Rainy Paris

We had our second long weekend of our trip here November 10-14th.  The school planned a trip to Paris, so a group of us signed up for that trip - the first school trip we have done since London the first weekend here.  The only thing I disliked about Paris was that it rained the entire weekend.  Other than that, it was really fun.  We stayed at a nice hotel that had a free breakfast, so we took advantage of that every morning.  We didn't get there until late Wednesday night after taking a train to London and the Chunnel to Paris.  After settling into our hotel, we walked around the area and got some dinner at a small sandwich stand. 

Thursday morning we got up early for our first day in Paris.  It was a bummer to wake up to rain, but we still trucked out and enjoyed the streets of Paris.  We did some shopping first as we made our way to the Louvre.  By the time we got there, three out of six umbrellas had been ruined by the wind and I was pretty miserable.  We got into the Louvre for free because we are students, so that was nice.  We spent a couple hours looking around, although we could have spent all day - the place was huge!  On our way home from the Louvre, we stopped at the local grocery store and got some food and wine.  We ate some food and some of us took naps, while others scoped out the area around the hotel a little more.  At night, we decided to take our bottles of wine to the Eiffel Tower with us and watch the light show.  It was gorgeous, and I absolutely loved it, we could have spent all night there.  I had to rush home that night to have a skype meeting with the group I am going to China with in May. 


(Side note:  For those of you who don't know, I was chosen for a student-faculty research project on ethics and information technology in China.  We leave at the end of May and are gone for about 3 weeks.  We are still working on funding for the trip, but hopefully with the grant, all costs will be paid for - even airfare.  It seems like a great opportunity, and I just couldn't turn it down.  Funny how I'm not even home yet and I'm already planning my next trip.  I am one lucky girl.)

Back to Paris - Friday we did some more shopping in the morning, I got a new jacket and some souvenirs.  Then we went to the Notre Dame, which was gorgeous.  After the Notre Dame, we headed to Galleries LaFayette to see a free fashion show.  They put one on every Friday, and you have to e-mail them to reserve your spot, which we had done earlier in the week.  Once we got there, we couldn't find where we needed to be and finally a worker told us that they have fashion shows "every friday, but not today."  So we were a little disappointed, but we were able to go out onto the 8th floor terrace and look over the whole city for free, so that made up for no fashion show.  That night all the other girls got "Paris haircuts" and they all looked really cute!  We decided to meet up with the rest of the guys and go out for the night.  We all got our own cheap bottle of wine again and just walked the streets by our hotel.  Eventually Veronica, Candace and I got into a club called Cafe Oz where we hung out until 4:00 AM.  It was a really fun night, but we definitely didn't get enough sleep.

Saturday we woke up early for breakfast and decided to walk down the Champ Elysee and see the Arch de Triumph.  Along the way we stopped in Louis Vuitton and a bunch of car dealerships that were displaying their latest and greatest.  After that, we hit up Montmarte and climbed up to the Sacre-Coeur Basilica (the famous white church).  Both the church and the view from the top of the hill were absolutely gorgeous, it was only a bummer that it was rainy and extremely windy, so we couldn't enjoy it for a very long before we were searching for shelter.  After that we walked down to the Moulin Rouge and took some pictures of the outside.  We were all pretty tired from the day, so we went home and napped for a while.  Some girls went out for the night, but most of us just stayed in and hung out in our dry and warm hotel rooms.

Sunday morning we looked through some souvenir shops and made sure to get some crepes, as they seemed to be all over Paris.  We left Paris at 1:00 PM and made it back to the castle by 6:00 PM.  Overall it was an amazing trip and just makes me want to go back when the weather is better - I feel like I have so much more to see there.

The weekend of November 19th we just had a weekend at the manor.  Candace and I went out with our British meet a family for Jen's birthday on Friday (which happened to be my REAL mom's birthday too. Happy Birthday Mom!!)  Then on Saturday, Candace and I went to York with the family to do some shopping and sightseeing.  We had a great day away from the manor.  Saturday night we had a costume ball at the manor, a Halloween in November, which was really fun.  We dressed up as pageant girls and had a blast eating good food (for once) and dancing the night away.  We leave tomorrow for Greece and we will be there for five days and I can't wait for some nice warm weather right off the ocean.


Less than a month before I come home and I can't wait to see you all!! 

