London

At the beginning of my semester I made a list of all of the places I wanted to go while I was in Europe. There were a lot, I mean a lot... and as my experience abroad (at least for this semester) is coming to a close, my apartment and I took one last hoorah to London.


To be completely honest, London wasn't exactly at the top of my list (it was on there though). But it is now granted as my favorite "Big City" that I have seen this semester. What makes a big city? I don't know... just go with it...

We arrived on Thursday night at London Stansted Airport, about an hour outside of London (thanks Ryan Air) at 12 in the morning. The passport check line, longer than expected, gave us another hour and a half of waiting. Who with though? The woman in front of us lived in Italy and had a son at... Appalachian State. Looking to the right of us we meet a guy from... Charlotte, North Carolina. The world just gets smaller.


The next day, too early for only 4 and a half hours asleep, we all went our separate ways and I was able to see how I could do navigating a large city on my own. In the end, I did pretty well, if you ask me. I arrived at Buckingham palace for the Changing of the Guards ceremony exactly way too early and a half before the ceremony. But people were already lined up and I had a chance to be right behind the gates, so I took it! An hour and a half later, drums were heard and men in red suits started marching to the palace. I was wondering if the wait was worth it; some would say no, I personally thought it was pretty cool and was glad I had a front row seat  stand!


Next on my list was Westminster Abbey and the House of Parliament, but first I had to check out the beautiful park that was sitting next to me. St. James Park, one with a wonderful amount of different bird species ranging from ducks to crazy pelicans! With weeping willows and beautiful flowers, spring had sprung and so had the smile on my face! I loved it there so much, I wen't back on Sunday for the majority of the day (we'll get back to that later-- I promise I'll make it quick.) After Parliament, Westminster Abbey, well... outside of both... I took the river walk to pass the London Eye to Tate Museum where I was too cheap to pay for any of the exhibits and decided to check out the free Damien Hirst "For the Love of God" exhibit that displayed a incredibly orchestrated, diamond skull in a dark room. Too cool!


Soon it was time to meet Kenan and Mary at Sotheby's for afternoon tea. I felt a little out of place when I entered and they called me madam and were dressed in suits. Nevertheless the Earl Grey I had and the scones were the perfect treat after a long day of sightseeing. That night we headed to a pub "Brass Monkey" and I had one of the best veggie burgers with a tall glass of cider.

Next day, I headed off again by myself to see if I could find the London Bridge. Without a map I aimlessly followed what looked like tourists and ended up stumbling upon Borough Market! It was set under the tube station and a had a really cool warehouse feel to it. The food there looked delicious and I picked up a few things for lunch. In the afternoon Mary and I had signed up for a tour of the Olympic Park, which was actually a lot cooler than I had expected since I knew we were only going to get to walk around the construction walls. The tour guide, "Margie" knew just about everything you could possibly know about the Olympics and proceeded to name every sight of ALL of the summer olympics and the facts dealing with each. Later on that day (after risking our lives trying to cross the famous Abbey Road crosswalk in traffic) we all set out to find Chipotle (I know, it's bad, but I had been craving it for say... almost 4 months now.) We were all exhausted from the day and headed back to our B and B (Thanks again Airbnb.com) for some popcorn, peanut m&m's and Titanic. (Yes, we ARE in middle school.) I made myself go to sleep before the ending came around...

Finally, third day I got on the Tube and searched for Tate Modern once again to actually check out their collection this time. Very cool stuff with lots of installations. I also watched some of a documentary on Hirst and found out he got his start by exploring his late neighbors house (who was also a hoarder). Many of his first wacky pieces of art came from the things he found in the house! It was getting to be noon so I headed back over to Buckingham Palace, where the finish line of the London Marathon was. It was cool to see world champion runners from all over the world run the race. Kenyan runner, Wilson Kipsang won the whole thing with a time of 2 minutes and 4 seconds. (Really?) What was most inspirational though, were not the winners but those who were still trekking 8 hours later and who were in their 80's, or on stilts, or those who were sadly injured in the race. It was an incredible experience to watch and I'm sure an even greater one to be in. (Maybe one day...)

After watching the race at different locations and sitting in Saint James Park for hours in the sun, I decided to grab a quick snack and headed to the Globe Theatre where they were holding a free sonnet Sunday! It was a beautiful theatre with open ceilings. Later I explored and found both Trafalgar Square and Covent Garden. Both fantastic and lively places with music and a lot of happy people. I was glad I got to have last-minute discovered both before I left because they turned out to be some of my favorite places in London! 
I don't know if it was the nice people, amazing parks, or beautiful architecture that made me like London so much, but I'll be sure to go back one day and check out all of the things I have yet to see!


Oh yeah... I made another video. This one is more oscar worthy than the last but it's a collection of things I saw while I was there! Apologies for the camera shake, an iPhone isn't exactly top notch filming gear.