planned for!
We made the best of the weather and enjoyed our first few days of married life! We extended our trip hoping to end the week with better weather and luckily it paid off – ensuring we got to enjoy a sunny day on the Oregon coast.
Again, I’ll delve in to this part of the trip in much more detail in a future blog post but it was a lovely break despite the weather and nice to experience some new things in Oregon.
Idaho or no? – April
On the 9th of April myself and Haleigh finally got married in Walla Walla, Washington! On the 30th of April Haleigh’s cousin Michelle got married down in Salt Lake City (ish), Utah!
One month – two weddings – three weeks apart!
The problem for me was my intentions for our wedding was to arrive in Washington two weeks before the wedding and leave two weeks after. A second wedding so soon but not soon enough in some respects made for some tricky travel planning – keeping in mind that I was employed full-time.
Haleigh and family were planning to drive down from Washington but the timing of the Utah wedding gave me a tricky dilemma. Do I try my luck at getting five weeks off work? Do I even want five weeks off work for one trip? What about the rest of the year?
Joining Haleigh’s family for a roadtrip had its pros and cons, flying back to England only to return again so soon also had its pros and cons. Decisions, decisions..
The only certainty was that I was going to this Utah wedding. The logistics of how to do that was the only complication but one way or another I was going to Utah. In the end I decided that I’d fly home on the 23rd of April and then fly back to Utah (via Denver) on the 28th of April in time for the wedding.
Alas, come the 22nd of April I discovered that British Airways had kindly delayed my flight by 18 hours! The consequence of which meant a massive headache and the likelihood that I wouldn’t be getting back to England until the 25th. I considered my options and had a long and frustrating conversation with British Airways which went roughly along the lines of “this is your problem mate. Why are you (the customer) only letting us (the airline) know about our delayed flight at the last minute? Where’s your crystal ball?”
There aren’t enough words to describe my anger for British Airways in that moment. I can accept cancellations, delays, blah blah blah but BA’s willingness to throw the blame back upon me in addition to the lack of desire to find a solution did not sit right with me and left quite a sour taste for a while (I’m over it, honest..).
After much deliberation and back-and-forth I decided to extend my trip and stay in the USA for two further weeks (having to work Stateside) so long story short – roadtrip!
So a change of plans and an opportunity to see a new state! We broke up the drive and spent a night in Twin Falls, Idaho – a nice little town with, you guessed it, waterfalls! We obviously didn’t spend much time looking around but it seemed a nice enough town and we made sure to see Shoshone Falls before leaving too. It’s very pretty!
A wedding in Utah – April
Myself and Haleigh talked about visiting Utah a couple of times in the past. Firstly on my big 3-0 trip as we contemplated driving to San Fran via Salt Lake City. In the end we decided it was too much to do in too little time.
Two years later I met Michelle and David for the first time and we had a lovely Valentine’s Day double-date in Washington. They’re the loveliest couple and we agreed that we’d come down and see them over the 2020 Easter break. Yeah, 2020..Ā Needless to say, that didn’t happen either!
So third time lucky! I was excited to finally visit Utah and specifically Salt Lake City. It felt long overdue and I was particularly excited to see Michelle and David get married – our April anniversary buddies!
We weren’t in town for long and much of that was spent catching up with Haleigh’s family and then of course the wedding itself. The wedding was lovely. I’m such a fan of weddings so an outdoor wedding in a state as pretty as Utah certainly ticked the right boxes – it was a lovely day!
I have to say Salt Lake City was a nice surprise too. We were so busy with family stuff that we didn’t see much of the city or the downtown area but there was just something about it that was endearing. This was the USA in all its glory but with 360 degree mountain views.Ā It left an impression on me and I couldn’t shake the feeling that this had the potential to be one of my favourite American cities – despite seeing so little of it. I can’t explain it! We returned to Washington at the end of the weekend but Salt Lake City and Utah had not disappointed.
Back to Washington – May
So from Utah it was back to Washington for a little longer. It was nice having that little bit more time with Haleigh, although extending my stay did mean I had to work remotely at the end of my trip – not ideal working UK time on a PST timezone!
However we made the best of the extra time. We even squeezed in an overnight trip to see our friends in Pullman which meant I swapped working in Haleigh’s kitchen for this pretty AirBnB view in Pullman – it was nice watching the sun rise in the peaceful early hours!
