waking up sweet: Trains, Helicopters, Tractors & Emergency Room?

** BEWARE - LONG POST! **

For the week of Christmas we booked a 2 bedroom stone cottage on Tresco, in the Isles of Scilly. The Scillies are a group of small islands off the tip of Cornwall (Southwest England). We first learned about the Scillies from our friends Corey & Simon who go away there yearly and rave about it. The main selling point being a fabulously secluded island where you can just relax and do as you please - far from the bustle of London. The cottages are comfortable and self-catering and there is a small, but well stocked island store from which to plan your meals. If you don't feel like cooking, you can either purchase a pre-prepared meal (v yummy!) or eat at the Flying Boat Club - a small, but excellent restaurant & bar. There are no cars (only a few service vehicles and golf carts for the elderly) so children can run wild exploring the paths, fields and beaches. There's also an indoor pool & spa for fun and relaxation! So, you can imagine why we were seriously looking forward to our get away!

And that brings me to the Emergency Room. That's right - Emergency Room! Or, as the Brits like to call it - the A & E. So, what you need to know first is that we were due to catch the sleeper train out of London down to Penzance (tip of Cornwall) and it was leaving at 11:45 pm on Tuesday, December 21st from Paddington Station. Prior to that, we had arranged for a car to collect us at 10 pm and drop us at the station.

So, Bowen & I were busy packing on Tuesday - but to be honest, I hadn't gotten a whole lot done. Had been feeling pretty tired that day and, in general, trying to pack alongside your 16 month old is not that easy of a task! Remember, also, that I'm packing for Christmastime, which adds a whole other dimension. Plus - just to make things more complicated - we have a 15 kg (about 32 lb) weight limit per bag (1 per person) because when we get off the train at 8 am Wednesday morning, we hop on a helicopter for a 20 minute ride to the island!! Wowzers!

Approaching 6 pm, all this running through my head, and desperately wishing Stewart was already home from work, I was working on packing my bag in our bedroom when Bowen fell off a bag of blocks and hit her head on my chest of drawers! Now, it wasn't that bad of a fall and she only cried a minute or so. I checked her over and she seemed fine, her ear a little red, but that was all. I continued packing, she continued playing and 20 mins later we went to find her some dinner. Well, you can imagine my shock when I found blood on her head as I lifted her into her high chair! It was a circle of blood about the size of a quarter about 2 inches above her left ear and when I looked closer I could see that the scalp was split about a centimeter. Well, although I could tell that, thankfully, it wasn't anything too serious... my heart started racing as I began to think of what would need to happen and then quickly how everything else would need to come together to allow us to make our holiday. NOT a great feeling.

In the next 20 mins, I called the local GP, fed Bowen her dinner (she's got to eat, right?), Stewart arrived home, we bundled Bowen up and flew out the door to the local clinic. The GP confirmed that although, not serious, her head would indeed need gluing. Don't ask me why this can't be done at the local clinic, but we needed to make the trek to the A & E. Of course, it's now 7 pm and we're due to be picked up in 3 hrs! I was just trying not to think about it all - Stewart, however, remained calm (no surprise) and called to push back our car to 10:45 pm.

After making it to the A & E (half by cab and half by walking) we were told the wait could be hours. I made a desperate plea to the man at the desk and I think I must have indeed looked pretty desperate - no shower, pregnant, needing to catch a train out of town and a 16 month old needing her head glued. He took pity on me and told me he'd see what he could do. 30 minutes later we were walking out of the A & E with Bowen who was no worse the wear minus the bit of hair matted down with glue!

We flew home and in 2 1/2 hrs managed to get ourselves packed and out the door and into the cab at 10:45 pm!! It was a true whirlwind. What followed was a semi-sleepless night (for me!) in a tiny little sleeper cabin. I got the joy of Bowen bunking in. She did wonderfully, but this meant I slept with half my body off the mat. Stewart, on the other hand, had a pretty decent night's sleep on the top bunk by himself. We had 3 pieces of rolling luggage, a duffle and 2 pieces of hand luggage that ALL had to come into the sleeper with us! It was small - VERY SMALL. By the time all the luggage was in, we had to be on the beds because their was no place to stand! The cabin attendant woke us at 7 am for "breakfast in bed" and we all tried to pull ourselves together to be ready to hop off at 8 am.

Once off the train, we caught a quick shuttle van to the heliport where we were due to catch the 10 am helicopter to Tresco! What a great feeling, EXCEPT that we still had one final hurdle. In the rush to pack, we were aware that ALL of our bags were overweight. What we didn't know was that apparently Bowen (as an infant) really didn't get a baggage allowance - so we ended up with a severe weight overage! But the staff, although entitled to charge us heavily for the overage, were so laid back and helpful. Not only did they not charge us, they managed to get all our bags minus 1 on our flight and the remaining bag showed up the following morning! Phew!

We boarded the helicopter - a Sikorski and it was an amazing 20 minute flight over to Tresco! It was all very exciting! Bowen loved it and I think the loud noise of the propellers was actually very calming. She enjoyed looking out the window as we flew over the end of Cornwall and out over the water. It was so exciting to see the first signs of the Scillies and know the traveling was almost over!

Once off, we gathered our luggage and boarded a trailer attached to a tractor that took us across the island and up to our cottage. We stayed at the Doctor's Cottage and finally arriving there was like being able to take a nice deep breath of fresh air!!

We had certainly earned every bit of relaxation that was to come!

Enjoy the travel photos. More to come on the actual trip!