Ferry Ride

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So, we're on the ferry going to Calais, France right now. London was awesome and I have a feeling it's going to be my favourite city on the trip. The traffic continued throughout the night and I saw drunkards leaving the bar below our room at 6 in the morning when I woke up. I watched a little news at night and a weird version of American Idol but English and the winner got to star in the refreshed musical The Sound of Music. We saw Big Ben, Westminister Abbey, The Tower of London, Buckingham Palace and much more. We either didn't have time to go in anywhere or it was shut. We rode the double decker bus around for 17 pounds. It was a hop-off, hop-on type thing and it was really cool and convenient, I would recommend it. I love London, it's a beautiful city filled with so much history. We went to a little restaurant and had fish + chips and Shaun had a local bitter beer. We weighed our bags this morning (mine was only 16-17 kgs) and got on the coach. The bus is really nice and I sat next to a really cool guy from Australia. I think his name is Jake. He gave me a couple Australian coins once we got talking about our countries then I gave him the only Canadian money I had, a $5 bill and so he gave me $20 Australian. It was awesome. Our driver's name is Sean and our tour manager is Lousie (or Lou). This trip is going to be awesome!

Me and Shaun are sitting here drinking coolers called WKD "original blue vodka" and they're sooo good. They taste like kool-aid. Shaun got a pic of me at Platform 9 3/4! I packed my cape but didn't have it with me as we didn't know we were going there. We got on the wrong hop off bus, oops. Riding the tube was fun though, we did a lot of walking. Last night we checked in, found an internet cafe and I called my mom. We saw homeless Londoners and they were all clean and polite. I would ahve given them some change except I really need to budget. (afterwards note: I think anyone that hung out with me on tour would say I did anything BUT budget.) Our hotel room was really quaint and cute and it had a "trouser press" that was electric. It had two bathrooms, one had the shower and sink and the other had the toilet and weird super low sink/bedet thing. Both had sliding unlockable doors. The best part was that the room had a real key! And the windows actually opened, but weirdly, so I fell asleep listening to London traffic and slurred accents. We had to shut the window and stick some ear plugs in at around 2 am though because some idiot didn't notice his car alarm blaring. London news is hilarious to watch. They were talking about gardening and wanted viewers to call in if they had any tips on growing blueberries. I love the english, I want to live there for at least a bit one day. So, we go to Amsterdam today. Today we go through 4 countries (England, France, Belgium, Netherlands). Tommorow is me and Andrew's (and my parents) anniversary. I have to get them both something really cool and European.

It's too foggy to see anything on the ferry. Shaun got a decent pic of the White Cliffs. We drove by Dover castle, no pics of that though, went by too fast. Looked really cool though. At the French border control, the driver said we didn't have any South Africans on board so we could go right through (even though there are 3 on board). The tour is mostly made up of a lot of Australians and Canadians. There are two from Mexico and some from Japan. This ferry is a lot nicer than our BC ferries, there's even hardwood. London was expensive. Well, everything was the same price as back home, except in pounds. So our two coolers cost 5 something but in CAD that's 10 something.

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