On the 6th of July at 9.45am I boarded the Stagecoach 685 bus service from Newcastle to Carlisle handing over my £2 fare, a bargain for a journey which is just under 60 miles and takes 2 and a half hours.  The Stagecoach local public transport bus had USB chargers and Wi-Fi although my phone signal was just fine on its own.  I settled in with my bottle of water and my book as we passed hills and fields on this rural service via Corbridge, Hexham, Haltwhistle and Brampton. My great bus adventure had begun.

I arrived in Carlisle just after noon where I immediately dived into a coffee shop to find out where my Instagram and Facebook followers had chosen to send me to next.  The choices were Keswick, Annan, Langholm and Cockermouth.  I wished hard for Keswick whilst I imagined a lovely weekend touring the Lake District but no, instead my followers chose to send me to Annan.  I jumped on the 79 to Annan and once again settled in as we crossed the border following a lovely rural route.

Annan is a small Scottish town right on the border, it was so quiet it was as if it was closed for the day but no, it has its own museum and a harbour although the harbour is currently not all that nice, do not despair though, it has been chosen for a massive regeneration programme and I hope this might bring tourists back to a town which seemed to me like it had seen better times.

I stayed at The Old Rectory, paying £55 for a double room including breakfast, and my whole day's travel and accommodation cost only £59, I immediately felt like I was onto something, I love to travel but I’m also forever on a budget so if I can find a hack to let me travel more at a lower cost then I am all over this scheme.

Now unfortunately there was a glitch.  You see, what I didn’t know was that Scotland isn’t participating in the £2 bus scheme so it would cost me £6.80 to get back to England, my followers did not mind and decided to keep me going on public transport in Scotland and I found out that Scotland has lots of day savers which makes travel just as cheap so the next day my travel from Annan - Dumfries - Moffat cost me just £7.30 and I could have travelled as much as I wanted that day for that price.  My B&B in Moffat, Rockhill B&B cost £85 including breakfast and honestly, although it was the most expensive B&B I stayed in, it was also the nicest.

Moffat is a charming Scottish town on the border of southwest Scotland and I adored it, there are so many well-sign-posted walks that you can do of varying distances. It’s also famous for its toffee so there are not one but two shops specialising in toffee and fudge, the biggest of which The Moffat Toffee Shop has more traditional sweets than I have ever seen anywhere.  I cannot recommend a trip to Moffat highly enough, it’s a gem of a town and don’t forget to visit the local museum.  Apparently, Merlin might have lived in Moffat for a time but then again he might also have not, I’ll let you make your mind up on that one.

After Moffat, I was feeling full of bravado and my final destination was chosen as Oban, somewhere I’d only spent 6 hours on a coach trip and wanted to explore more of but at that point, the trip fell apart.  I boarded the X74 to Glasgow and found the bus full of young people travelling to a festival.  The bus was too hot, too full and I’d forgotten to bring a bottle of water.  My anxiety started to flare up and by the time I reached Glasgow, I got off the bus, saw the crowds and decided there was no way I could do 3.5 hours more on a coach to get to Oban, even if it was only £24.

I looked for other options and jumped on the first train to Stirling costing £9.50 and taking just half an hour.  Whilst on the train I booked myself into the uni accommodation for a bargain £45.  most universities will let out space on campus over the summer but not all uni campuses are equal.  Stirling Uni has a loch and a castle and miles of sprawling countryside.  It also sits just below the Wallace monument, making for the prettiest photos.  

I didn’t get a chance to visit the Wallace monument this time, instead, I opted for Stirling Castle and I am so glad that I did, it’s got the most beautiful gardens for a castle and spending a few hours there really helped to calm me down.  I actually did over 20,000 steps that day and could have done more so just because you’ve had an anxiety attack does not mean you can’t go on to have a brilliant day.  I always carry CBD oil and gummies with me for those exact reasons.  6 months ago I couldn’t have even done the journey but thanks to CBD I’m almost functioning like an average human (in some respects).

On my last day, I opted to get home by the quickest method and as Scotland has highly subsidised train fares I managed to bag myself a first-class ticket for the bargain price of £45.

