Hampton Court!!

On Wednesday Genna, Mimi, and I went to Hampton Court & this time we actually went the right way and got there! We had to take a train there which was nice because we got to see parts of England that we had not seen before. The train drops you off in the area that Harry Potter lived. Before we went to the castle we got lunch at an Italian restaurant. YUM. After lunch we walked across a bridge to the castle and it was AMAZING! The castle was beautiful and HUGE. It was really cool to be able to see where King Henry VIII lived. At Hampton Court you can tour Henry VIII's apartments, young Henry VIII's apartments, Henry VIII's kitchens, William III's apartments, Mary II's Apartments, and the palace gardens. My favorite part of the tour was King Henry VIII's apartments and kitchen. In Henry VIII's apartments I got to see the Royal Pew (where he sat for church), council chamber, the great watching chamber, and the great hall. All of it was amazing and beautifully decorated. Henry VIII's kitchen was interesting because you got to see where his meals were prepared and how much space they had to store food, wine, and bake. AND a big plus was they had a HUGE fire going in the kitchen where we could warm our bodies because it was very cold outside. After spending two hours touring the castle we went outside to the gardens. There are over 60 acres of gardens that run down to the River Thames. & they were gorgeous! The gardens reminded me of the gardens at Versailles. So many different trees, plants, flowers, and fountains. It was amazing I could not stop taking pictures. To fully understand and appreciate my blog post you should go take a look at my pictures of facebook.   

Cheers

Edinburgh!!

This weekend Alyssia and I went and visited one of my friends/sorority sisters Veronica in Edinburgh Scotland! We took a train from King Cross Train Station where Harry Potter goes to Hogwarts at Platform 9 3/4. There is a picture of me on facebook of me at the platform! The train ride there was about 4 hours but it was not too bad because the landscape outside was gorgeous. Once we got there we went to Veronica's apartment and dropped our luggage off. Then we went and ate at a Italian restaurant which was very good. I got a margarita pizza :) After that we walked around Edinburgh down the Royal Mile which is the main road in Edinburgh. On the Royal Mile there is a lot of touristy shops and unique stores. After that we went back to Veronica's to hang out for a little bit before we went out later that night. Around 8:00 we went to a beer garden called The Three Sisters which was SUPER FUN!! We danced, talked, met a bunch of fun people, and just had a great time. The only bad thing is that we were so wired from all our drinks that we did not go to sleep till about 4:30 or 5 AM :/ The next morning we woke up and went to get breakfast at Elephant's and Bagels. I got a cheese and jalapeno bagel with cream cheese which actually was really good. After breakfast we met up with Veronica's friend Sam who also goes to AU and we went and saw the Edinburgh Castle. It was huge and had fire outside the gate which was cool. We walked around inside for a little bit and then left and walked to Princess Street which has a bunch of stores to shop in. Also on Princess Street there was a candy store and we all got bags of candy. Most of the candy ended up tasting weird but some of it was DELICIOUS :) After shopping in H&M and Top Shop we went back to Veronica's apartment to take a nap but not before I bought myself a baked potato!! One of the BEST baked potato's I have ever had!!! After we napped we went out to dinner with another one of Veronica's friends Meg who also goes to AU. We went to a pizza place and I got pizza again but this time I got spinach and ricotta cheese pizza which turned out to be okay but not the best. After dinner we went back to The Three Sisters but with Meg and Sam as well. It was a lot of fun again and we met the Scottish Rugby team, a man from Australia who lives in Brisbane, and a lot of other interesting people.  Everyone gets excited when they hear you are from America which is really funny. The next morning, our last day in Edinburgh we hiked Arthur's Seat which is a HUGE mountain in Edinburgh. It was a tough climb but the views were amazing!!! After the hike we walked down part of the Royal Mile again, hung out in Starbucks and then went back to Veronica's got our stuff and walked to the train station. Our train ride home was 5 hours which was kind of rough only because halfway through it got dark out so I could no longer just stare out at the countryside. Overall it was a GREAT trip wish I could go back again!!

