Holiday Heaven or Hell

Holidays are meant to be happy and relaxing. They are meant to be fun memories that we look back at with a smile. My worst holiday nightmare is falling ill when you are travelling abroad. And that nightmare became a reality during our holiday to Guernsey in 2013. We set out from home with a lot of excitement and in excellent health. We were travelling with Condor Ferries departing from Poole.


The journey time from Poole to Guernsey is around three hours and the first two and a half hours of the sail was excellent. We had comfortable seating and had enjoyed a lovely meal. When we were around 10 minutes away from Guernsey, I developed excruciating pain in my pelvis. Pain like I had never experienced and so severe that I thought that this was the end. It was such a hellish start to our holiday. The crew onboard the ferry was very helpful. They arranged for an ambulance to meet us at the port. On arrival in Guernsey, I was immediately rushed to the hospital.

A scan was done and I was given a cocktail of painkillers intravenously. The medicines were not helping so the dosage of Morphine was increased in small increments until they could no longer increase it. Finally, the medicine began to take effect and I was drifting in and out of consciousness. My poor husband had to run around - meeting the doctors, calling the insurance guys and also sorting out our luggage, all of which had been brought to the hospital. This was not at all how we had imagined our holiday would be. I was discharged from the hospital after 2 days. The pain had subsided and I was no longer needed to be under medical supervision. I was weak but I was very happy to be out of the hospital.

Day three of our trip saw me getting better with the medication. I was still on a cocktail of oral painkillers, but the illness that had appeared suddenly out of the blue had abated enough to allow us to explore Guernsey. Over the next couple of days, we visited Castle Cornet, the La Valette Underground Military Museum, Candie Gardens, Guernsey Museum and a few other visitor attractions. The beautiful scenery, the lovely weather and the very helpful locals and hotel staff managed to blur the pain of the awful first two days. We managed to make some beautiful memories on the remainder of the trip. But when I look back at the holiday now, it still evokes mixed feelings. It was heaven and hell together on the same holiday.