Longest Day EVER--literally!

Last day in Italy, Last day in Europe :(  It was a sad one.  We packed up our things, and left them at the hotel to set off on our final day.  It also happend to be the same day as Britain's Royal Wedding between William and Kate.  We were just ambling about the city when we happened upon an English Pub that was playing the wedding so of course we made our way inside and celebrated with the other English tourists who discovered this little place.  I ordered tea and sipped it whilst feeling a little bit of national pride for GB.  Afterwards, we walked around and found our way across the island where we sat on the edge of the water and literally watched the boats go by all afternoon.  It was an awesome end.  The sun was shining, the salt water was lapping up and hitting our feet, and the view was something I could have only imagined.  Eventually we headed back to grab some pizza one last time and grab our stuff for the flight back to London.  We left at 11pm Italy time and got back to London at about 1am England time.  We went ahead and went as close to the gate as we could get at that time of night where we all opened our suitcases and redistributed stuff so that we could meet the weight requiirements.  We spread out some blankets and watched the british flick "Love Actually" while we waited for the night to pass.  At about 7am we headed up to the terminal and grabbed some food while we waited to be able to check our bags.  At 9am we made it through security and then sat with our carry ons inside and waited for the gate to be opened.  My flight left at 12pm England time and arrived in Chicago at 9pm my time (or 3pm US time).  We said our final goodbyes and headed out with our parents.  I then got in the car and took the 6 hour drive down to southern Illinois.  It was an intense day!  We arrived home at 10pm US time and I stayed up until midnight which would be 6am my time.  Essentially I was awake for about 48 hours.  Needless to say I slept well that night and the next day I began trying to remember what it was like to live in the US. 

Venice :)

First day in Venice was really awesome!  I think it probably turned out to be my favourite in Italy :)  Only bad part was to travel to any of the different islands we had to buy Vaparetto (water bus) tickets which were really expensive for public transportation.  Then we had to wait to get on the water buses for ever so that part was really annoying.  Eventually we were off to the island of Murano which is famous for glassblowing.  We walked around a perused the shops enjoying the beautiful day.  Some of the shopkeepers were really rude so I waited to purchase my Venetian glass from the main island.  We bought some food from the grocery store and the next thing on the agenda was to ride the water bus to the island of Lido which is where the beach is.  It took forever for us to find a vaparetto that would take us there, and finally we were helped by some friendly canadian women.  When we finally arrived on Lido we stopped to get gelato and then headed straight to the beach.  Unfortunately, that day it was super windy and sand was blowing everywhere.  When we tried to lay down the sand was blowing into our eyes and it was kind of miserable.  I walked along the shore because the sand wasn't blowing there.  The body of water at Lido is the Adriatic Sea.  We eventually picked up and made our long water bus journey back to the hotel.  That evening, we went to try to bargain for a cheap gondala ride but the best we could do was 25 euros each.  That is a lot of money so we decided to skip it and sit on a dock and watch the boats sail by instead.  It was pretty awesome.

Verona

Wednesday morning we got up and left early to travel to Venice.  Venice is a city that is literally built on water so the only way to get around is to walk or take boats.  It was beautiful upon arrival and I immediately fell in love with its uniqueness.  We arrived around 2pm and after leaving our stuff at the hotel, Amanda, Christina, and I headed ot the train station to spend the day in Verona.  Verona is the setting for Romeo and Juliet and a lovely little city.  When we got off the train we tried to find the related tourist sites but we had a little bit of trouble.  We went to the tomb of Juliet first, which was a bust.  The tomb was just an empty box with a bunch of graffiti on it.  So we asked the museum lady where the 'other' Juliet stuff was and she directed us to the city center.  We got to see a lot of the stuff that was in the movie "Letters to Juliet".  It was so cool seeing the infamous balcony and we even took our pictures posing with the statue of Juliet.  We also found the "Letters to Juliet" club place in an upstairs room by the balcony.  We got to read real letters that people across the world sent to Juliet and also write our own.  Eventually, we found a nice pizza parlour for dinner and enjoyed a relaxing evening before catching a late train back to Venice.