Candace's 21st in London

Wow, time is flying - I can't believe it has been so long since I have updated my blog.  I am sorry, school just seems to be taking over my weeks and we have been gone every weekend, keeping me very busy! On November 5th, we went to London with our school for a field trip to St. Paul's Cathedral and the National Gallery/Portrait Gallery.  St. Paul's Cathedral was really neat - we got a tour around the inside by a professor, and then were able to go up to the top (a LOT of stairs) and look over the whole city.  It was kind of rainy and cloudy out, but the view was still gorgeous.  In the afternoon, we headed over to the National Gallery.  Since I had already seen it with my mom, we decided to spend some time eating at a nice restaurant.  After that, we headed back to the buses to get our luggage for the weekend.  We got a free pass down to London, and if we decided to stay the weekend we had to find our own transportation home.

Candace's friend Ryan has an apartment in London where he is studying abroad and said we (Candace, Veronica, Talia, Holly, and I) could crash at his place for the weekend.  He met us at St. Paul's cathedral and we went to his house right away.  It was pouring rain out, but we decided we still wanted to go out to celebrate Candace's 21st birthday (Nov 2).  So we got ready and headed out to a pub crawl.  We went to a couple different places and ended up at Ministry of Sound, which is supposedly one of the best clubs in Europe.  Due to the rain, and the fact that we had no idea where we were compared to Ryan's apartment, we took a cab home and crashed for the night.

The next day we just HAD to go to the only Chipotle in England for lunch, and then we went shopping for a couple hours.  In exchange for a place to stay, we promised to make Ryan and his roommates a home cooked meal, so that is what we did on Saturday night.  It was the same meal we had made my mom the last time we were in London, a pasta with olive oil and vegetables.  After that, we just relaxed and went to bed early because we were so tired.

In the morning we left early to catch the first train back to Grantham.  We just barely made the train in time.  To add to our stressful morning, when the conductor came to collect my ticket he told me that I had the wrong ticket.  Turns out, the ticket office in Grantham gave me a ticket from Grantham to London, instead of London to Grantham.  Despite my attempt at explaining the situation, I had to pay a 57 pound fee to buy the correct ticket.  Trust me, I was not happy.  After talking to a couple people from the company, I am currently working on getting all my money back, but I have learned now to check the train ticket before I leave the ticket office.

Overall, it was a fun weekend, and our last in London before we come home. Miss you all, Love you!

Amsterdam

I'm sorry for not updating this as I should.  The days seem to go by so fast and each weekend we are off to another country.  On October 29-31 a group of us went to Amsterdam to see the gorgeous canal city.  There was a lot of students from our school there, but we traveled with 14 of us (6 girls, and 8 boys).  We flew out of East Midlands early Friday morning (the same day they found the bomb on the cargo plane - a little too close to home if you ask me).  The 14 of us were split up between three different hostels, so the 6 of us girls set off to find our hostel as soon as we got there.  We stayed in a Christian Youth Hostel, as we were told these were the safest and nicest to stay at in Amsterdam.  We checked in and took a quick nap, as we had gotten up at 3:00 Am to catch the taxi to the airport in time.  Then we explored the city for a little bit.  We walked around the streets by all the cafes and canals in between streets.  We visited the "I Amsterdam" sign and saw the outside of the Van Gogh Museum, but decided it was too expensive to visit. 

On Saturday we woke up and explored the city some more - only to realize that our hostel was in the red light district.  Our hostel was very nice and I'm glad we stayed there, but it was ironic that it was in the red light district.  While exploring Amsterdam on Saturday we came across a couple Halloween pub crawls and decided it would be fun if we did one as a big group.  We ended up choosing one that let the first ten girls in for free.  Guess what? We got in for free.  We didn't have very good costumes because we had been told that Amsterdam doesn't celebrate Halloween (which they really don't, very few people were dressed up).  We did pull together some costumes and had a very fun night walking around Amsterdam.

On Sunday, our plane didn't leave til later in the day, so we had a good day to do some last minute shopping and visit the Sunday markets.  It did rain a little on Sunday, so that was a bummer, but we still had fun.  Once at the airport, we had a two hour delay and didn't end up getting home until 12:30 in the morning and we all had a British Studies quiz the next day.  Overall, it was a really fun weekend with good friends.  I would love to go back to Holland sometime in the summer when all the tulips are in full bloom, but as for now, I had a great time in the Netherlands.

Mum Visits England!

I haven't posted for two weeks now because my mom has been here the last two weekends and I thought that I would wait and post them together.  My mom and her friend Toni got into London on the morning of Thursday, October 7th.  Candace, Veronica, and I decided to go down that night after classes on the train.  It was a pretty easy train ride, there are lots of trains that go from Grantham to London King's Cross pretty quickly.  When we got there, my mom and Toni were waiting for us at a local pub, each with a glass of wine in their hands.  We brought our stuff up the five flights of stairs to the flat they were renting for the weekend and then joined them down the street at the pub.  Later that night we decided to explore a little bit.  We walked around our area and went to a local food store where we got some breakfast food and some more wine for the next day.  My mom and Toni were pretty tired from their travels so after that, we went back to the flat and went to bed.  

