It was only last summer, why do I feel like it’s almost forever ago? I had this feeling so strongly that I decided to edit this post’s photos in a nostalgia faded away feeling. I always liked something “long ago” and “far away”. I must say I quite like how they turned out and I hope you can enjoy them too.

 

– I got a sunburn in England! –

Just a quick 45 mins train ride away, we are out from exciting London to England’s most loved seaside city Brighton.

I never thought that I would get a sunburn in England, unheard of right? Or is it just me? Anyway, while we were waiting for a nice table at the famous seafood restaurant Riddle and Finns, we went to sunbathing on the cobblestone beach.  It’s a different kind of feeling over here than on a tropical island. The temperature is a lot lower but the sun is direct and hot just as much. We had a lovely nap with seabirds singing. Ah those long and easy summer afternoons.

After a nice little lunch, we went back to the beach to chill just a little longer and headed down to the seven sisters country park. While we were waiting for the bus to take us there, we went on a little tour to see the Royal Pavilion that is located in the heart of the city. The Roya pavilion is an exotic palace in the center of Brighton with a colorful history. Built as a seaside pleasure palace for King George IV, this historic house mixes Regency grandeur with the visual style of India and China. I will say it is very oriental and exotic decor for a British palace. I loved the sun and garden in the place, you gotta love an English garden.

– Where the wild things are –

Of course you need a seat on the second floor of the bus because the ride is just too damn beautiful. I couldn’t stop thinking about how everyone’s life is over here. Living in a little white two-story house with a rose garden and you can look out to see the cliff and the sea over your kitchen windows. Sunrise and sunset. I love people watching, so when the bus came to a stop, I would like to see who get off the bus, what did they do today? Are they happy? Most of them are young people who work in the city and going back to the small town or village, I can’t really tell the expressions of their faces. Perhaps the same old everyday routine makes it less exciting.

An hour later, we came to our stop but the bus continued, and I kept wondering where is it heading to…

I’ve read and heard so much about the English Countryside, from Jane Austin to the Bronte sisters. From the movies to the magazines. And fellas, what you read and heard are all true. Normally, the places I visited are always come out from a different perspective in real life than I imagined in my head. But this is something exactly I imagined. The shade of the lights falls on the meadows, the pond, the ducks, even the sheep, and cows. Situated in the South Downs National Park, the Seven Sisters Country Park is made up of 280 hectares of chalk cliffs, meandering river valley and open chalk grassland. The Country Park is named after the famous Seven Sisters chalk cliffs on one of Britain’s finest unspoiled coastlines.

We chose to go up for a hike. Ah hikes, in all my travels I’ve been challenged to take up a hike multiple times, but still, my weak city legs, might be weak, always get the job done and I’m quite impressed by myself, with all the wrong shoes I wore, I still conquered the journey:) And the view, after all, is so so rewarding. The sea is so quiet that you hear the wind went through the flowers and weeds, the seagulls and other seabirds, and other bugs in the woods, It’s almost 8 pm but the English summer had the sun still up and high, and it shone over the sea, like diamonds. We said nothing at all, didn’t want to disturb the scenery, we just sat on the edge of the cliff, meditate, and take it all in.

It’s almost 9 o’clock in the evening and we need to catch our train back to London. The old gentleman who we saw when we get here was making up space in the wood. He’s gonna spend the night here. How romantic. The sun turned from golden to orange, and the full moon rose above the sea. I thought of Jane Eyer, the day when she ran out from Thornfield and spent the night in the wild, how sad, the poor little thing. I thought of Sade too, the half British singer, her low, smoky sentimental voice, singing “the Moon and the sky.”

On our long long way home, the moonlight shone over the English Channel, I fall asleep on a shoulder next to me. Along with the hills up and down, I slowly closed my eyes, and in my dream, we went back to the little white two-story house with a rose garden, looking out from the kitchen window, It was spectacular blue after luxuriantly green.

All photos my own shot in Brighton, United Kingdom.