Last days in England

After a stressful day trying to sort out residency and all that jazz in Norway I've decided its the last thing I wont to blog about. I am therefore going to go back in time and touch on my last few days in England as I was too busy to actually right about it at the time.

The last few days in England were surprisingly unstrange, despite packing and leaving Chester, saying goodbyes etc etc it really hadn't sunk in what I was doing. Everything had happened so fast over the last few months there hadn't been time to think about it. This was kind of deliberate as we had just wanted to get out there and settled as soon as we could. 

Saying goodbye to everyone wasn't even particularly sad if I'm honest. I'd been living away from home for 4 years at Uni so I didn't see most people very often and the point which I kept trying to sell to everyone was that the trip to Bergen wasn't that different in length and cost to a trip upnorth to where I was at Uni anyway. Ok its a fair bit more hassle but from where I grew up, its an hour or so to a the airport, a two hour flight, followed by like half an hour from the airport to where we are living in Bergen. In fact if you take out the tedious waiting around the airport the time spent travelling is actually shorter. This is of great comfort to me, I think I would feel a lot more edgy I think if it cost me hundreds of pounds and half a day or more on a plane if I needed to get home.

My advice to people I think would be if your considering a big move, just go for it, don't think about it too much as if your like me you wont be able to truly imagine it anyway just make the decision and go. People were so happy for me and in many cases very jealous. Lots of people I spoke to wished they had an opportunity like the one I was presented with and considered me very brave for taking it. Personally I don't think I've been brave, I didn't want to be anywhere in particular, I just wanted to be with Marianne, and she wanted to be in Bergen. I'd been their, I knew it was lovely, everyone I'd met had been great and every statistic I could lay my hands on seemed to suggest Norway is like the best place in the world for raising a family. It was an easy decision!

I love England, and there are things I miss already and many things I always will and when the plane left the ground at Gatwick airport 8 days ago I was full of strange feelings and emotions. But none of them were regret, and when I touched down in Norway and when I wake up every day, I am a happy man. What more could one ask for. 

On one my last days in England we all went to the New Forest for a hike. Perfect day out to see some beautiful English country side.

Feeding some of the famous wild horses of the New Forest

A cow had gotten out of a field onto the public path and was rather distressed. We all teamed together to herd her back in. (I really hope it was into the right field)

I think I may have been a little half cut at this point but this picture is from my Leaving bash in Basingstoke and nicely shows the decorating by my Mum of a centre photo of me and Marianne with the English flags coming out from my side and the Norwegian ones from here. It was very thoughtful and went down a treat. Maps were also laid out so people could work out where in the world Norway and more specifically Bergen actually was, not unsurprisingly most didn't have a scooby do.