Day 6 (continued) 9:14 PM, Brighton

I am sitting on the bottom bed of our bunk with my little book light making the ink from my pen shine. Meg is asleep in the bed above me. Directly across, in our tiny room, the window is wide open and I can here the waves from the ocean washing up onto the rocky beach. It has been a good day! I am in love with Brighton.

Our hostel is a mile and a half from the train station. We decided to splurge (and save our feet) and snagged a taxi. Something strange happened as we packed up our packs this morning. Some how they have grown in bulk and weight! What the. . . ! We are contemplating on what we can throw out. We have so little already; it is difficult to decide on what gets the boot. (or maybe it will actually be the boots!)

We are staying at the Sea Dragon Backpackers. It is a small hostel owned by a young couple who use to be backpackers themselves. They have settled down into this little niche and just had their first baby. He is adorable. The owners could not be nicer people. They are taking great care of us, especially the husband Glen. (Who Megahnn calls “Mr. Hottie” when he is (sort of) out of ear shot.)

Glen showed us to our room. Like I said before, it is tiny and a bit shabby. Meghann’s first introduction to Hostel living came complete with a used condom outside our window ledge! Which naturally leads to the next question, whose bed got all the fun? I am guessing it was mine . . . unfortunately. Gross! I had been hoping to ease Meghann into the backpacker’s life style a bit more gently!

We did a lot of walking today! We started with a mile walk along the beach while I tried to keep the tears at bay. (I have a thing for the ocean). We went to the Royal Pavilion that King George built centuries ago and dubbed, “The Pleasure Palace.” (That just made me think of that damn condom again!) We walked down Brighton Pier and feasted on fish and chips. Meg says she can’t wait to get home to show her friends how good salt and malt vinegar tastes on fish and fries. The pier is a bit cheesy but fun none the less. I let Meghann talk us into getting tattoos. . . (Ok, someone please pick Mom off the floor!) They are not real. Well, not really. They are the kind that fade after a month or two. I really do like mine. We are suppose to keep them dry for 24 hours so we have been keeping a nice layer of Vaseline on them.

We made the long walk back to the hostel and grabbed our dirty, sweaty clothes and spent the evening at the laundry mat. We went to the super market for dinner food and cooked it in the hostel kitchen. (After some trial and error on how to use European appliances.)

While at the laundry mat Meghann did a count of how many days we have left on the trip. She came up with nine and then burst into tears. “I don’t want to go home” she wailed.

I promised her there will always be more trips. “I am already planning the next one.” She assured me as her chin quivered.

The weather here has been incredible! Not on drop of rain since we got to England. I told Meghann to pack for cool weather and instead we are sweating and getting sun burnt! The lady at the laundry mat said that this is very strange weather for them. “Just enjoy it while it lasts. It will probably snow tomorrow.” We aren’t really enjoying it though. It’s so dang hot.