Hi there, peeps, how are you? I hope your life rock ‘n rolls nicely and doesn’t throw you too many obstacles in the way. But if your path is littered then you can always change your point of view to jump over the hurdles.

More Cancer Up-Dates

So, last week I went to my annual mammogram appointment but I have no results yet. That, my dears, is a good sign 🙂 . The nurse said they would contact me fast if they would find anything. Another sigh of relief 🙂 . Besides the annual mammogram, I need to keep my breast checked, eat healthily and and move.

Yes, moving I should. Well, moving as in “moving my body” because not exercising enough is one lifestyle factor that is in my hand to avoid any cancer from coming back. I always wondered why so many women start running after cancer treatment. I guess it’s an “easy” exercise to take up and walking or running helps to process trauma and challenging experiences as I learned in therapy many moons ago.

Unfortunately, I can’t run because my knees are too run down (sorry for the pun) and I am a little risk-averse to do more walking because there are so many people out there not adhering to social distancing. So the running/walking is out of the equation even, if I wanted to. In January I had started to dance like no one’s watching 🙂 for at least half an hour a day but I somehow lost the motivation and energy when I started to work again.

But hey ho, there is no reason, why I can’t start it again, is there? I’ll keep you updated 🙂

Three Things That Worried Me About Moving On A Boat

We are still pondering and researching the narrowboat escape. We have a plan B if this doesn’t work out but I have to admit the boating keeps calling to me. But there are three things that I worried a little about when moving on a boat:

1. What about an address
2. What about having a GP
3. How to get internet

But lucky us there is a video for everything on YouTube 😉

What About an Address?

To stay legal or get anything legally done you need a physical address in the UK otherwise you can’t sign up to a GP, stay with your bank or vote. Many continuous cruisers use a family member’s or friends address but that is not possible for us. So we had a look into online post offices that give you an address. Many travel bloggers use those and some boaters too.

It is an extra expense that you wouldn’t have being in a house or having a mooring. I feel though it is worth it as I would like to keep shopping online. Even though that might be a bit tricky as you need to carry everything from the post office to the boat. These online post offices receive your post and then send it on to where ever you currently are. Most boaters collect their post from the closest post office where they currently are.

If you are interested, you can check out these two links:

UK Postbox – The UK’s Online Post Office

Cheapest business and private mailboxes, virtual UK addresses, mail scanning or forwarding (expost.uk)

What about the Doctors?

I think the pandemic had one good thing coming out: You can do more online or via phone when it comes to your GP. “What about a doctor?” is one of my most important questions as I need to get the anticancer medication and need to access a doctor easily if anything is out of the ordinary. And we currently live pretty far away from the British canals.

But as you can see in this video, there is an app for literally everything nowadays 🙂

And How Do You Get Internet On A Boat?

This “problem” rather mystified me in the beginning when we started looking into the narrowboat thing. Surely all these vloggers can’t just do the uploading of their videos via their phones? And surely they can’t have normal broadband. What the….. Find the answers here because I still haven’t fully understood how it works 😉

Well, that is it for now when it comes to our narrowboat ponderings. In the next few weeks I want to try out something new with my Monday posts. It’s not fully developed yet but please stay tuned 🙂 and come away with me to Dominica.

Introduction to Dominica

Have you ever dreamed of getting away from it all on a Caribbean Island? I have to admit I never have. First of all, I am not a fan of flying and secondly I do not enjoy hot countries particularly. But investigating all these little gems in the Caribbean made me question if I am losing out on an experience. After all, I am quite curious about how life is down there and what the people and culture are like. But I guess, it might all be hypothetical anyway.

