First Long Weekend

This was our first long weekend here and its still not over.

Saturday!

Was quite an eventful day. Friday evening it all started with me getting tickets for New Forest National Park. The tickets allowed us to board any train anytime so obviously there were no alarms ringing in the morning. Finally woke up at 9 and was ready by 10 15 or so. Then it was time to cook and it turned out that we just missed the bus to Airport station. That meant that we had to wait for 1 more hour. Reached station right on time and boarded UK train for the first time. Trains were nice and quite different from Indian trains.. It was a seater car and the environment was similar to what we find in a 2nd AC compartment of Indian Rail.
New Forest was about 20 mins journey from Southampton. The feel of the forest was evident from the natural beauty we could see around us! After getting down at Ashurst Station we had to walk and walk and walk...
Walked for about 2 hours in one direction.. A nice walkway was clearly visible even in the dense vegetation. Some other tourists were walking too.. Was a wonderful experience to walk through nature literally! Saw many things on the way like camp sites, huge pasture lands, infinite horses grazing on them, hundreds of varieties of different flowers, small bushes, tall and dwarf trees, some huge trees too.. Went into 3-4 different woods altogether.. But due to the routine sighting a good tree/flower and taking a pic near it became boring we decided to turn back after 2 hours. Walked back through the same way, clicked few more snaps and returned to Ashurst Station before time for the train.
It was quite chill weather and found a shade to sit down on station. Also went around in the small village and general window shopping a bit.
Return train was right on time and i got down 1 stop before the destination. Picked up some stuff needed for cooking and returned in bus to hostel after 2 hours or so...

Overall it was a nice experience, but could have been better if more number of animals were involved in the whole story. But anyways, ditch.. a walk totally memorable...

pics are uploaded at
http://picasaweb.google.com/tejaskulkarni

Sunday!

Slept quite late Saturday night and hence again no alarms on Sunday. Finally woke up at 10 45 and then it was pretty much usual business. It was a very cold day. Perhaps the coldest since i have been here. It had been raining all morning and into the afternoon too...
Cooked Alu Gobi today and it was really tasty! Loved it! Due to misjudgement, it was left over for night too! Nice! :-)
In the afternoon the idea that i am going to London tomorrow suddenly struck me. All shops get closed at 5 on Sunday and i really needed an Umbrella for London trip. It was already close to 2 30! Hurried to the city centre and even returned before 3 30!!
After this it has been quite an uneventful day. Have done some work and wasted time too.. Nevertheless, the bbc says that weather in London is improving and the forecast has changed from heavy rains to light rain!!! Yay!

Really looking forward for tomorrows trip.. Have to wake up quite early so will shut down now..

About London in next post! London Baby! :D