Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

Once we’d gotten over the initial excitement of being able to live wherever we want.. No, scrap that.. Once we’d learnt to more effectively hide our excitement about being able to live wherever we want, we dug deeper into the world of work and are now back on the unstoppable conveyor belt of self employment. The day doesn’t end, it only fizzles out into sleep, and then we can go for a long walk, or a slack line session, or a kick about – to get some fresh air and let the new ideas simmer and settle.

North Wales is probably my favourite. Anglesey in particular. Of all the places I’ve been, it has achieved that wonderful status of having successfully fused beauty and landscapes and freedom, with I am so comfortable here, this is so familiar.. this feels like home. We only have two weeks left in the UK, so it made sense to stay somewhere like this for a little longer – just while we get all our last bits of important stuff sorted out. As it happens, the beauty and freedom of Anglesey is quite distracting, and we achieved very little in terms of work and productivity and progression. We did have a gorgeously superb time though.

Some family are still there, braving out the rain; we tore ourselves away – although the work had slowed down, the ideas had not stopped coming in. We’re now parked right by Menai Bridge (Bangor). It’s loud with rain, but quiet with peaceful isolation, plus there’s a fairly fast wi-fi connection. Chase that signal.. all around the world..

It’s funny actually, I just read a meme someone shared online that read something like ‘You won’t find wi-fi in the forest, but I promise you’ll get an even better connection’. My immediate thought was – you can get really good wi-fi at Longleat forest, we stayed there for three days – I even had my roller blades out at one point. It’s nice to get the best of all the world’s wonders, if and when you can. I like to disconnect, but they say life is short – a part of what makes it so incredible is being so close to those you care about, even when you’re quite far away. That’s just me though. Adam pretends he’s got no signal regardless of where we are, so that people don’t contact him. (I’m just kidding! Ish.) Lolz.

Let me back up a bit.. We celebrated my 30th birthday last week on Anglesey, my family and a few close friends all stayed in cottages at Church Bay. It rained all day, but fortunately calmed down around 6pm, so we had a supreme bonfire of excellence – down in a private little cove on the beach, till the early hours of the morning. My perfect kind of birthday. For the remainder of the week we hung out with family and enjoyed the fresh air and a fair few games of cards, long walks, paddling, lots of laughs and smiles, a little bit of Yahtzee, a little bit of beer drinking. This is a picture of Jasper playing in the waves.

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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I was left feeling rather spoilt after my birthday this year, to say the least. I came away feeling very loved, and excited about the future. I was given some really lovely cards that I’ve since put up around the van, and we now have some exciting festivals and extreme sportsing to look forward to in July. These will be in Austria and Switzerland, so that means our destination aims for the height of the summer have been decided, giving us a more solid plan for our travels – something I think myself and Adam, and those who care about us, are pretty happy about. The vagueness is gone, or is.. depleted, at least.

Things are about to get quite different. We’re diving into the unknown. I feel free from worries most of the time, then drowned by them quite suddenly, then free again – and a little embarrassed about the prior drowning episode. It’s a manageable state of emotions.

This is a photo of my mum, with Adam, and Jasper.. Playing / walking at Church Bay, possibly on my Birthday..

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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Below is a picture of me and my friend Lindsay, body-boarding in the sea, in the rain. It was freezing, but we hired wet suits. Wet wet suits, which were a delight to put on, and almost definitely had not been peed in by anybody earlier that day. We went in the sea in the rain because we are hard as nails. Lindsay is particularly awesome, she’s currently fundraising to go over to Calais and help out some of the families and people there who are in desperate need of support. Lindsay’s also an amazing musician – if you make a Pledge for this particular cause, you can get yourself some brand new music. It’s a win-win world of wonderful. Head over there and check it out.

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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This next picture is an example of how lovely it is to be able to park your house right next to a beach. I’m aware this blog does appear to have turned into something of a slightly awkward family slideshow.. photographs.. captions.. Do you see?? I’m sorry about that. I don’t have much else to talk about; I’ve been writing so much and working hard over at Stereo Stickman lately – we’re about to re-launch with a brand new website and lots of new features. Head over there and get involved if you like music and writing. Sometimes I ramble about random, vaguely music related musings, then put a nice picture at the top and call it an article. It’s great fun, and I’m really pleased with how far things have come since we started it. (I’m also pretty sure every blog or online magazine or news site type shindig has a fairly similar process of ramble, articulate, check, edit, add photo, publish, share.. we should be ok for a while..)

On another note – I also put together interviews, which is worth mentioning as it’s one of my favourite parts of the whole endeavor. If you’re a musician, manager, or somehow involved with an artist, band, or musical movement.. definitely head over and see what it’s all about. Please feel free to send me a message if you’re unsure about anything. I may swim in the icy cold sea in an already wet wet suit, but I’m really quite approachable – come say hello!

Oh yeah, here’s that van-by-the-beach pic.. Blue skies make such a difference – our grey looking van-by-the-beach pics have far less impact.. I do wonder if it’s too late to edit out the puddle, though..

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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I’m not sure where to go with this now, so I’ll just add a couple of extra photos, and leave you with the notion that life is beautiful, and wonderful, and packed full of amazing people, and places, and things to do. If it doesn’t seem that way sometimes then it can feel impossible to look forward, but there’s always more, and things can always get better. I promise. Thank you so much for reading! (This isn’t the end, by the way. This is the fake final curtain, like when musicians pretend to leave when they’ve not even played your three favourite songs yet, and then they burst back on stage like Ayyyy, you want some more?? I’m pretty sure the photos and captions that follow are on par with your three favourite songs.)

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

..In the midst of van life..

 

Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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Sunshine glistening on a rocky sea.. probably the best thing in the world (at the time that it’s happening, at least). There aren’t many ways to caption beautiful photos of landscapes. I’m not sure why I’m bothering, I guess it’s one of those I’ve started so I’ll finish situations. You don’t have to read these bits if you don’t want to.

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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I took this photo of a lamb – it’s one of my favourites. We were playing with these two lambs for about half an hour, they were just like puppies – same behaviour. Their mum wasn’t best pleased about our presence, but she let us stay for a little while; watching intently. This was the best photo from the session. I like the juxtaposed imagery – the barbed wire, the innocence behind it.. Like isn’t the right word. I think it’s powerful, anyway.

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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Some sort of made up Yoga type stretch play, by a lake. It was sunny, my freckles came out. We also played football.

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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Adam likes to zoom in on things with the camera, he’s getting pretty good at it. I prefer it when it’s not daffodils, so here’s a really nice photo of a ladybird who sat by us. **I don’t have anything against flowers, but.. they stay where they are all the time, so photographing them is not as exciting as, for example – ladybirds, crashing waves, Pat eating a croissant..

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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Rebecca Cullen Music, Blog, Van Life, LDV Convoy, Anglesey, Travel Blog, Songwriter,

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*** 🙂 See You Next Time 🙂 ***