Friday morning we got up early enough to see the changing of the guard.  We went a couple hours early to guarantee a good spot, and we sat there until the changing had almost started, when a police officer told everyone to get down off of the wall we were sitting on.  We quickly made our way up to the front of the crowd and managed to get a decent view, but I still wish we could have stayed where we were sitting all morning.  After that we decided to go get some lunch at a local Italian restaurant, which was very good.  Then we went to the Apollo theater (where Wicked performs) to see if we could get tickets for that nights show.  Turns out they had 60 pound tickets, but we could get a student discount and only pay 25.  We of course bought those right away!  We then headed north to Camden Town to do some quick shopping before we had to go home to get ready for the show.  Wicked was absolutely amazing and I am so glad that I was able to go.  After Wicked we searched for a place that was still open for dinner.  Not many places were still serving food, but we finally found this Mexican restaurant that was still serving food for the next 10 minutes, so we quick grabbed a table and ordered food.

Saturday morning we got up and planned to have a nice big breakfast.  Turns out we were a little late and no places were still serving breakfast food, so we just had lunch.  We spent the afternoon at the National Gallery which was pretty cool to see.  Then we went home and got ready for dinner.  There was a little restaurant by our flat that we had been wanting to eat at since the first day, but it was always too busy.  They don't take reservations so we had to quick grab a table as people were leaving - which we did.  The service was terrible, but the food was very good.  We called it an early night so that we would be rested up for the next day.

Sunday morning we got up and went to a church service at the Westminster Abbey.  It was neat to see the inside of the church and to see how they perform their services every week.  After that we headed back to our flat to move out and go to the next flat that my mom would be staying at during the week I was in school.  It was a little difficult for five people with lots of luggage to go from one station to another on the London Underground, but we eventually made it to the new place and dropped off our stuff.  We headed out to go shopping and came back with food to cook the moms a meal.  We made noodles and vegetables in an olive oil sauce and it was delicious.  After dinner, Veronica, Candace, and I had to leave to get to our train in time.  We got on our train and back to the manor by 11:00 PM.

 I had school Monday-Thursday so my mom and Toni stayed in London to explore the area some more.  On Thursday, they came to the manor for another weekend together.  They rented a car so we were able to go into town; and Candace and I took them to the The Goose for dinner.  The Goose is normally where all the students go to when they go to Grantham.  They have cheap food and drinks that still taste really good.  After that we headed home for the night.  In the morning they picked us up and we began our trip to the Cotswolds.  The English roads are very different than we are used to, so we got lost and honked at a couple times, but we made it to our cottage safe and sound.  

Our cottage was adorable and very homey, it had a full kitchen, two bedrooms, and two baths.  We dropped our stuff off and headed to the closest town to get some wine and food.  Back at the cottage, we drank some wine, snacked on some food and went to bed.  The next morning we got up early to drive down to Stonehenge (about 2 hours).  We didn't get lost hardly at all on the way there and it was really neat to be able to walk around Stonehenge and hear the history.  We headed home after we were done and stopped at a small cafe on the way home for lunch.  Then we stopped in Stratford-Upon-Avon and toured Shakespeare's birth place and Anne Hathaway's Cottage.  For dinner, we bought some ravioli at the store and just made it back in our kitchen.  We are reading North and South for class, so we also decided to watch the 4 hour movie on Saturday night, and then we went to bed.

Sunday morning we got up and went back to Stratford-Upon-Avon to tour the rest of Shakespeare's houses included in the tour and of course, we got some shopping in.  At 1:00 PM we headed home to Grantham to have dinner with my meet-a-family.  We had an excellent meal and were in good company.  That night, we had to say goodbye as Toni and my mom were leaving early the next morning to head back to London.  It was a fun two weeks and I'm so lucky that my mom was able to come out and visit me. 

This weekend, we are just staying at the manor and catching up on some homework before we go to Amsterdam next weekend!  Until next time, Cheers!

Mi Amor Madrid

Well we just got back from Madrid on Sunday, so it's about time to update this blog.  Everyone at our school has to take the same British studies class and we had our first essay exam last Wednesday. I thought it went pretty well, but I guess we'll see when we get our scores back next week.  Due to the test, we did not have school on Thursday or Friday, so a lot of students took off to different places for the long weekend.

