Waking up in a new bed is always a pretty strange experience. I find it always takes a few moments for your brain to remember where you are and you get that slight amount of panic before it all clicks. Today though, once I fell back into reality, I never felt more excited about the day ahead.

Hitting the trail

Those who know me, know that I’m quite the avid runner. I’m not a very good runner, but I like to just get out there and start pushing the dust behind me. Now that I’ve moved to a new neighbourhood I know I need to work out a few new routes around the area so that I can make sure I’m getting my time in.

So, bright and early this morning (I think it was around 8am), I set off running, not following any kind of map just trying to do a general loop around and aiming for a good 5 kilometres. It was a decent run all around, lots of hills to get the heart going and plenty of scenery to keep me distracted. A great route, and one I’ll definitely be doing again!

Back to Business

Once my run was complete, it was time to continue yesterday’s tasks: cleaning and organising all of my many belongings which I had brought with me. It was a tedious task, only made better by my personal ‘inspo mix’, but eventually the task was complete, and my room looked all the more better for it.

I even managed to find my boys a cosy spot! They look so cute and happy there 🙂

An Expected Journey

With a tidy bedroom, I have a tidy mind, and I knew exactly what I wanted my next move to be: it’s time to head to campus!

Like most places around Leicester, I’d only ever seen it in pictures. I’d never even been to Leicester until yesterday, so everything I was seeing was brand new, which just made it that much more awe inspiring.

My walk took me through Clarendon Park, a small area south of the city centre. I must say, it was adorable! The main street was lined with independant shop after independant shop. Cafe’s, niche stores, even an eco dispensary I must remember to check out. I definitely looked like an annoying tourist just walking down the street with my mouth half agape.

What! I’m a sucker for a good high street, especially when it contains so many small businesses…

Next on the journey was Victoria Park, another area where the pictures just didn’t do it justice, it WAS HUGE. Massive sprawling fields littered with play areas, sports courts, and memorials. The beautiful weather coupled with the gorgeous environment really helped Leicester to sell itself to me. Not that I wasn’t already sold!

Finally, I arrived at campus. I mostly just wandered around and got my bearings as to where a few buildings I’m expecting to need are. I of course checked out the on-campus sports centre and was given another delightful tour by the staff. This centre was just as good as the one nearer my room, and I can get into both places on the same membership! Crazy!

I got some lunch from the ‘Astro Van’ and headed towards town. I’m so grateful my method of going places is to just go down a random road and see where I end up, it helps me to find some amazing places like the city walk, which connects the centre to Victoria Park. I realise I’m just writing paragraph after paragraph about the amazing things I saw today but honestly that’s what my day was, I just kept walking and kept being amazed!

The city was like any other, streets lined with restaurants, chain stores, and people telling me what the afterlife looks like. Another day in the UK! Thankfully I happened upon the Highcross Shopping Centre, which brought on another spell of me walking around with my mouth half agape. I’m starting to think I have an obsession with just going into shops and looking at stuff, I spent over an hour just wandering this shopping centre smiling to myself about everything that could be bought, whilst barely actually buying anything.

Eventually I dragged myself out of the shopping centre, and decided to head back home. It was an absolutely exhausting day, according to my watch I walked over 30,000 steps! So, I think I’ll go a little easier on myself tomorrow. I had a lot of fun though, just seeing the sights of where I’m going to spend the next year of my life. As much as I’d love to keep writing about everything I saw, I’ve got a delicious curry one of my new flatmates just made me to eat!

Gosh, life can be pretty sweet, and pretty spicy sometimes too!

See you on the trail!

Cassie 🙂