We headed back to Walla Walla for the final couple of days. After six weeks myself and Haleigh were finally parting! The immigration process had begun but I probably wouldn’t be returning to Washington until Thanksgiving..
Washington State, again – June
Oh.. Maybe a little sooner than Thanksgiving then. This wasn’t the plan, I hadn’t intended to come back and certainly not so soon but you can only hear “How’s married life?” so many times before wanting to rip your ears off.
That was undoubtedly the question of 2022 and it probably wasn’t helped by having as long as six weeks together but I think by the end of May I was already sick of being apart.
A lack of annual leave meant it was going to be a short and sweet visit but I decided that I’d go and surprise Haleigh and visit Walla Walla for her mid-June birthday. A wonderful idea in theory, in reality Haleigh was talking about heading out of town for the weekend and spending time with friends.
So I came clean. I didn’t really fancy a surprise trip to see my wife if my wife wasn’t actually going to be in town! The trip flew by far too quickly but it was nice getting to spend a bit more time together. I also squeezed in a few hours in Seattle which was lovely!
Hopefully the next time we’d be seeing eachother would be when that pesky visa comes through (HA!) and we’dĀ finally be together!
Newcastle – May
Alright, let’s go back a step! In-between Washington trips I went up North for a weekend. My friend Sarah was celebrating her 30th birthday and that was a great excuse for a weekend away!
The 30th birthday celebrations were in a small town called Northallerton which I contemplated for all of five seconds before deciding it’d be better to base myself elsewhere. Excluding watching Spurs hungover at St James’ Park I’ve never really spent any time in Newcastle so decided I was going to visit the land of the Geordies for a weekend.
The birthday celebrations were wonderful. Sarah had hired an Abba tribute band to play and keep us entertained with Abba tunes all evening which was a fun way to celebrate.
Getting to explore Newcastle was an added bonus to the trip. On my first morning I met up with a fellow travel blogger – Sam – who along with her husband Adam were great hosts and it was so nice to finally meet up.
Newcastle itself is a cracking city too. I quickly fell in love with it. It’s easy romanticising anywhere on such a short visit but it instantly felt like one of those “I could live here” kind of cities. It was 100% my kind of city and that was without even really enjoying the Newcastle nightlife that its renowned for. I highly recommend a visit and it’s somewhere I’m certain to return to.
Sheffield – July
As many of you will know, football happens to be one of my biggest passions and it just so happens that this summer England were hosting the women’s European Championship.
Women’s football is rapidly growing in England and as soon as tickets went on sale I applied, blindly, to go to a couple of the games. There were two considerations for any games I wanted to apply for. Either they had to be weekend fixtures or they had to be accessible midweek games (London).
I looked at the various weekend games being played throughout the course of the tournament and contemplated which location tickled my fancy most. In the end I decided I’d go and spend a weekend up in Sheffield, visit Bramall Lane for the first time and watch teams C1 & C2.
I’d blindly booked tickets without knowing which teams were competing at the time so it was pot luck. More than anything I was keen to support the tournament and visit a new stadium in the process. As it was the game ended up being the Netherlands vs Sweden so two of the better teams in the tournament and two of the most colourful fanbases too with their orange and yellow shirts on display across the stadium.
The weekend was pretty much all focused on football and friends. Two of my friends (Hayden and Jenny) moved up from Peterborough to Sheffield a while ago and it was the perfect excuse to meet up with them. Ironically Hayden was actually down in Peterborough for the weekend but Jenny was kind enough to give me the grand tour of Sheffield on my first morning in the city. It was nice catching up and seeing a little of Sheffield in the process.
Later in the day I met up with my friend Natalie who was pretty much touring the country throughout the tournament and pretty much attending all of the games, or as many as physically possible (there were some games played at the same time). We had a few drinks and had a good catch before heading off to the ground where I reunited with Sarah and her dad.
All in all it was a fun weekend seeing a mixture of friends and enjoying a few beers along the way.
The land of dinosaurs – July-September
Well, I don’t know that this really counts as part of a travel roundup but some of you will recall I had a busy summer volunteering over at Peterborough Cathedral.
Peterborough Cathedral were hosting a T-Rex exhibit featuring many life-sized dinosaurs in their beautiful cathedral. An unusual setting to say the least and certainly raised questions about the relationship between god and dinosaurs but it was a bloody cool experience to be a part of.
