No one can understand how difficult retirement is until you have entered the struggle yourself.  I know, I know, you think it’s all sunshine and rainbows and gumdrops, but NO!  It is none of those things. I mean, there are gumdrops, which you can have as much as you like, since you are now officially in charge of yourself, but the sunshine and rainbows remain beyond your control.

I personally find retirement to be exhausting, and I’m so busy now I’m not sure how I even had time to work back in my days of steady employment.

So how do I keep myself busy?  A little volunteer work at the local thrift store, spending time with friends and family, serving on a trivia team (we’re the River Rats), and a whole lot of travel.

I love to travel, and when my late husband John and I were on a plane many years ago, an older man told us to keep going as long as we could.  We took him up on that. We visited London and Paris, and took tours through Italy, Spain, and Scotland with Rick Steves’ group. On our final trip together we traveled to Paris, Vienna, and Salzburg with my daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter. And, of course, there were those epic Stabbert family adventures in Switzerland, London and Paris, and Puerto Rico.  So many great memories.

Well, as faithful readers may recall, I visited the United Kingdom in March of this year. Nonetheless, when an ad for a tour called “Walking to Derbyshire Houses” came across my Instagram feed, I knew I was in trouble.  For included on the list of famous houses in Derbyshire was my holy grail—Chatsworth House, I have been wanting to see Chatsworth for forever.  It was the home of Georgianna Cavendish, the fabulous Duchess of Devonshire (married in 1774) as well as Deborah Mitford Cavendish (married in 1941) also the Duchess of Devonshire. This house is legendary. Deborah aka DD (for Duchess of Devonshire), had restored the house to its former glory and beyond and worked to make it a top destination for tourists as well as the set for many an English film.  It served as Mr. Darcy’s Pemberley in the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice. Its rooms were also used for The Duchess (2008) starring Kiera Knightley as Georgianna.

And now, it seemed, I might have a chance to see it.

First things first.  I texted my trusty travel companion Marystephanie, and it took her all of 30 seconds to reply in the affirmative.  We were soon off to the races.

The tour was led by Martin Randall Travel, a British firm that specializes in small group cultural tours.  I had never heard of them before, but a quick internet search gave them high marks. (One must do some due diligence.).

After a bit more research, we decided to sign up. The tour was set for June 25-30. Ordinarily, we retirees like to travel in shoulder season (spring and fall) to avoid big crowds, but it was Chatsworth, so all bets were off.  We were going.