Round two finito

Ok first and foremost can someone explain to me what "ta" is? A few people have said it to me and I think its supposed to be thank you, except they cut out the majority of the letters!? More strange british sayings. But anyway carrying on..so yes I went to a small grassland area with lots of cows and sheep. The river passed thru so I walked along that until it got pretty dark, then I made my way back to shrewsbury. I saw the Darwin gate and ended my touring there cause it started to rain. I went back to the b&b and just had dinner and warmed up before watching more British "cops" and then went to bed. So Monday Dec 5: I had gone to bed early the night before so I could wake up at like 7 to do some more booking and stuff for my moms trip cause at midnight my plan started again. But Michael woke me up at 12:30 am so I just did some booking then and there. 3 hours later I went to bed but I set my alarm to wake up at like 8 am cause breakfast was till 9. But my stupid charger didn't charge my phone and after all the usage in the middle of the night, it eventually died after I fell asleep. So I woke up on my own and turned on my phone and saw it was 8:50 am so I literally ran downstairs. At least it wasn't as busy as yesterday (I forgot to mention, there were a bunch of marathon runners on Sunday morning, which may explain why nearly every b&b was all booked up for sat night!!) So I ate quickly then did the parts of the Darwin tour that I couldn't do, like see the memorial to him and the bell stone, and I went inside st chads and asked someone to show me scrooges grave so I finally saw it :-) then I went to st marys church and that had a real greatly carved ceiling and lots of nice stained glass windows. One of the stewards got talking to me, she was originally from the US but moved to shrewsbury (of all places) and stayed there. Then I left to go to the museum. They were in the process of moving to an exhibition space at the music hall so a lot of things were missing, but nonetheless I saw the natural history, Roman and Darwin exhibits. Then I went to the castle. I went to the top of one of the towers. It was good weather at that very point in time so I got some good photos. Then I went to the regiment museum inside the grounds. There was a lot there so I didn't finish cause I wanted to start heading for dudley. So I left around 2:30 ish, went to the b&b to pick up my bag and set off. Of course I realized when I got to the b&b that my front tire was flat again. So this meant that it wasn't just my inner tube that got punctured yesterday, it was my whole tire. But I wasn't going to find somewhere to replace it then! So I pumped up and hoped for the best. So I took off at 3 pm. It was a bit scenic before it got dark, the area of leighton was pretty nice. Then there was a power station right after and that killed it. So this was a pretty stressful ride; my phone was near dying and I had a lot of turns to do, so I knew I was going to need my gps at some point but I wouldn't be able to use it if my phone died! And to make matters worse, I had to stop and repump my tire every 5 miles! The directions were written down on my phone but when my battery got really low I couldn't risk it dying and then I didn't know my next move so I stopped right in the middle of the road (this journey also didn't have any sidewalk for me to ride on) and wrote the directions down on the back of a receipt with a pen that only half worked, using my head light as light. What a nightmare!! But it could have been worse, at least it was a clear night so I used the moon as light a lot of the way. So it could have been rainy or windy. And there were a bunch of annoying hills, especially when I got to coalport, that was insane! But on the flip side, i wasn't cold!! And I didn't end up getting lost, I missed a turn off in coalport but I still got to the main a road in the end (whether I could have avoided those obnoxious hills..well I don't really want to know). So I followed signs for dudley and just turned right onto a road cause my odo told me to turn in .8 mi, but the st name was different so I started second guessing myself so I turned back to the main road and eventually decided I was going in the right direction but I asked someone just to double check and I was right :-) I was surprised that the man I asked knew where the hotel was cause like who stays at hotels in their own neighborhood. so I shortly arrived at the kingfisher hotel. It was a hotel/restaurant/bar/leisure complex all in one!! Which explained why the guy knew it so well. My arrival time was 7:10 pm, did 31.9 mi, max 28, avg 8.8 mph which is probably the fastest avg time so far, yet I did it on a half filled tire! So I checked in, I had the room directly across from reception so I kept hearing people moving around outside my door and I kept thinking someone was just going to walk in! So after my shower it was bed time! I was so happy to arrive after such an ordeal! So I'm going to call it quits here but I just want to remonisce on my trip for a minute, being that this is the last night of my trip. So looking back on my trip id say the place I miss the most is Manchester. Alex was really nice (even though he cruelly joked about getting hired as a bus boy in the gay village and leading me on to thinking he could get us free tickets to the dream boys stripper show) and Mmmmm the smell of the men going to the clubs, with their low cut tight shirts and tight pants.. Manchester was just sexy central!! But on top of that I really liked elise. I think out of all the people I met, she is the only one I would like to be long term friends with (maybe Alex if his English was better, and he didn't have such a crush on me). Maybe Paul Thomas cause he makes me laugh but otherwise we live in completely different worlds. And for the fact that there was always something to do in Manchester! Not even Liverpool had as many walking tours. If I had to choose somewhere in the UK to live (judging thus far by where I've been) it would definitely be Manchester. I should have just lived there and commuted to Leeds every day, its only an hour bus ride away! But ok no more now, time for sleepies!