On April 14th I took an 8-hour night bus ride, destination: London. Because I hadn’t missed any classes yet for the semester, it was planned that we could get to London on Wednesday and enjoy an extra day. A large group of WIS students were going to be coming down the following day, but John and I left Edinburgh at 11pm and arrived in London around 8am on Wednesday. Well let’s just say that the night bus was not my favorite part. When we got there we dropped our stuff off at our hostel in Victoria, but couldn’t check in until 2pm. So, we set off exploring London. It had rained a bit and now was kinda foggy (something that was definitely a reoccurring weather pattern in London we learned). We got our city map from London Victoria Station and soon found Westminster Parliament, Westminster Abbey, and Big Ben. Then we found Trifalger Square, visited the National Gallery, and said ‘Hi’ to the Queen at Buckingham Palace (okay…she wasn’t actually in that day). The sun was finally coming through and we found a park (the first of many in this trip), where people were
relaxing in fold-up lounge chairs. We took two of them and it came to our attention that people were actually renting these chairs for an hour and a half at a time. Well, this is when ‘chair surfing’ was invented and we just relocated to another chair when we saw the rent-collector coming our direction. After this little break, we went back to our hostel to move into our room and take a much needed siesta. That evening we went to the Hard Rock Café. We got to the door and were handed a buzzer for the wait that was going to be an hour and fifteen minutes! But that was okay since we used the time to walk to the Marble Arch and through Hyde Park. Dinner was pretty good but Hard Rock Cafés are kind of expensive, good thing we brought along the PB&J supplies again! When we got back to the hostel I worked on… homework! Agh! I had to finish up my research for the paper we had due on Monday for our Scottish Globalisation class.
On Thursday we took a day trip out of the city. We had a train ticket for Salisbury and plans to see the famous Stonehenge. I used my ‘Lets Go Europe’ book again on this trip... it is amazing. Once we made it to Salisbury we jumped on a tour bus that would take us out to Stonehenge and
to Old Sarum. Since it was just about to leave we kinda just jumped on, but it turned out to be a good deal that gave us transportation, guided tours, and admission into everything. Stonehenge is still a bunch of big rocks situated in the middle of nowhere surrounded by sheep. But it was actually really cool to hear all the speculation and the mystery of them. We also got to see Old Sarum which was a castle and community of King John. It had turned out to be a beautiful day and we got to eat our PBJs in the sunshine. From there we walked back into Salisbury. Salisbury is a very old town and claims fame to the tallest Medieval Spire that is on the Salisbury Cathedral. The River Avon runs through the town and we followed the River Walk for awhile as well. When we got back to London we found that our hostel had filled up with familiar faces and we just hung out for the rest of the night.
Friday we went on a walking tour of London. There is a company, NewEurope Tours, which offers free walking tours in many cities. London is the first one of these I went on though. It was nice to have an expert with us as we visited some of the same places again and some new ones. She told us lots of history and pointed out things we would have never known otherwise. My favorite stories were about the break-ins of Buckingham Palace. Like the one where a group of German tourists camped out in the yard thinking they were at Hyde Park and the next morning asked a guard how to get out. Needless to say, he showed them out very quickly! We got a day pass for the Underground and used a Tube Map to navigate the city for the rest of the day. Since the London Eye (HUGE ferris wheel in middle of city) was 17 pounds to ride on, we took an alternative that was stated in the ‘Lets Go’ book. It lead us to Hampstead Heath, a beautiful wooded park with many trails in a quiet setting. Very different part of London than what we had seen so far. For some reason we thought it was going to be a hill that would also offer great views of the city, but it actually wasn’t. However, the swans on the pond were a pretty good alternative anyway. It started to lightly rain and we jumped back on the tube. Next we
discovered Kings Cross Station… the one mentioned in Harry Potter. We found Platform 9 ¾ which was utilised for the characters to get on the Hogwarts Express. Then we jumped on the tube again for a trip to London Bridge. By now everyone had their umbrellas out in London and we got some pictures of the Tower Bridge in the London rain. We got back to the hostel just in time to change and get to the Apollo Theater for… Wicked! I was so excited to finally see it. I have had the soundtrack on my iPod for a long time and listened to it on the way down to London and on the train! It was a wonderful performance and definitely met all my expectations and more.
Saturday was a day planned out by Professor Parkinson. We got tours of the Globe Theater
and the Tower of London. It was finally a clear day starting that morning! We got our Underground passes again but they had lots of the lines closed for work that day making it a little bit more of a challenge to get around the city. The Globe Theater, though not the original, was interesting. We got to see a little bit of a rehearsal for Romeo and Juliet going on. The show was going to open in a few days. We got into the Tower of London that afternoon. Here we met the Beefeaters. These are the guides that now chauffeur people through the Tower, but were once very important to the running of the Tower. A lot of history happened in the Tower and also many executions. It was a really neat place to visit and the Beefeaters were definitely my favorite guides. We took lots of pictures in London. Some of my favorites are from Saturday when we took our ‘London Phone Booth’ pictures. These things smell horrible though! I’m fairly certain that my theory is correct- no one actually uses phone booths anymore because everyone has mobiles, but the booths are now used as urinals and by silly tourists! Really they are that bad! We also got some awesome shots that evening by Big Ben as the sun was going down 
and the sky was so pretty. Then we went to get pictures of the Tower Bridge at night all lit up and of Piccadilly, the square that is similar to Times Square with the lights and screens. Then we got back on a night bus for Edinburgh again!