Candace, Veronica and I decided to go to Madrid, Spain to soak up some sun.  Overall, it was a fabulous weekend and we wish we could have stayed longer.  However, we did get off to somewhat of a rough start.  Earlier in the week we heard that there were strikes at the Spanish Airports that were scheduled to start on Wednesday, September 29th.  Some of our friends had their flights canceled so we were on edge all week hoping that we would get to go.  We were supposed to leave for the airport on Wednesday night after dinner and so far our plane was scheduled to take off.  As we were leaving the manor in the taxi, Candace realized that she had forgotten her passport so we had to turn around quick and get it (at least she realized then that she didn't have it and not at the airport..) We got to the train station with a couple minutes to spare and got on the next train towards London King's Cross.  We were supposed to get off in Peterburgh (the next stop) and get on another train straight to Stansted Airport.  Unfortunately, we got on the wrong train and it was not stopping in Peterburgh like we needed.  Oops.  So when the train conductor came and asked for our tickets, we obviously didn't have the right tickets.  We explained what happened and he printed us out a new itinerary so that we would be able to get to Stansted in time.  We had a lot of train changes, took the London tube for a short time, and eventually got to the airport only 10 minutes after we were originally scheduled to be there.

We spent the night at the airport and left for Spain in the morning.  Our plane was delayed a couple hours, but we ended up getting to Madrid around 3:00 PM.  We bought a weekend pass for the Metro and took that to our hostel.  Then we took off to explore the city.  The night life in Madrid is fascinating and we had a great time enjoying the nice weather and watching the sunset on the city.  We turned in early to our hostel since we were pretty tired from not getting much sleep the night before.

Friday we woke up at 9 and got our free breakfast from the Hostel.  Then it was shopping time.  We spent a couple hours shopping and found some really good deals on clothes.  At 2:00 PM some of the stores closed so we decided to go back to our hostel and tan for a little bit.  Our hostel had a rooftop patio so we were able to lay up there for a couple hours and soak up the sun.  Friday night we met up with a friend of a friend who lives in Madrid.  He took us to a park that overlooked all of Madrid and we watched the sun set on the city, it was gorgeous!  Then he took us back to his house and we made dinner and met his parents.  Later that night we went to a club called stardust.  We stayed out almost all night and managed to make it back to our beds by 6 AM (I guess that's why they need  a siesta in the afternoon).  

Saturday we woke up after four hours of sleep to get our breakfast and then we went back to sleep.  At 1 PM we moved up to the rooftop again and tanned for a couple more hours.  We finally left the hostel around 6 PM on Saturday and did some more sightseeing and shopping.  After a while we met up with our friend, Javier, again.  He brought us to a typical Spanish restaurant where we had Tapas.  We tried pigs ear and potatoes with a special sauce.  Needless to say, I mostly ate the potatoes.  We called it a night by midnight so we could get some sleep before our early flight home on Sunday.

Sunday morning we caught a shuttle to the airport at 3:25 AM.  We waited at the airport for a while and our flight left at 6:40 AM.  We got back to Stansted airport and took the train back to Grantham in time for lunch on Sunday afternoon.  Overall it was a fabulous trip and it was nice to be in 80 degree weather for a couple days.  This week is already flying by and my mom is leaving tomorrow to come visit me!!  Candace, Veronica and I are going to London on Thursday night to spend the weekend with my mom and her girlfriend, Toni.  They rented a flat close the London eye so I'm sure we'll do some more sightseeing and shopping and I can't wait!

Until next time.. Cheers!

Ein Bier Bitte

Well we survived Oktoberfest and made it home safely and ahead of schedule.  It was a weekend to remember, and a weekend I am still trying to recover on sleep from.  We left the manor Thursday night after dinner to catch our train by 6:45.  The train ride was pretty smooth, we had to get off in Peterborough and change trains but the whole trip only took us about two hours.  We had to spend the night in the Stansted Airport because our flight left at 7:00 AM and there aren't trains to get there that early.  The airport was a lot bigger than we thought and it wasn't too miserable to sleep there.  We spent a majority of our night in the seating area for Burger King.  They had pretty comfy chairs and a TV on so we just camped out there.  At about midnight we decided we should get some sleep.  By this time, hundreds of people are already sleeping all around the airport and the only place left for us is the cold tile floor.  We had no blankets or pillows so it was pretty interesting.  A couple hours later we woke up freezing so we got up and moved to the back of the airport away from the doors.  Around 3:30 AM they open the security gates and we could go through to the other side.  We were one of the first ones through so we were able to grab some benches and get a couple more hours of sleep.  At 6:00 AM we decided we should try to find our gate, but it wasn't listed on the screens yet - it just said wait in lobby.  So we went to the bathroom and when we came out checked it again.  It said gate 43 - now boarding.  Needless to say we booked it to our gate, but we got there in time and we weren't the only ones that were out of breath.

