Many people spend their entire lives dreaming of traveling the world and seeing different cultures. I’ve been lucky enough to finally get the option to travel and visit different places in southern England. I got to see a different culture, see beautiful historical landmarks, and visit museums around topics that have always intrigued me.
Before this trip, I’d never actually left the United States. Loving history and being pagan, England has always been on my bucket list of places to visit. Being able to stand in locations that have existed for thousands of years was a dream come true. The United Kingdom is absolutely breathtaking and having the opportunity to spend 5 months there made me so excited that I have the chance to move there.
So where all did I visit and what did I do? I got to meet my future in-laws, meet some of my fiance’s friends as well as sightseeing. A couple of things that I managed to do? I got to see Stonehenge, Bath, and London.
As a pagan, I’ve always wanted to see historical spiritual locations and Stonehenge has always been at the top of my list. In fact, the stones were one of the first places I wanted to see.
On the day we went it was extremely windy but we still decided to walk to the stones. There was an option to bus along the road, but I wanted to see the landscape. They told us that it was a half-hour walk, but I am pretty sure that it was longer than that.
When we got up to them, my god it was amazing. I felt a wave of calm come over me as soon as I saw them. My fiance even said that my content was very clearly visible. I was all smiles and the location felt so romantic that I couldn’t help but show him affection. We spent a little bit just cuddling on the pathway while looking at the stones with me explaining some of the history I knew about them.
I actually had not heard of this location before but upon seeing a picture I knew I had to visit. There wasn’t any doubt in my mind and it suddenly became a place up there with Stonehenge that I couldn’t leave England without seeing.
Standing in a structure that was built thousands of years ago was incredible. With how young the United States is the oldest buildings we have is only a few hundred years old. That’s still incredible mind you, but being able to touch a building constructed in 70 AD was mind-blowing.
This location also held a little surprise when I arrived. Seeing that they had a statue of a Goddess, I became excited to see her. Being spiritual and loving history seeing a true Roman statue of a goddess had me excited and it was one of the first things that I pointed out to my fiance.
And here she is.
She’s only a head as when the Roman empire was taken down she was broken into three pieces and hidden. They’ve located her head and hope to find the rest of her body at some point, however, it’s very likely she’s buried under the buildings in Bath, unlikely to ever be found again. Due to this as glorious as she was, it was painful to find out that the statue housed there was actually my Matron Goddess (Athena/Minerva) and she’s been reduced to nothing but a head.
Within Bath, I also learned they had a Frankenstein Museum. I am a massive fan or horror so after visiting the baths we decided to swing by it to see what it held. We did the escape room and failed it. We did three escape rooms in total during my 5 months in England and this one was by far the worst.
I did however get to see what Frankie was intended to look like and he’s nothing like the green monster we’ve come to know and love.
London was an interesting trip, to say the least. It was both the first time that I’d ever taken a train somewhere and also the very first time I’d had something stolen directly from my person.
Our trip to London was meticulously planned out. On our roster were The London Dungeon, The Saw Experience (my favourite horror movie), Madame Tussauds Wax Museum, The London Eye, and visiting a few landmarks like Buckingham Palace. Sadly I had more landmarks I wanted to see but it didn’t turn out that way.
The London Dungeon was probably my favourite spot and I can’t wait to visit it again. It was so interactive and educational. It was also quite funny to be the one they constantly pulled from the crowd to participate and seeing my fiance grow annoyed when one of the actors tried to get my number. He became slightly territorial making his presence known as well as the fact I was spoken for.
It was after this visit that my phone was stolen from me, leading to an unexpected bill in order to replace it. We had meant to go to the wax museum right after but spent that time instead hunting for my phone. We looked for about an hour but clearly had no luck.
The London Eye while gorgeous was extremely disappointing. On my visit they packed way too many people into the pods, creating a bit of a fight to the windows to be able to see the landscape. I still managed to get some fantastic pictures, though.
Obviously, The Saw Experience was fantastic. Just so good. It’s put on by Lionsgate so the immersion is spot on. It was honestly like being right inside the actual movie. With that said the puzzles were often broken or not up to par with other escape rooms that we’ve done. Not their fault, though. It opened in October and we went in November. It’s brand new. They need time to grow. We absolutely plan to revisit later to see what they’ve changed. Knowing I’m a superfan they took notes of my feedback so hopefully, they will make the changes I suggested.
Buckingham was also beautiful, though not at all like the movies. It was a lot smaller than I pictured in my head and maybe it was the time of year that I visited but there wasn’t much going on.
I honestly feel so lucky and fortunate to have been able to even visit the UK, let alone spend 5 months there. I feel even more privileged to have a real opportunity and chance to get to move and live there.
I absolutely loved my time there and I can’t wait to go back. My fiance keeps asking when I get to come home. Hopefully soon.
