Far too long… since we witnessed the sun’s explosion of colour across the land as it sets on another day.

… and far too long since we sat out under the stars and marvelled at their brilliance, and the sheer magnitude of how many billions we can see…

‘Stop the world, I wanna get off’ we say when we need a bit of space to breathe, to pull our thoughts and heads together.

For me that space has always been best found at the beach. Any beach will do, preferably the closest to wherever I am at the time.

It’s when I hit that crest of the hill that I know Im really on my way somewhere, somewhere more than just up the road from home. That somewhere translates to a fun and exciting destination. There’s no doubt you’re going somewhere. In this case that somewhere fun and exciting was…

I was the only person there, except for the odd solitary runner, listening to the waves washing up against the rocks, watching the sky glow with early morning light behind the cityscape.

The wire fence was covered with love locks engraved and attached to the fence by couples declaring their everlasting love for each other, was bathed in a warm, golden light.

Walking across the ice towards the middle of the top of a huge frozen lake I paused and looked around, suddenly aware of exactly where I was standing. A quick look at where that little blue dot was on Google Maps - me - showed I really was miles from the middle…