From there we flew to Memmingen Airport in Germany.  We then had to get on a coach bus that took us to the Munich train station.  From there we had to get tram tickets and hop on a tram to get to our hostel which was a little bit outside of the city.  It took us a while to get around a city that speaks German, but we did it.  After we got to our hostel at about 3 in the afternoon, we were so tired.  Our hostel was cheap, but it literally was a huge tent.  There were hundreds of bunk beds in the same room - I guess you get what you pay for.  After we checked in, we decided to explore the city.  We walked around by our hostel and found a park that had some really neat buildings around it.  Eventually, we ended up going back to our hostel and getting some hot tea.  We spent the night at the hostel, they had kegs of beer and a bonfire.  We met a lot of cool people that were traveling Europe.

Saturday morning we got up and headed back to the Munich train station where I had planned to meet my German exchange student from high school, Franzi.  From there, her friends took us around Munich and then to the opening ceremonies of Oktoberfest.  The parade was pretty cool, and afterward we followed the end of the parade to the entrance of Oktoberfest.  The best way I can describe it is it was like a giant state fair.  There were thousands of people there I could hardly move at some points ( and the people aren't exactly "Minnesota nice" there). There were food and souvenir vendors everywhere.  The beer tents were enormous, and they had roller coasters and some other crazy rides (Not sure who came up with the idea of mixing large amounts of beer with roller coasters?)

Because it was the first day, we had no chance a getting a seat in a beer tent - which is okay because I probably saved myself a lot of money.  After we had had enough of Oktoberfest, Franzi and her friends brought us back to Ingolstadt - her home town.  It was about an hour train ride and a nice break for a short nap.  Back in Ingolstadt we went shopping and for a walk around the city.  We saw where Franzi goes to school, her church, and cute German side streets that we would have never gotten to see if we didn't have her.  After that, she took us to a fabulous German restaurant where we got to try some really good Bavarian food.  Candace, Veronica, and I each got something different and then we kept changing plates. 

After dinner we headed back to Franzi's house where we were very well taken care of.  We got to take nice warm showers - which were definitely needed.  They gave us some chocolate, and made sure we felt right at home.  We were so tired we went to bed at 10:00 PM.  We did have to get up at 3:45 AM for breakfast, then Franzi and her mom took us on the autobahn on the way back to the train station.  The coach bus left the train station at 6:15 AM to go back to Memmingen Airport.  Our flight left Memmingen at 9:40 AM and because of the time difference, we got back to Stansted at 10:00 AM.  From here we had to get back on a train to Grantham - not so simple.  Turns out there was construction on the train, so we had to go to the bus station, wait for a bus to go to Cambridge, get on a train to Peterborough, switch trains and finally get back to Grantham. 

Overall it was a fabulous weekend with a lot of traveling.  Now we know that we can conquer almost any form of transportation even in a country that speaks a different language.  Pretty sweet if you ask me.

Last night Candace and I got to go to our Meet-A-Family's house for a night.  Our family is a retired couple named Jen and John.  They are both from Grantham and two of their daughters live there too.  They have two grandchildren which we will get to meet later this semester.  We had tea, watched some TV and chatted about everything.  Then John made us a delicious Turkey dinner and one of the best desserts I've ever had.  Afterward, we played Mexican dominoes for a couple of hours and got home late last night.

After a crazy first three weeks here, we decided it would be best to spend this weekend at the Manor to catch up on sleep and homework.  John and Jen are taking full advantage of us being home for the weekend and are planning to take us to a flower festival in a nearby town on Sunday.  Other than that, there's not much going on this weekend.  Next weekend is our first long weekend, so Candace, Veronica and I are going to Madrid to soak up some warm weather.  Then my mom is coming to visit on October 6th!! Can't wait! :)

Kilts & Cashmere in Scotland

Well, I should probably get to updating this before I leave for my next weekend trip.  I meant to update it on Sunday night, but time just flies by here and it didn’t get done.  So, let me tell you about my trip to Scotland.

First of all, it was absolutely gorgeous!  A group of 12 of us left early Friday morning for the train station.  The train was interesting because some of us had assigned seats and some didn’t.  We weren’t quite sure what to do because some people were sitting in our assigned seats, so we just grabbed a group of empty seats.  After a few stops a bunch of us had been kicked out of our seats, so we ended up having to ask the people in our assigned seats to move.  The train ride there was about 3 hours long – not too bad, most of us just tried to sleep the whole way.  Once we got there, we set off to find our hostel.  About a ten minute walk and lots of stairs later, we made it to the Art Roch Hostel.  We were told that we couldn’t check in until 2:00 PM so we put our luggage in their storage room and took off for a couple hours to explore.  We got some food in a local pub and walked part of the Royal Mile.