Goodbye Harlaxton :(

Last British Studies Final.  Last Day at Harlaxton.  Last goodbyes before heading to Italy.  Today was a day equal to an emotional rollercoaster.  It truly was bittersweet.  We all rushed through our exams and probably didn’t try hard enough on explicating ‘British National Identity.’  We had our final lunch in the refectory with friends and then spent the remainder of the afternoon packing and saying goodbye to groups of friends who were leaving for home/independent trips.  I took one last walk down the lane by myself and enjoyed more English spring.  I trekked out to the Harlaxton church (not exactly sure what kind of church, I just followed the steeple) and I got to enjoy the pristine solitude of a beautiful spring day.  My last walk up the manner was sad as well, it truly was hard to say goodbye.  Even now, I feel like after Italy I will be going back up to school like usual.  So surreal how fast the time flew.  The Italy trip students got to stick around the manner until Thursday at 2am so we ate our final meal together (fish and chips-I thought that was rather fitting) and then took a walk into the woods behind the manor to see the bunker that the troops who stayed at the manor in WWII used to practice.  I got some more lovely stinging nettle on my legs and feet so that was fun and I also scratched up my leg on a branch (I didn’t anticipate that it would be so far back in the woods!).  Pretty much just wasted the rest of the evening away before heading out early for Heathrow Airport.  I will never forget my last few glimpses of Harlaxton Manor as the coach made its way down the drive way and down the A607.  This place changed my life, and I was sad to see it go.

Firenze

This morning we woke up early again to head out on the town.  On our way to our destination, we did some more perusing of the street markets and then headed out to the Accademia Galleria to see Michealango’s famous statue of David.  After standing in a pretty long line, we finally got in and it was magnificent, and much bigger than we expected.  We looked at the other pieces in the museum and then set out to find a place to eat.  We decided to cross the river and look for a less touristy area.  We didn’t find the restaurant we were searching for, but we did find a giant hill to climb and at the top there was an awesome view over the entire city of Florence.  It was really cool to see how far we had walked and all the places like the Duomo that we had visited.  We grabbed some lunch and then walked back to our hotel .  We ambled around for a bit and heard some music playing outside so we went to investigate and found ourselves in the midst of a communism/marxism rally.  Needless to say, we made our way our quickly and explored a local church instead.  On our way back to the hotel, we also picked up some gelato that turned out to be 10 euros, so that will go down as the most expensive ice cream I ever have—15 american dollars.  We made it back to the hotel and took a nice long nap to relax.  Around 7pm, I set off to take a walk around town and then I ran into Marie and Jessica on the way out.  They invited me to go with them to dinner at a spagetteria they found that was far from the hotel.  We walked there and I had delicious fettuccini and mushrooms, and then some tiramisu.  It was really nice, I had a very nice time.  We walked back and our room decided to have a showing of Pocahontas as we packed for Venice in the morning.

The Leaning Tower and Florence

Today was our first real day in Florence, and first thing we went to Pisa to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa.  We got up early and walked to the train station to buy tickets after eating a really nice breakfast at the hotel.  We found 12 euro tickets roundtrip and left at about 9:30am.  Pretty much slept the entire way to Pisa and when I woke up we were there.  We got off the train and got lost on our way to find the tower, but we did pick up some lovely gelato—I got a Lion flavoured cone.  We spotted the leaning tower from a distance and it was just what I expected.  We took our iconic photos holding up the tower and I almost face-planted trying to get out of the way of a photo(not a fun part of the trip).  It really was cool to see this in person.  We walked around their duomo and saw the baptistery and then we did some shopping at the tourist shops along the way.  We then grabbed some lunch at a café (I had a calzone) before heading back to the train station.  Our train left at 1:30pm and we got back to Florence at 2:30pm.  From here we set off to find the Duomo—very gorgeous—and waited in line to get inside.  The outside was magnificent compared to the inside, but it was still cool.  Next we found the Ponto Vecchio which is the iconic Florence bridge that holds lots of jewelry and leather shops.  Seeing as none of us have very much money to spend, we just walked through and a little further into the city to explore.  We randomly heard some music around a corner so we went to find out why there was a random band playing on the street.  We don’t read Italian, but we knew enough to realize that we had walked into a communist/fascist rally.  Obviously, we got out of there quick, and wandered into another free church that was nearby.  This church wasn’t as beautiful on the outside, but the inside was much more ornate.  Our day was wrapping up so we headed back to our hotel and stopped at a grocery store on the way back.  We picked up some food and rested after a long day of travel.  Amanda and I got in our swimming suits and made the lovely jet-bath in our room as a Jacuzzi.  Overall, it was a great day J