The video’s I watched describe Dominica as the Nature Island of the Caribbean. It’s also the Island of partying as they seem to have a feast or festival for everything from things to animals. Yes, there really is a festival of odds and other crazy things I can’t remember now. Am getting old, I guess LOL. It didn’t surprise me that it had quite some Pirate activity but I didn’t quite understand the commonwealth thing. Apparently, it is not a commonwealth island but became directly a republic. The Commonwealth crops up here and there and I know the games but what it really stands for escapes me. That I will have to investigate further. The middle of the island is still preserved rainforest and if I remember rightly hardly discovered. It is so wild that most of the Pirates of the Caribbean films were filmed there. Dominica sports lots of water and volcanic activity. You can for example find a crazy, boiling lake and hot springs. Lots of them. Now that would definitely entice me to go there 😉 . Snorkel fans find many ideal opportunities in Dominica and the government supports traditional business like agriculture more than tourism. That sounds sensible to me. The Kalinago peoples are the original peoples of most of the Caribbean islands. There are still some on Dominica because they could hide in the wild mountains. They were not so lucky on other islands. One of the languages on Dominica is a French-derived creole and it looks like they are rather relaxed people. Maybe because there is no mass tourism.

So let’s have a look what vloggers make of Dominica. As usual I have no rights to these videos and hope you’ll help to support them with a like. Thanks.

An Artist of Dominica

It would never occur to me to study in China unless I am interested in traditional Chinese Medicine or the Languages. However, many Caribbean and African countries have close ties to China and their youngster are happy to study over there.

So did Shadrach Burton a brilliant young artist from Dominica. Find out more here…

And here:

Biography | Shadrach Burton

A Climate Activist of Dominica

I know I said it before but it simply astonishes me that so much of the climate crisis was already felt on the Caribbean islands about 10-15 years ago and the rest of us simply ignored it. Or weren’t told. Or both. Find out the impact on Dominica with Russel, a young reporter via UNICEF:

Food of Dominica

Sorry, I could not find any links to food from Dominica but this video which gives you much more than eating 🙂

Writers from Dominica

No poetry today my dears. I just could not find a video or link to any poetry. But there are some writers and poets at this link:

Writers from Dominica You Should Know (theculturetrip.com)

Mental Health in Dominica

This island really keeps itself as off grid as it can from the mass tourism and mass social media. So find out about mental health on Dominica at this link:

Mental Health: My Primary Health Care Responsibility | Dominica Vibes News

Some musicians of Dominica

Enough babble from me. Just enjoy some lovely music:

You want to add a music or travel post of yours? Please do so here at this Linky. Click on the image and the form pops up.

And where are we going next week?

Come Away With Me 2021 Musical Challenge Country for Monday, June 28th, 2021

I am taking a rather random route around the world, but sometimes it makes sense. Next week we venture to St. Lucia. Please find musicians from St. Lucia on the St. Lucia Oral History Page.

As for the suggestions to take part:

1. Join in! No matter where, when and with what. You missed the first year? Don’t worry. Just jump in when it suits you.
2. Send us the link! The ping-back option does not work because my blog is now private so please leave a link in the comments of the post on the day you take part. Or leave it at the “Come Away With Me 2021 FB page“
3. Tag your post either with ” Come Away With Me Musical Challenge”/ #CoAwWiMeMuCh” / “Come Away with Me 2021 Musical Challenge” o/“CoAwWiMe2021MuCh” / . You can also use these as hashtags for Twitter and other Social Networks to give your post more exposure. If you add #blog and #music with your hashtags it will get you more readers.
4. No matter which music or country the prompt favours you create with it whatever you please. This is supposed to be a fun challenge and no chore.
5. I post a prompt for the next week with every “Come Away With Me 2021 post” I write.
6. If you like, use this picture for your readers to find the posts.

Just one more thing before you go: The hospital that is treating me is fundraising for a dedicated breast cancer unit which would allow some same-day diagnosis and better premises for patients and staff.

Please, if you can spare a little money hop over to their Just Giving Page and give as little or much as you can. Or share the page on your social media. So far the campaign has raised about half the amount needed: £450,451 of £800,000 (June 2021).

Your support means a lot to me! Thank you very much.

Thanks, my dears, for staying with me until the end.

I appreciate your presence.

Please stay safe, stay kind and remember that you rock!