Jessie McKinnon

So since I've last written on here, I've managed to get myself a job straight out of uni and I'm already at the point in my career where a three and a half week holiday is well deserved. I've been at my job for a whole year as of June 30th! It's crazy how fast time starts to fly as your work and life routine just gets going. Tom and I have started our first trip back to England in nearly three years with a five day trip to Norway with his parents. To be entirely honest, I was a bit lazy and did very little research about Norway, except enough to figure out that we were doing a Norway In A Nutshell tour. We got to Oslo and I had low expectations - I think I expected it to be a pretty city but kind of boring. I think I thought something similar of Norway as a whole. I knew nothing much about the country except that I was there at the wrong time of the year for the Northern Lights and that it was renown for being particularly expensive. Boy, was I wrong about th...

I thought I'd write a short blog post while waiting for some rice to cook. I haven't put my thoughts down in writing for a little while so perhaps this sort of therapy will work its magic on me. [ Image Source ] First things first, I've signed up for my very first half marathon. It's with the Melbourne Marathon , and is about twelve weeks away. I'm absolutely terrified. I've never made this kind of commitment... and it is a really really long way! It's further than the distance that I travel on my bike in a day, commuting to uni, and that in itself takes about an hour. I'm already worried that my legs are going to stop working halfway through. So I've been reading a lot of articles, and searching Pinterest relentlessly for half marathon training guides. I think I'll use my Nike+ running app as a guide too. If anybody has any tips, please share them with me! I reckon I'll finish it comfortably in about two and a half hours....

I've been wanting to get back into blogging and vlogging for a while now but keep having creative-blocks as to what I should talk about. So I thought that I may as well just jump in the deep end, otherwise I'd be forever putting it off and wouldn't get back into it again anyway! I want to start my new and improved blog off with a few of my favourite photos since I last posted in 2011! One of  my favourite trips in the UK was to Scotland in June 2011. This photo was taken from Stirling Castle, and remains one of my favourite photos of my travels on my gap year.   In April 2012, Tom and I went to western Indonesia for 10 days for my first 'off the beaten track' Asia experience. It was truly the best holiday of my life and I don't know when and if it will ever be beaten. Our view of the ocean from our hut in Pulau Weh Snorkelling off the coast of Pulau Weh Journalling in Ketambe, in the jungle In September 2012, I visited Engl...

For my second week of holidays, I went to stay five days in Malta to meet a whole bunch of my family :) I stayed with my lovely second cousin, and tour-guide, Claire, and her mum and dad, in Lija. By this stage, I'd bought a new camera whilst having a quick stop over with some friends in London, so I had a brand shiny new toy to play with and take lots of photos with! Malta was amazing. The buildings were gorgeous - all limestone - and all of the roads were tiny and winding. There are heaps of churches in Malta. I'm not even kidding when I say that I reckon there's one on nearly every second street. And they're all huge, and gorgeous. Claire took me to the popular tourist destination - Valetta. A gorgeous city with plenty of cute tourist shops and awesome ice-cream :) We spent the day taking photos, wandering through some gardens with some stunning views and admiring a lovely exhibition of the artist, Mucha. And so, the whole reason ...

And on the fourth day we went and hung out at the Cliffs of Moher. It was pretty foggy when we got there, but by the time we’d gone for a bit of a walk, it’d cleared a bit . That night we headed to Killarney and went to a fantastic pub called the Grand Hotel. There was a rad cover band and once they packed up, a door opened up and turns out there was a club just out the back :) By day five, we were all getting preeeetty tired. Lots of 3 and 4am bedtimes, and so a massive beach day was more than welcome. We were really lucky on our tour to have fantastic weather and it was only a little drizzly on one of the days. We went to two different beaches; our tour guide, Connor, told us to frollick on the sand and so we did - lots of cartwheels on my behalf :D The last day was our 'going home day,' but it was also the day that we made a treck to Blarney Castle. I got the pleasure of sharing my germs with the 300,000+ people that kiss the Blarney Stone per annum....

‘ By the age of 12, a child knows at least 27 ways to tell if someone is a catholic or a prodestant. ’ - Derry On the first Saturday of my school holidays, my 12 hour bus ride -including a 4 hour ferry ride- left for Ireland. We landed in Dublin at about 6.30am and so I had a whole day of checking out Dublin. I went and had a look at Dublin Castle, and the Garda (police) memorial gardens. On April 4th, my Paddywagon tour began at Paddy’s Palace, Dublin. First stop was The Papal Cross in Phoenix Park, Dublin. The cross was erected in anticipation of Pope John Paul II's visit in 1979. Over a million people came to see the Pope celebrate mass here. And then.... the Guinness Storehouse! Zoomed through the factory, tried half a glass of Guinness draught, left my mark on the ‘Guinness message wall’ and headed up to the Gravity Bar, ready for my FREE Pint of Guinness!! Woo hoo! But alas, it tasted pretty funky – and as I was to discover later on the tour, it tast...