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Published: March 12th 2007
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Rainy Day in London
But it only rained for 15 minutes... The other abroad program I considered attending was the journalism program in London, which a bunch of my friends from school are doing this semester. So, since I wanted to visit them, and since Alyson had never seen the glorious city of London, and since we found a super cheap flight over there, we decided to take a weekend trip to the UK. The weather was perfect - it was in the 50s and only rained for about 15 minutes the whole weekend. And we saw a ton for the short time we were there!
We got in Thursday night and just hung out with the girls, catching up and watching tv since we were tired from traveling. On Friday morning, a friend of Alyson's grandmother who is studying to be a taxi driver in London came and picked us up to take us in a cab tour of the city for the day. He was such a nice man, and knew SO much about the city. We saw all the well-known sights of London, plus lots of little insider neighborhoods and attractions. He took us to see the changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace, which was under tight
security as they prepared for a visit from Ghana. He also took us to his old fish and chips shop for lunch, where he used to go when he was our age and working! We visited all four royal parks that day, as well as the Temple and the Temple Church, the most important landmark of the Knights Templar. After finishing our stroll through the Kensington Gardens, he dropped us back at my friends' flat, and Alyson and I grabbed dinner at a swanky little restaurant across the street. We then met another one of my friends there and the three of us headed towards London's theater district to see Avenue Q, the muppet-like musical all about real life. It was soo funny and so well done! We stopped by a traditional pub after the show to grab a pint, and headed home early after a long day.
The next morning we grabbed breakfast on the way to the Tube, bought ourselves an all-day travel card, and headed to the Tower of London as our first stop. We enjoyed the tour with the Yeomen Warder, and saw the chapel and the crown jewels after the tour was finished. The
two of us then walked along the river to the Tate Modern Museum of Art. The art itself was generally too modern and obscure for my personal taste, but the coolest part of the museum - the giant twisty metal slide that stretches 5-stories high - was amazing to watch! Becuase it was packed and a Saturday, we didn't have time to get in line to experience the slide first hand, but it was still pretty cool just to watch everyone else slide down. After the Tate, we went met up with a couple of my other friends again to enjoy a traditional English high tea at the Reubens Hotel near Buckingham Palace. It was just lovely!! Everything was fresh and beautiful and delicious, and we all enjoyed being pampered and chatting over this darling service. Alyson and I said bye to the other girls after our tea service was complete, did a little bit of London window shopping, and headed over to the theater district once again to try to get last minute cheap seats for an English Play. As many shows were sold out because of the weekend performance, we managed to get seats for our third choice show, "Treats," an English dark comedy/drama about a demented love triangle, more or less. I was pretty critical of the show, but it was still great to be able to see an English performance while we were there. We went to a late-night dinner after the performance at a little 24-hour place that apparently serves the best English breakfast in town, at all hours of the day, so of course I had to try that! After a great meal, we headed back to the Tube to my friends' flat and chatted with them until we went to bed.
Sunday morning we packed up and said our goodbyes and thank you's. Another one of my friends went and had breakfast with us on our way back to the airport, and we proceeded on our journey home to Bilbao. Though London has apparently become even more expensive than it must have been the last time I was there, it was still a wonderful weekend, and it was so nice to visit all my journalism friends from school!
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Aunt Mb
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Jolly good!
I have always wanted to see and explore London. Thanks to your vivid writing it is as close as I will get for the forseeable future. Uncle Steve is making the corn beef today (long story),and Andrew is hoping you didn't run into any Redcoats! We love you! Happy St. Patrick's Day!