A very different Easter Sunday

Today was sort of low key because it was full of traveling and waiting around.  It was also sad because this was my first Easter Sunday that I missed church and also I didn’t get to spend the day with my family.  Anyway, the uneventfulness of the day  was kind of a good thing because I’m getting over another cold, but it was also a little disappointing.  We slept in this morning and packed up our things to wait for the coach.  We went to grab some food and then just chilled because the coach came about 45 minutes late.   We took the bus through the gorgeous Italian countryside to Florence.  Upon arrival we checked into the hotel (big improvement on our last hotel) and we found it pretty modern and spacious.  We have a shower and a big jet bathtub.  We decided to splurge and head downstairs to the restaurant for dinner.  Here I had my first Italian pasta.  It was ravioli that was potato filled with a meat sauce—very delicious!  We headed upstairs to plan our night and relax.

Do as the Romans do!

Today we had a hard time getting started, but we left on the Metro to go out to the Coleseum.  It was really neat to see this ancient place that held so much Roman history.  We then grabbed some food at a grocery store and walked back to the Coleseum to have our lunch.  I should really document all the cool places I’ve eaten lunch at.  We spent the remainder of the afternoon looking around the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill.  We grabbed some gelato and went back to the hotel.  At the hotel, we took a nice siesta and then headed over to grab more food from a grocery store.  We enjoyed the food, watched Italian TV, and just chilled for the evening.

When In Rome :)

What a good Friday indeed.  We set out pretty early in the morning after a free breakfast at our hotel.  Our first stop was the Vatican City (a separate country inside Rome).  We took the metro (with only a slight confusion) out to the area in west Rome.  Our first stop was St. Peter’s Basilica.  This building was beautiful!  We fought the lines to get in for free and despite my uneasiness of the crowds, we enjoyed a nice visit.  We were hungry so we stopped at a pizzeria for our first taste of Italian pizza.  We weren’t exactly sure what we were going to end up with (menu was in Italian) but

we ordered anchovie and prosciutto (ham).  Interesting to say the least!  We also picked up some more gelato before heading to the Vatican Museum and the infamous Sistine Chapel.  Soooo beautiful!  This was a masterpiece by Michelangelo and it houses his works such as ‘Creation’ and “Last Judgement”.  Afterwards, we went for round two on gelato before heading to the Coleseum to meet up with friends.  After we met up we stood in line to get to see the Pope at The Stations of the Cross.  We were front row to see it and I saw the Pope!!! We stood there from like 6pm-11pm.  Our feet hurt!!!  But it was soo worth it.  We tried to catch the bus back but it never came so instead of spending $ on a taxi we were going to walk back.  Luckily we found a nocturnal bus and we arrived back faster than our friends.  We were exhausted and definitely had no problems falling asleep.

Traveling to ITALY!