Lost in London

This week was a fun and interesting week. On Tuesday Alyssia and I went to Genna's house in South Kensington and went shopping at Top Shop, TK-MAX which is TJ-MAX in the US and also...URBAN OUTFITTERS!! I miss Urban soooo much!!! After shopping we went back to Genna's house and met up with Mimi and went out to dinner at a little Italian restaurant near their house. I got pasta with red peppers, tomatoes, and mozzarella cheese YUMM. On Wednesday Genna, Mimi and I went to CHIPOTLE which was delicious and a little bit better than the US Chipotle. However it was drastically more expensive. For my vegetarian burrito bowl it cost 6 pounds which is about 9-10 dollars. WOOF. After lunch we planned on going to Hampton Court which is where King Henry VIII lived. The night before I had looked up the directions on the London Tube website. We got on our bus and got off at our stop...Once we got off I knew we were not in the right area. We walked into a shop and asked where Hampton Court was and they all proceeded to look at us with confused faces which then confirmed my fear. We were not in the right place...we were actually 12 miles away from where we needed to be WOMPWOMP :( The palace closes at 6:00 and it was about 3:00 so we decided not to go because we would not make it there in time. I had bought our tickets in advance but the good thing is, is that they last for 7 days! Since we were not going to go to Hampton Court we decided to walk around the area we were in which I still do not know where we were. We went into a couple different bakeries and ate pastries and meandered though different shops around the town. Now on to more exciting news...I am going to EDINBURGH SCOTLAND this weekend to visit one of my friends/sorority sister Veronica :) I am super excited to see her and Scotland! Will write about it when I get home! Hope everyone has a good weekend.  

Notting Hill & Regent's Park

Well my first week of school is over!! Crazy that I only have about 8 weeks left haha. My class on Friday was Human Learning and Memory which actually turned out to be a fairly interesting class. The only problem is that it is a 2 hour class so I tend to tire towards the end. On Friday night Alyssia and I went over to Genna's house with Michelle and we hung out with a bunch of people from AU and had a lot of fun. On Saturday Michelle, Alyssia, and I went to Notting Hill (which is the same place where the movie Notting Hill was filmed..go figure) We walked down to Portobello Road which is where the market is. I am obsessed with English markets which is a good thing because there are about 342,984,732 of them. The Portobello Market had a lot of antiques, tons of fresh fruit, veggies, baked goods, and other various items. I ended up buying a beautiful scarf, a brown leather jacket, and a huge loaf of bread for a pound! While we were strolling down the market all of a sudden there was a huge fight going on. Apparently two men stole something and started to run away and the cops chased after them and threw one of them to the ground and the other guy who got away from the cops two citizens got him and brought him back to the cops. There was a tun of yelling and a lot of commotion. Everyone stopped what they were doing and watched. It was very entertaining for awhile. After the excitement ended we walked further along and spent about 3 hours at the market before going home. Later that night Alyssia and I went to a pub with our friend Mimi who also goes to American but is studying in London this semester. We went to a pub in South Kensington which is right next to where she lives. We walked in and there was a bartender that she had met before named Mario (he said his name like Mario does in the video games it was very funny) He is from Rome and has a strong accent so we could not really understand what he was saying. At one point he looked at me and said I was very tidy and we were all like what tidy? And he said tidy, clean...and Mimi was like do you mean pretty and he said o yes yes pretty. haha After Mario left we got a drink, sat down at a table, and then hung out until the pub kicked us out. It was really fun except for the bus ride back which took about an hour because of traffic. Today which is Sunday Alyssia and I went grocery shopping and then I walked to Regents Park which is about a 5 minute walk from our apartment. Regents Park is 494 acres and is BEAUTIFUL. I walked around for a little while, then sat down in the grass and listened to music. It was so peaceful and a great place to people watch! I stayed there for about 2 hours and then strolled home. I will now be going there every time it is sunny out because there is so much to see and it is gorgeous.

