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Kari goes to Lincoln, England
I heard Annette's alarm go off again and rolled over until 8.20. I was just lying there not wanting to get up. There were 12 sets of bunk beds in our room and it seemed like we were the only ones still there, we were. I asked Christine if everyone had left besides us and the one guy sitting on a bottom bunk. I asked him if he was waiting for someone and he was waiting for his mom. Hes from Pennsylvania and is studying in England for the semester. I didn't understand when he said where, somewhere near Manchester. His mom came over to visit for a week and they were traveling together for the weekend. We told him where we were from and then his mom came back and asked what we were doing for the day and we told them that we had just arrived last night but had somewhat of an idea. The guy whose name we never got said someone had told him to do the walking tour and he wanted to do that. They were also planning to check out Stonehenge.
Finally I got out of bed and went to get ready. I went to breakfast and it wasn't as elaborate as the day before; they just had cereal, toast and tea but that was good enough for me. I love cereal and lately have been eating a lot of toast so it didn't matter to me. We ate in the bar and that was definitely a new experience. While we were eating the Pennsylvania guy and his mom came and asked what time and where the walking tour started. We were planning on doing that so said we would see them then. We went upstairs to get our bags and checked out. The hostel would hold our bags for the day while we walked around which was awesome!!!
We had an hour before the walking tour so we into the Abbey. It was pretty, but having seen a bunch of churches and cathedrals now, they are beginning to look the same. But it was still cool, and then it was time for our walking tour so we headed over to the Roman Baths, which was the starting point of the tour. There were two tour guides and they split the group of people in two. The guy from Penn and his mom were in our group but I didn't really talk to them but did find out that his is majoring in marketing and management. Our guide was hilarious!!! He was a pretty old guy with lots of spunk. He walked really fast because as he said there was lots to see and not that much time. His attitude was very much no bulls***, straightforward to the point one. He would say now this way, lets go, kind of thing. He showed us all over town in our tour that took 2.5hours. We saw a lot of buildings, which were different types of design/architecture. He knew a lot of history, interesting facts and stories. I liked him.
He took us to see the Royal Crescent and the Circus, two pretty famous architectural buildings in Bath. I am glad we took the tour b/c I learned way more that we would have and no to mention we saw a lot more and were more efficient than if we had walked around by ourselves. The worst part about it was that it was so cold. I was freezing an hour and a half into the tour. It didn't help when the tour guide was like "Its usually isn't that cold here." Meaning it was a lot colder than normal.
The tour was over a little before one. We decided that we needed to go inside somewhere for a while, and that we should get some lunch. We had no idea where to go and started walking toward this one bridge and realized it was all shops. Shannon spotted a mall off to our left and was like there has got to be food in there. So off we went, there were a number of restaurants on the second floor and we decided to go to an oriental buffet for 6 pounds. It was really good and I got full before I could try everything that I wanted to and I had to save room for dessert. There were three different kinds of cakes, cookies and three different flavors of ice cream. I don't get to eat dessert very often here so I was really excited for this, sorry I didn't take any pictures for you. We had a great view and it was a really nice lunch. Great buffet, great service, great experience.
Next we were off to the Roman Baths. This is probably the most famous attraction in Bath and what it is noted for. It was kind of expensive to get in, but we really wanted to see it. We got audio guides, which is this handset you hold up to your ear and listen to when walking around. There are numbers posted on the walls and when you get to that spot, you punch in the number on your audio guide and it will talk about that area. It was interesting but after a while I started to get bored and would only listen to the kid numbers, which were less boring and lots shorter.
There was a lot to walk through. There were a bunch of displays with recovered parts of stone and such. It was a relief to finally get to see the Bath near the end. I was starting to get a little drained from all the history, as it was a little much to take in. I took a bunch of pictures of this but had to be careful because my battery was running low. Christine and I had fun taking pictures, as she was a little history drained also. There were more displays of smaller baths and other things but at this point we had been at the baths for over two hours and had had enough. We left after finding the other two and taking a group picture. We stopped in the gift shop for a little while and then headed up to the Pump Room, which is a tearoom there. There was this cute fountain thing with water that came from the spring at the Bath. We got to try it because we had taken the tour but it was ok because it was lukewarm and had a funny taste. I drank most of mine because I had a sore throat and was just thirsty.
Now we weren't sure what to do next. It was 4.30 and we weren't sure what time our train left. Annette had left the paper with the times in her bag back at the hostel. So we went back to the hostel to pick up our stuff and discovered that the train didn't leave until 6.30 and now we wished that we hadn't picked up our bags. This meant two hours of carrying our stuff around.
We thought about going shopping but didn't think that would work too well with our backpacks. We went to see the Pulteney Bridge, which was very pretty. It was here that I took my last picture of the day. My battery had been flashing for a while and had finally died. We had a little more time so we crossed a different bridge further down the river and then went down and were able to walk along next to the river. That was pretty. We didn't have a whole lot of time left and were getting tired so we got some coffee and hot chocolate at this ice cream place. It was cute because it was pink inside with cow borders. Christine and I got gelato, which was yummy. Then we headed to the train station. We had a little bit of a wait and then began out journey home. We switched trains a few times. I slept most of the first train ride but after that was wide awake and wrote in my journal the rest of the way. We got back to Lincoln at 11.30 and were all tired. Walking back toward the courts we didn't really talk - what an amazing weekend.
I got home and uploaded a bunch of pictures and called my mom back home and even though I was supposed to go to bed early, it was nearly 4 when I finally got off my computer!!!
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