I didn’t even leave my home town but mentally I was transported to another world that resembled something out of Jurassic Park with roars echoing off the cathedral walls. So many visitors came and enjoyed the exhibit and it’s one of the best things I did this year so couldn’t forego mentioning it. I blogged about it a little halfway through the experience (link above) but I loved it and I believe they have something just as exciting lined up in 2023. Watch this space!
De-Sa-lou? – October
Oh forgive the terrible pun WordPress but I could not help myself! For the most-part I’m pretty good at remembering where in the world I’ve visited but I’ve never been fully convinced on where in Spain we went to on a school trip back in 2002.
Don’t get me wrong, I remember enough about the trip that I’m 90% certain it was Salou. We visited the “famous” Portaventura theme park, we took a trip to Barcelona and saw the Camp Nou and La Sagrada Familia and a few other things. I remember wandering down to the beach from our accommodation and it being a quick and easy walk.
It was a fun week away in Spain but nevertheless I don’t exactly remember where we stayed and I’ve always been of the belief that it was Salou. All of the evidence stacks up that way anyway.
Fast forward twenty years and I was invited on a friend’s stag do away in Europe – a weekend in Salou! Instantly I had a feeling of de-ja-vu – I’ve been there before, right?
Anyway, as far as the plans were concerned.. the timing that they wanted to book the trip wasn’t the greatest – right before I was due to get married so I bowed out of a group booking and said I’d sort myself out later in the year. True to me word I did that and the result was I ended up going for a day longer than most of the group.
I’ll eventually do a trip about the post but I’m sure you have a general idea of how things went. Simplistically put it was a few days of sunshine and many beers.
I’m still none-the-wiser if Salou was where I went in 2002. I’m convinced that it was but it was unrecognisable on this trip so who knows?
Salou itself was nice. Very touristy and by touristy I mainly mean catered towards Brits who want a cheap and boozy weekend away in “Spain”. There are an endless number of English-speaking pubs and restaurants to take your pick from and I dare say we visited our fair share.
For a relaxing break / stag do it was perfect but if you’re wanting an authentic Spanish experience it’s perhaps not the top Spanish destination to visit.
Another wedding in Virginia – October
I know! A third international wedding! A third on US soil and another new state to visit! It’s a good job I love a wedding, eh?
My friend Shay invited me (and Haleigh) out to her wedding in Virginia and, again, as if I’d possibly refuse such an opportunity! I was 100% committed to going, the only uncertainty was whether we could find a way for Haleigh to join us.
Unfortunately we couldn’t make it work and Haleigh wasn’t able to attend so in the end I went anyway and rocked up solo for my third US wedding of the year!
This time the venue was a cosy house in Fincastle which coincidentally happened to be run by a fellow Brit! It was a lovely venue, wonderful to see Tony and Shay get married and also great to finally meet in person. Definitely another highlight of the year!
Roanoke – October
The wedding was in a tiny town called Fincastle. The nearest city was a place called Roanoke which I’ll admit I knew little about prior to meeting Shay. I wasn’t entirely sure where I wanted to base myself for the trip and pondered spending a bit more time in DC or elsewhere but in the end I committed to spending a few days in Roanoke and a couple of days in DC.
Roanoke was a pleasant surprise. It’s situated in a beautiful part of the state so I had mountain views from my lovely AirBnb downtown. The whole downtown area was entirely independent too. Independent shops, independent restaurants, coffee shops, bars, breweries..
No Starbucks, no McDonald’s, none of the big-name brands you know are situated anywhere within the downtown area. It was wonderful!
Again I had to work remotely a couple of days whilst I was in Roanoke which wasn’t ideal and meant that I didn’t do too much in the city but it was a great place to relax, check out a few breweries and just find joy in this adorable little city.
Washington DC – October
For this entire trip I weighed up where to base myself. I wasn’t sure if Roanoke would be interesting enough to spend my entire time, plus I couldn’t fly there directly anyway so I had to fly in to somewhere else.
DC was the city that seemed most obvious, however I’d been to DC before so had to consider whether visiting somewhere new might be more tempting. Alas DC was much cheaper to fly to and made a lot more sense logistically so I committed to a couple of nights in DC.
