From London to Nottingham

---

This morning Taylor and I took Hotelink to Heathrow Airport in order to catch our coach pick-up to Nottingham University. Our ride with Hotelink was full of adventure—a crazy, speeding driver who got into an argument with a truck (lorry) driver on a small street. We couldn’t get through because of road work or something and because this huge truck was in the way, etc, etc. So….our driver got out and had a look about and proceeded to have a “discussion” with the driver of the truck. We eventually were on our way again and arrived safely at the airport. On the way to the airport I noticed a really cool pub (which apparently is a chain) called The Slug and Lettuce…it reminded me of Santa Cruz’s mascot, the Banana Slug.
Once at the airport we waited for about 10 minutes before loading ourselves and all of our baggage onto the bus and lorry (for extra luggage). I have, I think, broken the handle or bent it or something on my large suitcase which will be traveling home with me in order to be looked at and/or swapped out at Christmas. And of course because I have a lot of stuff, I paid the 10 pounds for my extra baggage. It’s a great deal considering that the airport charges 50-70 pounds to ship extra luggage. Yikes! So once we loaded our luggage the real fun began.
A) The bus was extremely hot and very little air was circulating at any given point on our trip. B) It took us about 4 hours to get from Heathrow to Nottingham because we had to sit in traffic due to massive road construction plus the time of day it was for a great length of time, most likely the majority of our trip. C) I found some very interesting and intriguing road signs of which I’ll share with you. One being: “Fatigue kills. Take a break.” It’s very similar to our “Click or ticket” signs on the roadways. Also, the naming of different things never fails to change. For instance, a freeway is a motorway or carriageway.
Anyways, we also had to sign a form with our info so that they knew who had checked in to the coach pick-up thing and welcome programme. There are so many people from around the world it’s crazy!!!! But it’s also going to be a blast getting to know them.
When we finally arrived at Nottingham University we went the wrong direction and the bus had to turn around in a very narrow area that was not designed for bus turn-arounds. So that was interesting. Once we finally got settled in it was pretty much time for dinner, which I thought was pretty good. I had pasta with tomato sauce which was excellent.
It was altogether an exhausting day but we still headed down to The Ark which is the campus pub—not my favorite venue already (and it’s not because it’s a pub, but because they allow smoking inside which is disgusting. We are truly spoiled with that in the States).

---