This seems to have turned into an occasional blog for holiday posts so here is another one of those posts.
If you just want to see my holiday snaps scroll to the bottom.
I have gone back to uni, part-time and blended, to study behaviour change. I am loving my course and enjoying being at Derby albeit for only 3 days once a term. I am finding my fellow students and tutors to be interesting, engaging people and I am learning a lot.
When I saw the opportunity to apply for an International Travel Award to go to Iceland with the university I initially felt like this sort of opportunity was not aimed at people-like-me. However, in the last year I have applied for both a summer school and a summer internship, both not aimed at people-like-me, so thought why not. The purpose of the award is to enhance my global mindset, increase cultural awareness and grow confidence. I only saw the opportunity at the last minute, put in an application and forgot about it. I was astounded when I was accepted not to mention excited but also approaching the idea with some trepidation. I would probably be the oldest person on the trip (likely even older than the leaders), I have only flown 3 times and hate it, and I am not confident walking in slippery places (Martin usually helps me and even Jonathan keeps an eye out for me on steep downhill walks). However, with my limited travel experience and a determination to embrace opportunities I took the opportunity on.
A key part of the trip was considering what we had learned and what challenges we had overcome. So what did I learn/overcome:
- I found that I didn’t really hate flying nearly as much as I thought I did and didn’t even feel too nervous when the pilot said “we’ll try to land in the high winds” in a similar manner to the ferry captains.
- I was the needy person in the group when we did glacier walking. I was determined to do it but before we had even got to the bottom of the glacier I was struggling with the slippery down hills. Luckily our guide gave me his walking pole and I was able to complete the glacier walk with just a little support. My learning was definitely that being needy can be harder than being the supportive person and accepting that I can play different roles in different circumstances is important. I found this particularly hard in this situation as these people barely knew me so their main image of me would be as someone who needs support and is apprehensive. Also that goals can be achieved, even if they are hard, with the right support and it is OK to ask for help.
- From my Positive Psychology module last year I had been learning about the principles of Broaden and Build (fredrickson – Positivity) and this really did broaden my experience and has buildt my confidence in exploring options outside of my comfort zone.
- I learned that Iceland is an amazing place and I definitely want to go back again in summer
- There is a huge outdoor swimming culture in Iceland that I could fully embrace
Now the pictures:
This holiday has seemed like a series of quite different holidays strung together, and no section more so than the last couple of days. We have returned to a favoured spot from previous Netrherlands trips, basing ourselves at the 
On our first full day here we headed out to Haarlem. It’s a great ride, mostly along canals and through parkland all the way into the city. We had a little wander round town and bought some ice creams (no stroopwafle ice cream available sadly, a disappointment for Martin, but the ice creams were still top class). We also indulged in some expensive chips, but they were very tasty, even if the man selling them gave Susan a dirty look for opting for Belgian Mayonnaise rather than Dutch… We thought about spending more time in Haarlem, but decided the cycling was our real focus so we headed off again, deciding to head for a pancake house on the way back for a beer and “maybe a pancake if we fancy one”. Of course that meant pretending we might not buy pancakes in spite of the inevitability of it. When in the Netherlands it is just rude not to support one of the many pancake houses. 
We then carried on to Hoofdorp for a spot of shopping – originally to check out panniers in the bike shops but we ended up shopping for dinner in Lidl and buying some socks from Primark, we know how to live it up! We returned, with 50km under our belts (around 30 miles as long as the mile/km ration hasn’t gone the same way as the pound/euro since we booked the trip). Susan then cooked a fabulous chicken and chorizo dinner, it would have been great at home, so as camping food was simply fabulous. 
On day two we also got out on the bikes in glorious sunshine, and cycled out to Noordwyck, touted as an old fishing village, but the bits we saw were more sandy-beach seaside resort (but very pleasant). We had a wander round the Sunday market, bought some rather yummy coconut things for coffee later, then cycled off through the dunes and made up a route home with the help of the 
On our return we lazed around for the rest of the afternoon. We thought we’d have more time doing very little on this trip, but we haven’t really – that’s not been a problem, but it was nice to have an afternoon doing very little today. Tomorrow we’re doing the next bit of our limp back towards Calais, heading for an overnight at another previously-visited Camperplaats in Zeeland.