So my most recent adventure took place last weekend, when I made plans to meet up with two of my good friends from Penn State in London. Kyle and Simon have been roommates of mine for the past few years, and they are also studying abroad this semester, in Rome. Simon has lived in England for the first 15 years of his life, and still has family there, so he knows the country pretty well. We had been meaning to meet up in Europe at some point this semester, so last weekend when we were all free, London seemed like an obvious choice for a great weekend. And it was just that, after a little initial confusion.
We were flying out Thursday night and meeting up in the airport, since we would have to take a train to get into the heart of London where our hostel was. The only problem was that their flight from Rome landed 2 hours before mine was supposed to, we hadn’t exchanged European cell phone numbers beforehand, and they forgot what flight I was supposed to be on. So after they arrived, they checked for flights arriving from Spain, and picked the wrong one. After an hour of not finding me after they thought my flight was supposed to arrive, they started worrying. They paged me in the airport, called people back in the US to try to get a hold of me, and ultimately ended up giving up and going to the hostel. And all of this took place before my flight was even supposed to get there. So after I did arrive, I didn’t find them (obviously) and after almost an hour of looking I gave up and went to the hostel as well. Luckily we all ended up in the same place, only one hour after we were supposed to meet up. So it really wasn’t so bad, just some poor planning and miscommunication, and a few unnecessarily worried people back in the States.
After a sub-par night’s sleep (the beds were just awful) we started our first day in London with a proper English breakfast – 2 big strips of bacon, 2 sausages, 2 eggs, baked beans, toast, roasted tomato, and tea. This was a nice break from all of the light food I’ve been eating in Spain, finally something with fat, flavor, and substance. We then tried to hit all of the big tourist spots in London – the Parliament building and Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, and the Tower of London. Unfortunately we couldn’t get into parliament/Big Ben or Buckingham Palace, and Westminster Abbey and the London Eye weren’t worth the admission price. We missed the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, but thankfully we would be able to see that the next day.
Despite all of that, the Tower of London was amazing. We did pay to get in, mostly based on the fact that it was where the royal jewels were housed. That was where we went first. Unfortunately we couldn’t take pictures, but they were simply amazing…ridiculous, ostentatious, gleaming, just crazy. I could never have imagined a collection of jewels so big, so much gold and silver…it must literally be of incalculable value. The other neat part of the Tower of London was that it was the heart of London’s defenses for hundreds of years, and is currently home to a museum of all of the old weaponry. We got to see everything from canons and suits of armor up through modern assault rifles. This was also the site where they would bring in traitors and enemies, try them, and usually execute them (and for this it is rumored to be haunted). All in all, it was really cool to see, and thankfully I was able to take pictures of it.
The next day, we went back to Buckingham Palace to see the fabled Changing of the Guard. To be honest, it really wasn’t all that exciting. They packed the plaza outside of the palace with tourists and guards, so it was fairly hard to see anything happening inside the gate. But here’s how it went – the old guards assembled inside, the new guards marched in with a band, the two groups of guards did some military drills inside the gate while the band played, and the old guards marched out with the band. Not nearly as exciting as I thought it would be. Not only that, but tourists aren’t allowed to get inside the gate or anywhere near the guards, so the old stories of trying to get a rise out of the guards since they’re supposed to be like stone can no longer be tested – what a shame.
The next morning, Simon and Kyle’s flight back to Rome left much earlier than mine, so I met up with a few girls from my study abroad program who had also spent the weekend in London. We wandered around and did some random stuff, but the only thing worth noting is that we went to Abbey Road and recreated the Beatles album cover. It was surprisingly just an average road (with a fair amount of traffic that made it difficult to get a picture) in an average neighborhood. But we did it anyway, and I think the picture game out pretty well.
My flight left in the afternoon, and I ate a decent meal at the airport with one last cider and black to end the weekend. By the end of it I was exhausted, but we had had a blast and I really liked London – the first city I could actually see myself living in.
That’s all for now…�Hasta pronto, amigos!
Location: London, England
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Really informative entry! Kyle is in my study abroad program here in Rome and I think I remember you saying that before! I’m going to London over Thanksgiving break so it was really helpful to see all the places you visited and enjoyed!!