2012: A year in travel - part 1

This title reminds me of the Twilight films - The Celia saga: Places I've been in 2012, part 1. No? Just me? Oh well.*

Anyway. The whole point of this here blog was to help me remember where I've been, what I did there and why I wanted to go in the first place. So. Here's a handy little summary to save me (and you, if for some reason you were ever interested enough in the first place) scrolling through a shit-ton of old posts to remember where I happened to be in April 2012...

January:

I kicked off the year in south London with a raging hangover (first meal of 2012? Brixton Burger King. S, I hold you firmly responsible for this...) and spent my last few days in England catching up with the beautiful Miss M, hanging out with London people and shivering under a pile of blankets before heading back to LA, sunshine and a January of general busyness and hard work.

It's possible my definition of 'hard work' is a little skewed...

In the name of work, I also flew up to San Francisco for the briefest of overnight stays. As I haven't been back since, there's very little I can tell you about it, apart from that I stayed in a really rather lovely hotel.

February:

I spent my birthday in Arizona on yet another overnight work trip. Yet again, while I can vouch for the general awesomeness of mashed potato bars and show you more pictures of pretty hotels, I can tell you absolutely sod all about Phoenix...

March: 

This is where things get a little bit more exciting, because my awesome friend B decided to fly over and hang out with me for a couple of weeks, and, as well as touring the sights (In n' Out is a sight, right?) of LA, we took a little jaunt down to San Diego, stopping en route in Temecula for a spot of wine tasting and more than a spot of cheese consumption:

Oh cheese. And other yummy things. How I love thee

We ambled and ate and drank our way around San Diego in beautiful sunshine.

And even crossed the border into Tijuana for a few hours, where, instead of spending a wild night drinking $1 margaritas and getting crazy on prescription meds (which is apparently what you're SUPPOSED to do in Tijuana) we wandered around in the middle of the afternoon, enjoyed a glass of beer and took photos of Mexican-looking things. Because we're wild like that.

April:

Of all the trips I took this year, I have to admit that my absolute favourite is probably one of the least exciting from an outside perspective. I flew back to England over Easter for my friend Jo's wedding, and went back to Cornwall for the first time in 15 years, with my family (sans brother) and two dogs in tow.

South Cornwall (and specifically the Fowey estuary) is, and always will be, one of my favourite places in the world, and it felt so special to be back there after such a long time, hang with my family, get to know my sister's boyfriend better and spend my days traipsing through the countryside and eating far too many scones.

The view from the car park. The CAR PARK, people.

Then I got to head back to Suffolk for a few days, spend a little bit of time with my favourite ladies and witness the incredible nuptials of these guys:

Next up: Part 2, in which I have a huge row with my mother while surrounded by giant trees, go to two more weddings and stay in a hotel with a TV in the bathroom mirror. I bet you can't wait...

*Not that I'm likening my year in any way to the antics of abstemious yellow-eyed vampires battling the wrath of Michael Sheen. Um.

Big skies

I spent my birthday this year travelling to and staying in Phoenix, Arizona, on a work trip.

Poor me, you might say (if you're really kind-hearted) - working on my birthday, away from home.

Nope.

This was my room:

It had a fully functional log fireplace, guys.

And a rather nice view.



And in the evening, there was a mashed potato bar.

It's possible you didn't quite comprehend the full significance of that first time around, so I'll repeat: A Mashed Potato Bar. With purple mash! And garlic mash! And toppings! And sour cream! And filet mignon to eat on the side.

Best birthday meal evah? Very possibly. Except there was no cake. That is something that needs remedying ASAP.

Anyway. I'm 28 now. I feel old. But Arizona was freaking gorgeous, and, as you can see above, somehow the skies there just seem very BIG in comparison with English ones. Anyone know why that is?

Road trippin'

As part of my campaign for November awesomeness, I've been on a little journey. Well, not so little - in the space of 40 hours, I managed to drive from LA to Vegas, to the Hoover Dam, to an extremely random In n' Out in Kingman, AZ - and then back to LA. It did mean one almost sleepless night, but it was completely, 100% worth it to see my amazing friends S and A, and get to hang out with them for as long as possible.

Plus who doesn't love a bit of loud, tuneless singing while driving along a desert highway?

I found Vegas a strange city - I think maybe I was just more in a frame of mind to have a huge catch-up session with people I hadn't seen for 7 months than to gamble/drink/fritter the night away in debauched fashion. It was definitely less glamorous than I'd expected - more filled with large people eating large amounts of fast food than with fast-living, poker playing, risk-takers. But we still had a great time, and I would have happily sat in the middle of a field for a day to spend time with S and A.

I had planned to head straight back to SoCal after my little Vegas stint, but the lure of a few more hours with friends, plus the promise of a board game (have I mentioned that a) I am hideously competitive and b) I freakin' LOVE board games?) sent me in completely the other direction, and off on a little jaunt to the Hoover Dam.

Which turned out to be surprisingly (to ignorant me) beautiful.

So that's how I've been spending my week - talking to my car like it's a human being, praising it for driving 600 miles without any glitches (it's almost 20 years old, folks, you don't know how proud I am of it), almost doubling the amount of states I've visited, and feeling UNBELIEVABLY lucky that in the time I've been out here, so many of my friends have made it out in this direction and found some free time to meet up with me.