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Summatime and the Living's Easy
hello again! I need to keep up to date with these blogs, so I might as well write this one before I go to bed tonight.... even though I have to get up in four hours. That's ok.
Alrighty, today Jessica and I woke up super early to catch the 7:15 train back to London. Since we knew how to get to the train station without a cab, we tried to walk to the station. Bad idea. It was so hard to lug those suitcases through the cobblestones! So an exhausting half an hour later, we arrive at the station.... 5 mins late. Ha. We had to wait another hour for the next train. But it was an express, so it#s all good. On the train ride back I noticed a cool little thing in the countryside. There is this small canal that winds back and forth but stays fairly close to the tracks. I would say its about 25 feet across. But it looks like for a vacation, families buy these long thin boats and take them on the canal! It looks like so much fun, and the canal is absolutely beautiful. Next time, I will have to ride on one :)
We got into London at round 11 pm. With my sweet public transportation skills we managed to make it to our hostel in one peice. AMAZING! Our hostel is the youth#s paradise. It's exaclty like a college dorm, with an internet cafe, dining hall (delicious food), a bar, and tons of other added features. I am pretty much so ahppy right now :) Plus, it's in the cutest neighborhood. I love it.
We decided to put our Underground skills to work and set out to go see the sights with no map, and no idea where the heck we were going. We got on the train and decided to get off at the Victoria station, which seemed to be the main hub. Good pick! We got out wandered aimlessly trying to figure out which way to go until Jessica remembered that in her travel book there was a map of London! Thank God! We found our way to Buckingham Palace, which is just HUGE! I was hoping to catch a glimpse of the princes in the window haha. Anyways, there was a bug display where you could go inside the castle, but it was ridiculously expensive, like everything else in this country. We took pictures of the front, without the guards because they were no where to be found. Pretty dissappointing.
After the Palace we went down a cool looking long street, which bordered st. Jame's Park. It was the epitome of an English park, complete with a pond with swans, and people enjoying the sunshine on the lawn. In the distance we could see the Big Ben peeking over the trees. We made it to a Horse Stable building and FINALLY found a guard. wow, he did not have any expression at all. What a hard job!
When we went past that, we went down towards Big Ben, just following the top of the roof. We had to stop when we ran into this hoard of people standing outside this random gate taking pictures. We heard "It's number 10, you just can't see it" and "I wonder if he is in there!!" And Jessica and I being the idiots that we are had no idea what we were looking at so we asked..... It's the Prime Minister's house.... whoops. We are definately not from England, and if that didnt give it away, I dont know what else will.
We finally got to Big Ben, and let me say, it's BIG! It's so beautiful too, lined with gold trim with small words engraved around the face of the clock. The Big Ben is attached to the Parliment building, which is actually smaller than I thought it would be. The details on the building are so intricate, it was breathtaking! Right behind us was Westminster Abbey, hands down, we are going in there no matter what. I paid for Jessica to get in cause I wanted to go so bad! And all I can say is wow. There are no words to describe the history, and the splendor of the Abbey. I was in the prescence of Queen Elizabeth I, Queen Mary, King James, and even the church of John the Baptist. I am simply speachless, it was amazing. There is so much history there, I couldnt fit all that I learned today on this small little blog. We went into the Commons area, where the monks used to hold their daily meetings, and on the wall were paintings from the early 9th century, peeking through layers of dust and paint. It was a story of the Apocolypse. It was so neat. But definately the best moment was when we were leaving, I got to light a candle and say a prayer, and then the choir started singing. I will never forget that moment in my life. We were in the temple area and were listening to the choir sing ancient hymnals. I started to tear up! It was the most memorable moment.
After that we went to the Tower of London and the London Bridge. We decided to eat some fish and chips for dinner, and actually found a place that was selling them for 2.50 pounds (super good deal!). Needless to say, its was disgusting! Oh well. :)
We are back at the hostel now, it's almost mignight, but we went to go meet people at the bar area. We met two girls that are on our tour from Australia, they are so nice! It looks like everyone is pretty young on our tour. There was this one creepy guy though staying at the hostel.. would not leave me alone! He is from Holland and couldnt understand a word he said anyways, oh man. It was pretty funny. The girls were making fun of his persistance. haha. But, I think I should get off to bed. I dont know when I will be able to make it to an internet again, but thanks for reading this far. We are off to Paris bright and early tomorrow! We should be there around 6 Parisian time. Yay!! So, until next time, love ya!
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