The intervening weeks

In the last two weeks I have gotten married, been on honeymoon and climbed once.

 

It all started with the wedding. What an amazing experience! I felt pretty nervous, although I dont know why - there was no need, the thing with spending so much time thinking about and planning something is that objectively it becomes bigger in your head than it needs to be. The key being not to intellectualize everything - just be, live for the moment! If it feels good - do it. Our big day flashed past so quickly, and it was amazing, but I would like to go and do it again - just to be able to talk to everyone, and see it all knowing what I know - that there was nothing to be worried about!

 

We woke up on August the 10th a married couple. Miraculously a pipe and slippers had not appeared at the end of the bed, and she didnt have a rolling pin with which to batter me. Nothing had changed, we were still us and we still liked what we liked before. If you do get married, the best advice I can offer is that you should go on your honeymoon straight away. I reckon theres a crash coming if you just go back to work or something (perhaps only if you are as neurotic as I am), so thats what we did. Went on holiday. Excepting a near no passports/tickets mess at the start this was brilliant. We'd chosen Santorini, which is a greek island in the Cyclades chain.

 

Greece is quite poor, so they love the tourists. They are also immensely proud of their cuisine which is good because they do it well, want you to enjoy it and its actually quite healthy. One of my favorite things about Santorini is that whilst it has been touristified, its all couples - there are no marauding groups of unruly football shirted brits on a quest for 'clunge'. All nice restaurants, little villages, galleries and stuff. Island is tiny and of v.interesting geography. Formed by a collapsed caldera, its essentially a crescent shaped cliff with villages along the ridge top. Lovely views, nice walks and almost no need to hire a car. We ate like kings, slept like logs and drank wine like water. IT WAS GREAT! realised just how much I had missed going on summer holidays, and also why we wanted to get married.

 

I should also doff my cap to our incredible hotel. To pick it we'd gone on tripadvisor.com and gone with the number one for santorini - the Anastasis Apartments, and by god - it was amazing. Expensive but worth it. I have always held the belief that you get what you pay for. It wasnt that it was particularly opulent or that we had 12 trouser presses or anything, it was made amazing by the people who run it. A family thing, the lady of the house is the brains behind the success, she's a really honest woman who loves where she lives and wants you to get what she likes it for. They manage to really look after you, and do everything they can to make your stay better but without mithering or making you feel like they are on top of you. You know like you get a better experience at a new crag with an experienced local? well the same equivalent here. Awesome.

 

I thought that I would be grotesquely fat when I got home, and whilst I have put on pounds, its not too bad (11st9lbs). I climbed on Friday at the tor with a fair cast of heroes and i managed nothing, felt weak but it was nice to catch up. Put a rope on Dianetics which has some of the smallest holds I have every tried to use! Didnt even do all the moves, but quite keen to drop a bit of weight, get a bit of strength back and go back out. Ok, for now thats it. Climbing weds if anyone keen? forecast dreadful.