Mind the Gap

We landed in London at around 10:30pm, took a train and the tube, and arrived at our hostel in Greenwich at midnight. The hostel had a bar on the first floor, as did our one in Berlin, but this one was crowded and very loud. Like we didn't get to sleep until it closed at 2am loud. But it's okay, because we woke up Saturday morning, had a decent breakfast, and rode the DLR into the city for our walking tour.

We covered a lot of ground in the few hours we were on the tour seeing Buckingham Palace, St. James Palace, Clarence House, the changing of the Horse Guards, St. James Park (including the Queen's swans), Westminster Abbey, Parliament, and ended in Trafalgar Square. On the tour we learned all about the Queen's duties, a little bit about Brexit, about all six of Henry VIII's wives, and that there is always a "spare" heir to the throne, aka Prince Harry. After the tour finished we got lunch at a local cafe and went exploring the West End for a few hours. Sarah, Genna, and I went to Said Dal 1923 while out and about and got the best hot chocolate I've ever had. It tasted like drinking the inside of a lava cake. Then it was off to the London Eye for our 4pm entrance time. Having a 360° view of the city in a ferris wheel car the size of a room was incredible. Even though Big Ben is covered in scaffolding it was still cool to see everything from a bird's eye view.

After our ride around the Eye we visited some of Banksy's works around the city, made a stop at Kings Cross to see Platform 9 3/4, and found gluten free fish & chips for Sarah! By the time we returned to the hostel and were in bed it was about midnight, but it was just another late night full of bad club music and not sleeping until almost 2am. C'est la vie.

Sunday morning we ate breakfast and checked out of the hostel. Sarah's friend Parker is studying in London for the year, so we met up with him by the Tower Bridge and went from there to The Globe Theatre, crossed the Millennium Bridge, and stopped at St. Paul's Cathedral on the way to Doughnut Time where I got a Nutella-filled doughnut the size of my head. Full of sugar and ready to conquer the afternoon we rode the tube to Baker Street, saw 221B, and hopped back on the underground to Abbey Road. One of the most fun things we did was watch people try to replicate the album cover. We sat there for close to 30 minutes watching people run out into a pretty busy street only to get honked at and have to scramble to the sidewalk only to attempt it again 2 minutes later. After Abbey Road, we spent a good amount of time in Hyde Park and visited the Marble Arch and Kensington Palace. Unfortunately we didn't meet any of the royal family on this trip, but I'm holding out on my invite to the Queen's garden party in Edinburgh this summer.

We walked from the park to a healthy fast food place called Leon, ate a delicious and quick dinner, and then took the tube to the train station only to find out all of the trains to the airport we needed had been cancelled due to damage on the railway. We met another girl who was in the same situation as us and all decided to split an Uber to make sure we would get there on time as our only other option was a bus which would have gotten us there 50 minutes before our flight. Everyone in the airport was running behind, paid more to get to the airport than expected, and was in a bad mood. So we made the best of the situation and found a quiet departure lounge to wait in until it was time to board our flight. I fell asleep during takeoff and woke up when we landed in Edinburgh. Sunday night was one of those nights where I was thankful to be home and in my own bed without any club music.

This coming weekend I will be traveling to Prague solo! I will return Saturday evening, so expect another blog post Sunday. Classes are going well and it's hard to believe I only have about 3 weeks left in the regular semester! These few months have flown by, but I am beyond thankful for the experiences I've had so far and excited for the ones to come. 2 months from today I will be walking across the stage in Boone to receive my diploma, which means I have less than 2 months left living in Europe. It's bittersweet at this point, and I'm ready to see my dogs, but I do wish I had more time to explore while here. I'll update you all next weekend, so until then I hope everyone has a great week!