Exeter.

We´ve been strolling around Exeter a little, sleeping at a tiny campsite called Barley fields, which always makes me hum Sting´s Field´s of Gold.

It´s hot. So we have water fights.

You can take a bus from there to Exeter, though, there isn´t exactly a busstop. You just stand at the street and wave your hand when one of the green Western Greyhound busses passes by, and then the driver stops and picks you up. He also drops you off whenever you want to, and my kids love it.
Actually, I love the Exeter busses, too.
People here are incredibly open and friendly. Once, we rode for about an hour, and after that, I felt like I knew every single person on the bus. They all talked to us, told us about their jobs in the museum and what we needed to visit and where they´ve been on holiday themselves and about their sons who were about to get married... really, going by bus here is like attending a party. Really cool.

And don´t you just love that gas station? I think it looks like it travelled here through time, from the 50´s, maybe.

Exeter itsself?
I find it very...tidy. The streets are so clean you could eat from them. They have lots of great playgrounds, and churches all over, and students riding their bikes, so in a way, it´s a lot like Münster.

And of course, there´s the cathedral.

They have historical sites all over the place...

...and riddles. The Exeter riddle, in fact.

I need to google it. There are riddles at several places, like in this statue, or carved into the stones, and I like that a lot. We translate them to our kids, and it´s a shame a lot of the awesome wordplays are untranslatable into german.
Oh, and there´s a bookcycle store.

Not a shelf, like we have, but a real store, full of free books, run by volunteer workers. (That one volunteer worker looked so hot... well, I was too chicken to take a picture of him, but be assured, he looked really, really terriffic. Long, dark, curly hair... yum :)
Ronnie found a book about celtic runes. We´re currently reading The Mortal Instruments, and runes play a central role in the plot, so she was extremeley excited when she found that book.

Now she´s painting runes on pebbles she collected on the beach, urges me to translate their meaning, and even inks herself with a stregth rune with permanent marker, to increase her ability to carry her backpack...

 Yeah, we need that.

And, before I forget...

 There´s street musicians :)

So... friendly people, free books, hot book store workers, street music and perfect weather help me with my Cornwall-hangover. I should have stayed down there a little longer, like... forever... whatever. I left Cornwall, and I shouldn´t be too pathetic and just get over it.
See you from London, okay?