Day in Dover

What do you do when almost everyone goes to Paris?  You grab the rest and head to Dover!  Colby, Rob, Bryan, Antonio, and I hopped on a bus Sunday morning to explore the White Cliffs of Dover.   We planned the trip at 1 am that same morning, so we had no idea what to do but to just go and explore!  The bus ride was a 2 and a half hour ride, but since we left early in the morning, time flew by.  When we arrived around 11:30 we headed straight for the castle.  The walk was a long, uphill journey but the view was worth it.  Since the castle was not free and I've already seen so many castles, we passed on going inside (except for Colby, who somehow snuck in!).  The walls of the castle were beautiful and looked more medieval than the others that I've seen.

View from the outside of the castle

Entrance to the Dover castle

The walk back down

After walking up to the castle, we journeyed back into the town square to grab a bite for lunch.  We decided on a Charlie Chaplin themed restaurant and all got a true English breakfast.  As always, it was delicious! We filled up on eggs, toast, mushrooms, beans, hashbrowns, and sausage.

We walked around after lunch and saw a beautiful chapel.  It is eery, yet neat to always see cemeteries in almost every chapels' perimeter.   Eventually, we made our way down to the water.  It reminded me of Brighton, but much smaller and a lot less people.  It was very relaxing.

It was time to start the hike to the top of Dover Cliffs, but alas...we had no idea how to get there!  After a bus ride, going down multiple wrong paths, and asking many locals, we finally found the path that leads to the top.  I am used to hiking in the Red River Gorge which is covered in trees and creeks.  This hike however was not like that.  It was rolling hills of grass with farmland to the left and the sea to the right.  It looked unreal.  As a bonus, there were rabbit holes everywhere and if you looked hard enough, you could spot rabbits hopping along in the distance.

Once we got to the top, we popped some champagne and took in the view.  It's crazy that we all were strangers three weeks ago and now we all are great friends.  So thankful that I am surrounded by great people to spend this amazing experience with!

Left to right:  Me, Antonio, Rob, Colby, and Bryan

Funny Story:  While the guys were finishing champagne, I took the opportunity to walk around and take some photos during the golden hour.  I like to explore, but sometimes I forget not to stray too far.  I had gone past the fence and into the farmland when I saw a lighthouse in the distance.  Thinking it was a great photo opportunity, I started walking towards it.  I was far away enough from the trail to barely see the tops of peoples heads.  As I was walking, I noticed four guys heads walking away.  I panicked and thought that the guys were leaving me!  I immediately started running down the trail flailing my arms and yelling for them to wait.  After running for about a quarter of a mile, I finally found a gate that I could hop to get back on the trail that the guys were on.  I proceeded to continue to run up the hill to hopefully catch up with the guys.  When I made it to the top, there they were...sitting in the same spot and had not moved.  I had ran and looked like a crazy person for nothing and didn't even get the photo of the lighthouse!  After explaining what just happened to the guys, they laughed and said that I needed more champagne.  Typical!

Happy me before I went into abandoned, panic mode.

We ended our day by joining two of our new friends at an Italian restaurant for some appetizers before our journey home.  Although I did miss my girlfriends, I had a great weekend hanging with the guys!  Can't wait for our next adventure next weekend in Amsterdam!  Until then, cheers!

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"I do not have the slightest clue what I'm doing...that's the adventure...I stopped worrying about it...that's the beauty.
-Jason King

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