Blue Skies and SUN! :)

After many days of clouds and rain we have finally had a couple days of beautiful blue skies and warm SUN! :) It has been amazing and nice to not have rain. On Tuesdays Alyssia and I do not have class so we decided to go to Covent Garden Market. If you have seen the musical My Fair Lady this is where Eliza Doolittle fills her basket with violets and sells them at St. Paul's Church which is right across the way from the market. Covent Garden Market used to be a fruit and vegetable market but now sells many other things and on Mondays they have their famous Jubilee Antiques Market. We walked around and looked at what the different vendors were selling but I resisted in buying anything. Also while we were there we heard/saw a man singing opera, many mimes, and a man on a unicycle juggling. Covent Garden Market is now famous for having many street performers and they are very entertaining to watch. Once we had looked though the market we went over to St. Paul's Church which is beautiful and has a little garden behind the entrance. Alyssia and I sat on a bench and talked for awhile just enjoying our surroundings. St. Paul's Church is not so famous for being a church but more famous for being a place where shows are put on by different theater companies. Shows are performed outside and inside the church. Alyssia saw the play Romeo and Juliet at St. Paul's Church and she said it was very interesting because the actors would run around to different areas of the church and you had to run after them to see what was going on next. I hope that I can see a play there before I leave London. On Wednesday I had Health and Clinical again and afterwords Alyssia and I went to the British Museum which was very overwhelming. There are about 100 rooms in the museum full with different artifacts. The most interesting artifacts at the museum was the Rosetta Stone and the Parthenon freeze and sculptures. It was amazing to see them in person and up close. Then today which is Thursday I just got back from my class Psychology of Health Risks which was not very interesting today because it was an introduction to the course but seems like it will get more interesting with time. Tomorrow I have my last class for the week which is Human Learning and Memory. I will let y'all know how that goes later on. ANDDD you will be happy to know that i am FULLY registered for all my classes which lifts a HUGE weight off my shoulders!!! More to come this weekend!

First Day of School!

Well before I tell you all about school let me first tell you what I did this past weekend. On Saturday Alyssia and I went to Camden Market which if you are from DC or have been to Eastern Market it is about 10000000 times the size of it. Alyssia and I were there for 4 hours and did not get to see everything. They had tents full of jewley, handbags, clothing, accessories, food, and basically anything you could think of or want they had. I bought a handmade ring, handmade bracelet, and three pairs of earrings.Thank god the stands did not take credit cards because I am pretty sure I would have bought 4828934732974 more things if they had. After spending the whole day there we went home and rested for a little while before heading out again for dinner. We went out to dinner with a girl that goes to AU and is now at UCL with us. The restaurant we went was an Italian restaurant right near where we live. We got a bottle of white wine and I had a margarita pizza which was HUGE and YUMMY. We spent a little over two hours at the restaurant and had a really fun time. On Sunday Alyssia and I went to Primemark which I have talked about before. It is a cheap department store. Normally we would have tubed there but right now the bus and tube workers are on strike. They were on strike from Saturday night till 6:30PM on Monday night. So we walked about three miles to the store which was actually kind of nice because we got to see different neighborhoods, more of London, and get some exercise. NOW on to CLASSES....

Here's the deal...We are still NOT confirmed for our classes which does not make any sense to me at all and I was told we would be confirmed within 3 weeks. Which does also not make any sense because what if you get denied for a class that you just went to for three weeks and now you have to pick a new class that you just missed three weeks of? Well IDK I am just hoping I will be cleared for the classes I am going to right now. Today I had Health and Clinical Psychology which was good but I mostly know all the material because of all the other psychology classes I have taken. I also had Speech today as well which was a little painful because the professor was soft spoken and I had NO idea what he was talking about most of the time so this class should be interesting. But I am hoping I will learn a lot considering I know nothing. Tomorrow Alyssia and I have off (Tuesday), Wednesday we have Health and Clinical again, Thursday is Psychology of Health Risks, and Friday is Human Learning and Memory. I will let you know how classes go as I have them. Hope all is well with everyone reading this ! :)

Cheers