When we were able to check into the hotel at 2 we headed up two flights of stairs to our 18 bunk bed room.  We put our stuff down and some people took naps while I went out with some friends to explore a little more.  We went to a small supermarket and got 3 bottles of wine for 10 pounds (hey we’re cheap college students).  For dinner, we headed to a local Mexican restaurant which had amazing food.  We ordered some margaritas and just relaxed after a long day of traveling.  The 12 of us racked up a pretty expensive bill and decided that we were going to make our own dinner in the hostel kitchen the next night.  Then we headed back to the hostel to get ready to go out for the night.  We went to the same pub that we had lunch in earlier.  There were a lot of men in kilts who attempted to teach us some Scottish dances to the music they were playing, it was pretty interesting.  Then we headed to a club down the street where they had karaoke, we put in a request but ended up leaving before they called our name. 

The next morning we got up and decided to climb a dormant volcano called Arthur’s Seat.  A couple of the girls were in flip flops, but all of us made it to the top in a little over an hour.  It was pretty windy but the views were amazing, the pictures hardly do it justice.  You could see for miles in every direction including the ocean.  We sat on the top of the hill for about 45 minutes just soaking it all in and holding on to the rock so we didn’t blow away.  On the way back down we took a different route and found a pond full of swans and ducks; which we were able to feed bread crumbs for a while. 

After making it down to the bottom of the mountain, we headed to the grocery store to buy spaghetti ingredients for our home made dinner.  We stayed in this amazing hostel that had a “chill” room with a large kitchen that we were able to use.  The six boys that we were with decided to make dinner for all the girls – which was a nice treat.  The food was amazing, and better yet only cost us 3 pounds per person.  We continued to hang out in the chill room after dinner and had a couple drinks before we went out for the night.  The workers of the hostel led a pub crawl to three different pubs around Edinburgh. 

The next morning we had to get up early and check out by 10:00 AM.  We put our luggage in the storage room again and set out to find some breakfast.  After breakfast we went to a whiskey distillery tour which was pretty interesting.  At the end we were able to try a dram of whiskey, which for some of us didn’t go down so well.  After the tour we decided to split up into smaller groups.  Candace, Veronica and I decided what better to do than to shop!  We walked all over and pretty much spent the whole day shopping and people watching (there are some interesting characters in Edinburgh).  With about an hour to go before our train left we all met back at the hostel and headed to the train station together.  The train ride home took about 4 hours because they were doing some maintenance on the tracks.  With about 30 minutes left to Grantham, a bunch of drunken 40 year old men came on and were pretty entertaining.  They were singing songs and talking to us about America.  We got so distracted we almost missed our stop at Grantham, but we all made it back to the manor by 11:00 PM.

We took a British Studies field trip yesterday to Lincoln.  It was neat to see the buildings and locations of everything we are currently learning about in our history class.  The best part about the field trip was that I was able to light a candle at the cathedral for my uncle who passed away earlier this week.  The funeral is today, so my family is definitely on my mind on such a tough day.  

We leave for Germany tonight for the opening weekend of Oktoberfest in Munich.  I'll try to update this again on Sunday, but we all know how that goes. Until next time, love you all.

London Bridge is Falling Down.

As I sit here in my dorm room finishing up some last minute Sunday night homework, it’s hard to remember that I am in England.  However, all I have to do is lok up at the gorgeous designs on the ceiling to remember that I am living in a ridiculously large castle.  Every time I walk from one place to another, I feel like I take a different route.  My friends and I have also found numerous “secret passages” in which the doors are decorated so much like the wall, you don’t even notice them.  Although the food is actually pretty terorible, I have no complaints.  All of my classes are in amazing rooms that I’m sure would have incredible stories to tell – If only walls could talk.  Basically, I am still in awe of the manor I live at, and I don’t think it has quite sunk in yet that when I come home from a weekend trip, my new “home” is something I could have only imagined in my dreams.

Speaking of weekend trips, we just got back from London.  This was one of the trips hosted by Harlaxton so about 120 students and a lot of the faculty packed onto three different buses and headed to London on Thursday night after dinner.  It took us about 2.5 hours to get there by bus (it’s only a 45 minute train ride) because they don’t really have freeways here.  There are two lanes going each way but people can come on from crossing roads and of course there’s the occasional roundabout.  