In August from the 9-16th I will be doing this all again, this time I will be sticking to England and there are some more details I’m looking forward to announcing as soon as the contracts are signed and the details are firmed up and I will write again when I have more details on a very exciting collaboration.

Some things I’ve learnt from my trip

Carry cash

Enjoy the slower pace

Take a phone charger and back up batteries

Travel as lightly as possible as there isn’t as much luggage storage on public transport

Plan your route in advance if you like safe travel, or just decide on the go if you are daring and love adventure.

and with that, there’s just one thing to say… onwards to the next great bus adventure where we’ll find out just how far the £2 bus scheme can take us.

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Let's start this again shall we?

You may remember me from previous blogs such as...

Yep, I haven't blogged for nearly a month for a variety of reasons - 

• I've shot a lot of weddings lately and in between shooting them, (often with smoke bombs) I've been a slave to editing and to all manner of portraits and client work.
• When Google+ closed its doors it slashed my traffic by around a third and that's hard, especially as a blogger who does occasional sponsored posts but I've given myself a talking to about why I started blogging in the first place and I still hope to be writing my scattered thoughts for the next decade or so.
• Abigail cut me out of her life because I shared a post about coercive control on Instagram and I still can't process it months later, being silent about any kind of marital or relationship abuse just leads to more abuse, we can only stop this stuff from happening if we talk about it.  I'll always be here for her and she knows that and that's all I can really say right now because I still can't talk about it without feeling my heart actually hurt.
• I went on holiday with Looby and Holly Bobbins and actually did no work whilst I was there, this is a rare occurrence for me.
• I started to live the slow life, I've spoken about this before but these days you will mostly find me in my garden.

So, a lot of things have happened and yet, nothing has really happened, just life.

The summer holidays are just around the corner and for the first time I'll be spending more time alone than ever before, Looby will be off with friends and horses for most of it and I haven't really worked out what I'm going to do with myself as yet.  Harriet finishes work on Friday and we're going away on the 28th to Cumbria and then a couple of nights near Aberystwith, all with wonder dog Holly Bobbins of course.

I was also trying to plan a one-woman trip to the highlands but coach companies are so complicated and it doesn't seem like I've been able to find one which works with the dates when I'm actually available.  I have been thinking about whether I can do a one-woman rail and Airbnb  (if you click that link you can join Airbnb and get £23 off your first trip and I'll get some credit towards my travels) trip to the highlands but it just depends on the price of rail tickets etc.

I really want to make the most of summer even if I'm childfree but for me, I'm still trying to process that my kids are older and the summer holidays aren't that magical thing they used to be.  I'm sure like Christmas I just need to redefine them for myself, I'm sure if I don't it will end up in knocking off my depression and that's not what I want at all.

What I need I think is some kind of grown-up summer holiday bucket list I can check off and live my best life but I think I'm currently going through some kind of mid-life crisis in all kinds of areas of my life.

One thing that is definitely happening, I campaigned for a community garden and it's happening with the help of the NCS (national citizen service) I cannot wait to help build a garden for my local community with the help of 15 or so enthusiastic young people.  The plan is to remove a massive box hedge and a boulder from a disused and nettle filled flower bed, then to put in herbs and bee attracting flowers as well as putting a park bench and maybe a picnic table, finally I want to get lots of outdoor toys for the local small ones and hold a big party in my community to really bring them together.  Hopefully, it's the start of something amazing and I've already pledged to contribute time and financially so much as I can.  After all, I believe that small scale philanthropy can change the world, I know I am imperfect but that doesn't mean that I can't do amazing amounts of good for the community.

Captains Log - Update 16615

It's been a week, as they say, I don't particularly think anything staggering happened, my attempts to "nail the crim" in the police identity parade were fruitless, I think I am never going to be a crime fighting superhero with tights.  Perhaps it's best to just stick to being a secret superhero after all.

I want to give a big online hug to my lovely friend Gill who's beloved beagle Tess went to the rainbow bridge last night, Holly and I send all of our love and we lit a candle last night to help her beautiful paws find that special bridge.