After leaving on the coach and riding into London at 1am we shuffled into the airport and waited around for our 7am flight.  When we got on the plane I found out I was assigned to sit next to Dr. Taylor—my awesome british studies professor—so that was interesting/awkward.  We arrived and it seemed like it took FOREVER for everyone’s bags to come out, then we had to wait for the bus for a long time as well.  We embarked on coaches for the hotel and I started to get really excited about Rome when we drove past the Coliseum!  We got to the hotel and Amanda, Christina, and I showered to freshen up and then continued our never-ending day.  We left with Megan from the hotel in search of food and finally found a nice little café where we had paninis!  Mine was mozzarella and tomato and it was delicious!  I have a feeling all of this Italian food is going to continually remind me about my ongoing job at Fazoli’s Italian Restaurant.  I finally get to see some of our food in its true element!  We tried to go to the Trevi fountain but our Italian map reading skills are shaky so we ended up at a monument called the Porta Pia.  (Still not sure what this is?  Click on the description—I had to look it up too!)  We now headed in the right direction to see the very famous Trevi Fountain.  It is absolutely beautiful!  We picked up some gelato and ate it on the side of the fountain J  You are supposed to throw one coin in using your right hand over your right shoulder to ensure that you will return some day.  And if you throw in two you will meet your true love.  I threw in some coins and then I finally got to throw in the coins that Brecca, Bria, Katrina, and Gena sent with me for them (which included, a silver dollar, a shiny penny, 10 cent euro, and a 2$ bill respectively!)  Now I feel assured that some day all of my friends will visit as well!  It was beautiful!  Next we headed to the equally popular Spanish steps.  So pretty and there were people everywhere!  We walked back and pretty much are ready for bed even though it is only 9pm---it has been a LONG two days that have blended into one!

Final Goodbye to Harlaxton

Last British Studies Final.  Last Day at Harlaxton.  Last goodbyes before heading to Italy.  Today was a day equal to an emotional rollercoaster.  It truly was bittersweet.  We all rushed through our exams and probably didn’t try hard enough on explicating ‘British National Identity.’  We had our final lunch in the refectory with friends and then spent the remainder of the afternoon packing and saying goodbye to groups of friends who were leaving for home/independent trips.  I took one last walk down the lane by myself and enjoyed more English spring.  I trekked out to the Harlaxton church (not exactly sure what kind of church, I just followed the steeple) and I got to enjoy the pristine solitude of a beautiful spring day.  My last walk up the manner was sad as well, it truly was hard to say goodbye.  Even now, I feel like after Italy I will be going back up to school like usual.  So surreal how fast the time flew.  The Italy trip students got to stick around the manner until Thursday at 2am so we ate our final meal together (fish and chips-I thought that was rather fitting) and then took a walk into the woods behind the manor to see the bunker that the troops who stayed at the manor in WWII used to practice.  I got some more lovely stinging nettle on my legs and feet so that was fun and I also scratched up my leg on a branch (I didn’t anticipate that it would be so far back in the woods!).  Pretty much just wasted the rest of the evening away before heading out early for Heathrow Airport.  I will never forget my last few glimpses of Harlaxton Manor as the coach made its way down the drive way and down the A607.  This place changed my life, and I was sad to see it go.

Final Days at Harlaxton

At this point, we have all just been trying to savor our last days in England.  Plus, now the weather is unbelievably lovely here and everything is blooming so it's hard not to love it!  Here is some of what I've been up to lately.

Burghley House: This was a free trip we could take on a Wednesday afternoon.  It just so happened that the day we went was absolutely gorgeous (warmest day of the year at that point!)  We explored the house, which was used as Lady Catherine's house in Pride and Prejudice the film.  It was grand, and very beautiful!  Then we ventured out to the gardens for some spring fun!  They had a lot of really cool fountains, flowers, and even a maze!

Capture the Flag:  This was awesome!  We played outside around the manor after dark and my team dominated--well sort of!  It reminded me of playing games back in youth group during high school.  It was kind of dangerous though because there is so much to trip on, etc. 

Costume Ball:  Once again, really really great way to end the semester.  I dressed up as James Bond, but the girl version.  It was cool to see what everyone else came up with.  We had a nice dinner and then a dance in the Great Hall.  That night Amanda met some Bobby's as well (police officers) and they were nice (we got to take our picture with them!) 