I have never seen a city like London.  I don’t know how else to describe it, but the word fascinating comes to mind.  I really can’t explain London because words don’t quite do it justice.  I don’t even think a picture would do this city justice – you just have to see it.  The hustle bustle city life consists of narrow lanes, small cars, people on bikes, people walking everywhere, tube stations, little shops below apartment buildings, old buildings next to new buildings, and of course all the tourist sites.  By the time we got off the bus we were pretty excited to hit the town and explore.  We dropped off our stuff and a group of about 8 of us left to go find a local pub.  We ended up walking a lot further than expected but finally we found a club called the verve that looked like we could just sit down and enjoy ourselves.  We found out as soon as we tried to get in that there was a three pound cover, so being the cheap college students that we are, we decided to leave.  Across the street was a pub so we headed over there, found a table and were about to sit down when a waiter told us that they were closing in 10 minutes.  As we were leaving the host at the front of the store mentioned that he could get us into the club across the street for free.  So we go back to the verve and he gets on his radio – and we walked in like VIP.  We found a big table in the back and just got to know each other and had a few drinks.  Getting home was interesting because we had walked so far to get there, but we made it no problem.

The next morning Candace and I got up for a tour of the Tower of London.  After a mishap of getting on the wrong train at the tube station we got to the tour 15 minutes late and our group was still standing outside – so thankfully we didn’t miss it.  Our tour guide gave us a lot of information about the tower that pertained to what we are currently studying in British Studies, so that was nice.  We then had an hour to walk around the buildings; we saw all of the crown jewels, the bloody tower where Prince Edward V and his younger brother, Richard, were murdered, and a lot of suits of armor that the royalty used to wear.  The plan was to meet up with some other friends at noon but we never found each other (I don’t know how people ever lived without cell phones) so we decided to take off and walk around other parts of London on our own.

 
We saw just about every tourist thing there is to see in London.  We took the tube to Westminster and saw the London Eye and Big Ben.  We walked along the river and saw the Tate Modern, Shakespeare’s Globe Theater, and St. Paul’s Cathedral.  We were pretty much dead tired from walking so far but regained a burst of energy when we got off the tube in the Soho District.  It was full of places to shop everywhere.  The first store we walked in had five levels, and that alone wore us out so we went back to the hotel.  Friday night a group of us did a pub crawl through London.  We got into 4 pubs/clubs for free and a drink at each – all for 10 pounds.  It was a pretty fun night.

Saturday morning we got up early to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace.  There were so many people there we really couldn’t see much of anything.  So we decided we’ll get there much earlier on our next trip to London.  We then took a walk by Parliament, Westminster Abbey, and the Tate Britain .  Later we took the tube up to Camden Town where they had a ton of street vendors and some really cute clothes.  The guys that were traveling with us were not thrilled about shopping, so we decided to save that for another trip as well.  Saturday night we took it easy and stayed close to the hotel because all of our legs ached from walking so much over the weekend.  We got some pizza and the best bruchetta I have ever had at a local pizza place, and then headed back to the hotel for an early night.

This morning our buses left at 10:00 AM and headed towards Hampton Court Palace.  We spent a good four hours there looking around, watching short videos, and live skits.  It is amazing to walk through a place that has so much history.  The ceilings were all painted with gorgeous murals and many gigantic tapestries were hung on the walls.  Again, there are no words to describe it – you just have to see it.

All in all, it was one of the best weekends I’ve ever had.  It still hasn’t quite sunk in yet that I am actually living in England, but I’m sure it will soon.  Next weekend we leave for Edinburgh, Scotland at 7:30 AM Friday morning for another weekend adventure.  Until then, I have to get through this week and actually do some homework.  Work hard, play hard.  Right?

Love and miss you all!

Welcome to Harlaxton!

Today is my third day at Harlaxton and I am finally unpacked and getting moved into my new life here in England.  I am glad I am done with long plane rides for a while, I left from Minneapolis to Detroit where a boy a couple years older than I was sat in front of me from London.  We had a three hour layover in Detroit so we got some food and he gave me lots of advice, which was very helpful.  Then we left Detroit and headed towards London Heathrow.  They took pretty good care of us on the flight including a warm meal, complimentary wine and beer, and a decent breakfast in the morning.