Last week contained a lot of working hard and not enough walking hard though I did get a new Fitbit Charge because I found when I wasn't wearing one I was even more of a lazy lump than usual, I did achieve wonders for Mandy Charlton Photography though, It's a funny thing isn't it but the harder you work the better results you'll get, heehee, I know this of course but I'm the queen of procrastination and so easily distracted so it's quite surprising that I have just about come to the end of my Ebay escapades, I have a couple more items and 1 more pair of Irregular Choice to list and then I am done, the amount of stuff we seem to have gotten rid of is actually noticeable, it's amazing the things you hang onto even if you don't need them.  I do still have far too many craft supplies but I brought a box upstairs last week to start listing them and I looked at them, muttered "ooh no, you're too pretty" and quickly put the lid back on the box.  Who know's, maybe my new and fabulous streamlined life and business will let me do some occasionally crafty things!  I think I have to be really strict with myself though and if I don't do any crafting in the next 3 months it's a definite sign that I need to let them go.

Looby and I are getting quite excited about our week in Edinburgh during the summer holidays, just over a month to go and I am searching for dog friendly things to do and places to go, if you're in Edinburgh and have any top tips where we should go with Holly then do let us know.  I will also have my cameras with me when I am in Edinburgh so if you are local or have friends and family who want beautiful natural photos please tell them to get in touch

Summer is nearly upon us, I can almost touch it, you can see the kids are tired and ready for the 6 week break, and one look at the teachers at school tells the exact same story, school is hard on small people and even harder on the hard working teachers, they truly all deserve the 6 week break.  I'm not sure what I'll do when my children don't go to school anymore, the school holidays have always been my holidays too and September is more of a new year for me than January is, maybe I need to get Holly into Beagle school, heehee!

I'll be back this week with several exciting posts yet to be written, cupcake making, teeny weeny cute photo books from Printrbook and I still haven't shared all of the lovely images from our Edinburgh half term trip yet, so many words and pictures so little time!

Summer holidays are here at last

Every July I get excited at the prospect of the girls breaking up from school for their summer holidays, when I first started my business I would take the whole 6 weeks off and then as my business grew I would just stop all admin and still do photo shoots and weddings but basically spend as much time as I could with my family and to this day I have kept it up, yes I am busier now than ever and combined with the travel for my book I'm not really at home very often but it means the girls get to travel with me (they take it in turns) and I still keep up with photo shoots and weddings but admin waits until they return to school in September.  I've been thinking this morning about parents with their own businesses and how it can be hard to take time off but I think for me family time has always come first and my clients know by now that my summer holidays belong to my family really.  I take very little time off at other times of the year so I think it's one small gift I've given myself since I started my business back in June 2007.

I am really busy with photo shoots at the moment and that's great, lots of families get together during the summer holidays and so if your friends and family are doing just that feel free to book me for a family portrait session.

I'm also travelling while writing my book and I am managing to catch up with families who want photo shoots with me all over the country, I have one booked in Manchester on Wednesday actually so wherever you are in the country, if you are near to a city then why not email me to see when I'll be in your city and arrange a portrait session for your nearest and dearest.

And here's just a few previews of some of the gorgeous families I've photographed lately.

I met this little one yesterday when I was doing some family portrait photography in Jesmond Dene, so cute and a love of Thomas the Tank!

I met these three little people last weekend when I did a quick family portrait session in Edinburgh, it's lovely having clients all over the country.

This one was so cute, love his pose, what a poppet, a great family portrait photo shoot on the beach at Tynemouth Longsands

The beach is also a great place to have a Maternity photo shoot

If you would like to book a kids, family, couples, maternity or anything else you can think of type of photo shoot then all you need to do is email me or contact me through my website or you can also find me on Facebook.

2 weeks in Puerto Rico, Gran Canaria

It's been a month since I last blogged Dear Reader, please forgive me for I have a very good reason, I've been on holiday!!

Yes for the first time in 13 years we had a 2 week family holiday to sunny Gran Canaria or as I like to call it 1987!!

Going to Gran Canaria is like re-visiting the 80's, not quite Blackpool but pretty touristy with a lot of Variety acts!

So here's a few photos from our trip and I should add that I didn't take my proper camera, for a couple of weeks I managed with my Samsung Galaxy camera which is actually quite a nifty little thing!

and so that was it, our holiday, 13 years in the making over in just 14 days which seemed to speed past us faster than we could blink.