That Sunday was spent stressing over our essays. I have pictures of this as well. I got to my 2000 words by Monday at 1pm though, so it all turned out. :)
relaxing in fold-up lounge chairs. We took two of them and it came to our attention that people were actually renting these chairs for an hour and a half at a time. Well, this is when ‘chair surfing’ was invented and we just relocated to another chair when we saw the rent-collector coming our direction. After this little break, we went back to our hostel to move into our room and take a much needed siesta. That evening we went to the Hard Rock Café. We got to the door and were handed a buzzer for the wait that was going to be an hour and fifteen minutes! But that was okay since we used the time to walk to the Marble Arch and through Hyde Park. Dinner was pretty good but Hard Rock Cafés are kind of expensive, good thing we brought along the PB&J supplies again! When we got back to the hostel I worked on… homework! Agh! I had to finish up my research for the paper we had due on Monday for our Scottish Globalisation class.On Thursday we took a day trip out of the city. We had a train ticket for Salisbury and plans to see the famous Stonehenge. I used my ‘Lets Go Europe’ book again on this trip... it is amazing. Once we made it to Salisbury we jumped on a tour bus that would take us out to Stonehenge and
to Old Sarum. Since it was just about to leave we kinda just jumped on, but it turned out to be a good deal that gave us transportation, guided tours, and admission into everything. Stonehenge is still a bunch of big rocks situated in the middle of nowhere surrounded by sheep. But it was actually really cool to hear all the speculation and the mystery of them. We also got to see Old Sarum which was a castle and community of King John. It had turned out to be a beautiful day and we got to eat our PBJs in the sunshine. From there we walked back into Salisbury. Salisbury is a very old town and claims fame to the tallest Medieval Spire that is on the Salisbury Cathedral. The River Avon runs through the town and we followed the River Walk for awhile as well. When we got back to London we found that our hostel had filled up with familiar faces and we just hung out for the rest of the night.Friday we went on a walking tour of London. There is a company, NewEurope Tours, which offers free walking tours in many cities. London is the first one of these I went on though. It was nice to have an expert with us as we visited some of the same places again and some new ones. She told us lots of history and pointed out things we would have never known otherwise. My favorite stories were about the break-ins of Buckingham Palace. Like the one where a group of German tourists camped out in the yard thinking they were at Hyde Park and the next morning asked a guard how to get out. Needless to say, he showed them out very quickly! We got a day pass for the Underground and used a Tube Map to navigate the city for the rest of the day. Since the London Eye (HUGE ferris wheel in middle of city) was 17 pounds to ride on, we took an alternative that was stated in the ‘Lets Go’ book. It lead us to Hampstead Heath, a beautiful wooded park with many trails in a quiet setting. Very different part of London than what we had seen so far. For some reason we thought it was going to be a hill that would also offer great views of the city, but it actually wasn’t. However, the swans on the pond were a pretty good alternative anyway. It started to lightly rain and we jumped back on the tube. Next we
discovered Kings Cross Station… the one mentioned in Harry Potter. We found Platform 9 ¾ which was utilised for the characters to get on the Hogwarts Express. Then we jumped on the tube again for a trip to London Bridge. By now everyone had their umbrellas out in London and we got some pictures of the Tower Bridge in the London rain. We got back to the hostel just in time to change and get to the Apollo Theater for… Wicked! I was so excited to finally see it. I have had the soundtrack on my iPod for a long time and listened to it on the way down to London and on the train! It was a wonderful performance and definitely met all my expectations and more.Saturday was a day planned out by Professor Parkinson. We got tours of the Globe Theater
and the Tower of London. It was finally a clear day starting that morning! We got our Underground passes again but they had lots of the lines closed for work that day making it a little bit more of a challenge to get around the city. The Globe Theater, though not the original, was interesting. We got to see a little bit of a rehearsal for Romeo and Juliet going on. The show was going to open in a few days. We got into the Tower of London that afternoon. Here we met the Beefeaters. These are the guides that now chauffeur people through the Tower, but were once very important to the running of the Tower. A lot of history happened in the Tower and also many executions. It was a really neat place to visit and the Beefeaters were definitely my favorite guides. We took lots of pictures in London. Some of my favorites are from Saturday when we took our ‘London Phone Booth’ pictures. These things smell horrible though! I’m fairly certain that my theory is correct- no one actually uses phone booths anymore because everyone has mobiles, but the booths are now used as urinals and by silly tourists! Really they are that bad! We also got some awesome shots that evening by Big Ben as the sun was going down 
and the sky was so pretty. Then we went to get pictures of the Tower Bridge at night all lit up and of Piccadilly, the square that is similar to Times Square with the lights and screens. Then we got back on a night bus for Edinburgh again!That Sunday was spent stressing over our essays. I have pictures of this as well. I got to my 2000 words by Monday at 1pm though, so it all turned out. :)
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