After arriving at Heathrow I had a very interesting time trying to get my suitcases (48 and 52 pounds) plus my backpack and carry-on bag throughout the airport to a different terminal.  My luggage weighed more than me - the good news was that the luggage cars (trolleys) were free.  The bad news was that we had to get on a train to get to the next terminal and the trolleys were not on a train.  But I ended up getting all of my luggage to the meeting point where some teachers met us and there was a bus waiting.  The bus ride took a little over two hours to get to the manor, but I was sitting in the front row so I had a pretty good view to take it all in.  Overall I only got about four hours of sleep when we arrived at the manor about 12:00 PM England time.

First view of the manor from the bus

My bed on the far right

Words can not express how beautiful the manor is that I am lucky enough to be living in.  It's hard to remember when I am sitting in a dorm room, but just a look outside reminds me that I am living in such a magnificent castle - not many people can say that.  We had our first British Studies class where I met my discussion teacher and they served us some wine.  The last few days have just been filled with orientation session and various administrative stuff.  The manor is so huge we are still getting lost and continue to find secret pathways every day.  I live on the fifth floor of the manor with three other girls.  One of them is from UWEC with me and the other two go to Indiana- Evansville.  We have a rather large room with two single beds and one bunk bed.  Mine is the single bed in the far corner.  We also have four desks and a bay window that looks over the courtyard in the back of the manor.  They are currently doing construction out there, but it is still gorgeous!

Yesterday was probably the busiest day I have had here so far.  In the morning we had a rather long orientation session and then we took a shuttle into the town of Grantham.  The shopping area is about 4.5 miles away from the manor.  We had a very interesting time trying to find the items we were looking far (this is when I miss my Target store).  Finally we found the Asda store which is very similar to Walmart in the US.  We got some snacky foods, school supplies, shampoo, and I got a set of drawers for some of my clothes because our closets don't have any.  I was a long trip with lots of walking and I was definitely worn out.  Then at night we had a high top dinner where all the faculty were introduced and we had the best food since we've been here - way better than the refectory food (our cafeteria).  Afterward I was so tired so I stayed in my room, unpacked some more and finally put up all of my pictures.  A lot of the students went into Grantham to see what the pub/club scene was like, but I am sure I will have plenty of time to experience all that Grantham has to offer.  I was so tired last night I easily slept through my roommates coming home late and my alarm at 11:00 AM.  Candace and Danielle came to my room at noon to finally wake me up - but it was a needed sleep and maybe now I am close to getting over this jet lag.

Today we took our student ID pictures, but we pretty much have the whole day free to get ready for tomorrow.  Also, my roommates from Eau Claire will be very proud to hear that I joined the Harlaxton College volleyball team.  Not sure yet what that really means, but I believe we will be playing other schools in the area - should be fun :)

School starts tomorrow at 8:30 AM.  I have three classes on Monday and only two the rest of the days.  We leave for London on Friday and I am so excited to start traveling and seeing what Europe has to offer.  So far everything else is going well and I am excited for the rest of the semester!  I will probably update this sometime next week after my trip to London.  I miss everyone sooooo much! Love you all!

23 days and counting...

Hello All.

I thought I should get a blog started before I leave - so here it is.  For those of you who aren't familiar with my upcoming trip, let me get you caught up.

I have the most wonderful opportunity to live and study in England for the fall semester.  I will be taking this trip through the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire study abroad program.  The specific program that I have chosen is located in Grantham, England.  It is a small town (35,000 people) and located about 2 hours North of London.


I will be attending Harlaxton University (owned by the University of Evansville in Indiana) with about 200 other American students, although only 15 of us are from Eau Claire.  Everyone is required to take a 6 credit British Studies class, which will fulfill my history generals at UWEC.  I will also be taking a management and marketing class for a total of 12 credits.  Classes are held on Monday - Thursdays so that we have long weekends to travel.  The school has trips planned every weekend for an extra cost, or you can travel by yourself.

I will be taking three trips with the school.  The first weekend to London, then a trip to Paris in November, and after finals in December we will go to Italy for a week and a half before returning home to the United States.  In between these weekends, I will be taking many trips with my good friend Candace.  We are planning trips to Germany (for Oktoberfest!), Greece, Amsterdam, Spain, Ireland, and where ever else we decide we want to go for a long weekend.  Suggestions are appreciated!!

If you want to send me any mail you are supposed to mark envelopes "AIRMAIL."  These letters will take 4-7 days to arrive and will cost 98 cents.  Check out http://postcalc.usps.gov for the cost of shipping small packages.  My new address will be: 
Laura Spelbrink
Harlaxton College 
Harlaxton Manor Box # 76
Grantham, Lincolnshire
NG32 1AG
United Kingdom 



The dates of my trip will be August 26 - December 19th.

 And with that, I will leave some pictures of the castle I will be living and studying at for the next four months!!
Cheers :)