Fortunately I think DC is one of the most underrated cities in the US and I was keen to see a little more this time around. On my first trip I’d been sick through most of my stay and the warm weather meant I was quite keen to just do outdoorsy things on that occasion. I missed out the many museums that DC is famous for.
I already had a real fondness for DC and I think a return only really cemented those feelings further. It is a fantastic city, easily one of my favourites within the US. I visited some new neighbourhoods, ,visited some of those museums I’d missed first time around, checked out some new restaurants, met up with some friends on one of my evenings there and just loved my time in the city.
DC’s one of those places that I always thought that I probably would visit but never had any real desire to and I’m so pleased to say that I was 100% wrong to underestimate it. I fully recommend a trip and I’ve no doubt it’s somewhere I’ll go back to with Haleigh one day.
Another Thanksgiving, another Washington visit – November
and from one Washington (DC) to the other (Washington State), it was back to Washington again in November.
I love having an extra holiday to celebrate each year and escaping England in a cold, dark and dreary November is an added bonus. I don’t think I’d care for Thanksgiving so much if it was in I don’t know, let’s say July. Thanksgiving is a good mood-builder in the run up to Christmas and the festivities.
Due to visa issues, which are finally sorted!!, I hadn’t actually seen Haleigh since June. I was so short on annual leave that I couldn’t make a trip to Washington work and she wasn’t able to travel overseas due to the ongoing visa stuff so it had been a long time apart before reuniting for the holidays.
We didn’t do anything particularly special, Haleigh was sick for the first half of the week I was there and the second half of the week was occupied with family stuff for Thanksgiving but it was nice to spend some time together, eat food, catch up with family and just spend a little time in Washington.
I even managed to meet up with a friend from nearby Union Gap which was long overdue. News of my visit even made it in to local news – I’m now a Yakima / Union Gap celebrity! Maybe..
Overall it was a lovely week away. My only real gripe about the trip was that Alaska Airlines have cut their route from two services a day to one which wreaked havoc with my plans.
Firstly, I couldn’t actually get to Walla Walla on the day I arrived in Seattle which meant flying to a different airport a little further away.
I had no such trouble going the other way but they scrapped the early morning flight from Walla Walla to Seattle. Ordinarily I get half a day’s exploration in Seattle, such as I’d done in June earlier in this year but on this occasion I only had a four hour layover which wasn’t worth leaving the airport for.
I think they do intend to bring the second service back but it was bitterly disappointing to miss out on any time in Seattle on this trip. It’s part of my “heading home” routine usually and I did feel a little glum that I’d missed out on this particular trip.
2023 plans?
I hate to end any blog post on a downer so lets look ahead at what I have planned for 2023.
Honestly, not much..
I’m flying out to Washington at the end of January, Haleigh will finally be moving to England so I’m flying over there to help her move some of her things over. No more long-distance – hurrah!
I think one of Haleigh’s cousins is getting married in the summer so we’ll likely make another trip back to Washington in the summer. I also think we’ll probably make a third trip later in the year around the holidays so Washington will again likely dominate the travel plans for a lot of the year.
However beyond Washington I would honestly just want to go somewhere that isn’t the USA at this point. I love the place but it has dominated my travel a bit too much in recent years. I stretched my luck a bit this year and somehow managed to pack in nearly 10 weeks in the USA from just six weeks of annual leave (am I a magician?) but it left little time to go anywhere else. I was pleased to at least visit three new states this year (Idaho, Utah & Virginia) but I’d really like to spend some time in other parts of the world.
I don’t know that it’ll happen this year but I’m also really keen to step foot on some new continents. Africa, Asia and South America are calling my name. I’ve seen a lot of the US, a lot of Europe but the other continents continue to allude me. I’m very, very tempted to book a short trip to Morocco this year.
My final hope is to get back to Finland. I need to look in to it a little more but I’m quite keen on the idea of going there for my birthday in August. I grew up living with a Finnish grandmother who I also shared a birthday with and so it’s a day that I’ll forever think of Finland – I think to be in Finland on that day would be special but that’s just an idea at this moment in time.
Anyway, thanks for indulging me and my ramblings WordPress! I’ll write about each of these trips in more detail at some point and hopefully I’ll be a little more active in 2023.
Happy New Year!
Jason
Jason likes to travel 