Fair in Grantham:  This was really fun.  They set up a fair inside the streets of Grantham and it reminded me of the one they have every May in Mt. Vernon.  It was fun, Amanda and I both played a game and she won a goldfish named Algae and I won a banana!  We also got some doughnuts (we wanted funnel cake but I guess that isn't popular here?!)

Valedictory Dinner:  Bittersweet.  Last day of classes!  But it also meant that things were coming to a close.  It was a lovely dinner and afterwards we all headed out to the bistro for the last time.  It was a great night hanging out with Cara and Kelsey.  We made plans to meet up at Holiday World this summer so I hope we can make that happen.

Packing:  Ughh--not fun.  I had to pack stuff take to Italy, and also pack everything that was left in my suitcases to meet me at the airport.  This was a process, and I had to give some things away.

Bakewell/Chatsworth House Trip:  On my final Friday my English Novel class took another trip out to Bakewell and Chatsworth to see the home that Jane Austen based Mr. Darcy's house, Pemberley, after in Pride and Prejudice.  It was magnificant.  We started our day in Bakewell where we went to a tea shop for some tea and a famous Bakewell Tart.  As a group we trekked on public footpaths across sheep pastures to find the Chatsworth house.  The view approaching the house is iconic, but in our experience we got to come over the hill and see it "shrinkwrapped" essentially.  They were doing construction on the front of the house which was a bummer but it was still really magnificant.  The inside of the home was spectacular, so ornate!  Some of the rooms have been used in filming of Pride and Prejudice so I can't wait to get home and watch it again!  My favourite part was going out to the gardens.  These romantic style gardens are built to impress you and make you think that you are in the middle of nature--it worked!  So pretty, and so full of fountains!  Unfortunately, I ran out of camera battery so I don't really have picture evidence :(  This trip was really really rewarding and I had an amazing time.

Belvoir Castle Adventure:  On Monday Amanda and I had a day off from finals so we decided to take a walking trip to Belvoir Castle.  On a clear day I can see it from my bedroom window, but it is a good five miles away.  We brought directions, but we decided to meander around and take the wonderful public footpaths they have in England (I wish the US had them, you can walk right through ppl pastures and yards using styles to climb over their fences and such--very neat!)  We left at 9:30 and finally arrived at the castle at about noon.  Unfortunately, it was closed!  We did get some Belvoir springs juice that was delicious!  On our way back we decided to just go south because that was the direction that Harlaxton was in relation to the castle (I used my compass so that was cool).  We kind of got lost, went to Knipton and Croxton Kerrial.  We saw a LOT of English countryside that was very lovely.  Lots of flowers and lots of animals-sheep, ram, white horse, chickens, birds, cows, and so much more!  We even fed an apple to Steedy-our white horse!  Amanda found a magic feather and we literally walked out feet off!  We were sort of lost, and eventually we had to call a cab to pick us up because we needed to make it back for Amanda's checkout time.  It was a really fun adventure and I had a really goood time exploring!

Final Exams:  Not so fun, and took up a lot of my last time in England so I wasn't so happy about that.  It also made it very difficult to concentrate knowing that I had to get packed, say my goodbyes, and get ready for a trip to italy.  But I got through them thank goodness!

London- Round III

Last weekend Amanda and I set out to London to meet up with one of her high school friends and show her around the city.  We did a lot of the same things as before, but here is a little description about the things we did while visiting.  It was an absolutely GORGEOUS weekend--no rain which is not normal!
Camden Town- We went bargain shopping here and found some cool clothes.  We grabbed some dinner and sat by the canal to eat it.
Oxford Street- We took Nicki here to introduce her to Primark.  Primark was crazy busy, but not the busiest I've seen it!  We found some great deals and I picked up some more 1£ sunglasses to replace the ones I broke in Spain.
10 Downing St.- This is where the Prime Minister lives so that was kind of cool.
Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace- Wow there was a LOT of people there.  The crowd was quite overwhelming, but we got to see the famous ceremony that was full of fanfare. 
Portobello Road- The street where the riches of ages are sold.  Anything and everything a truck can unload, are sold by the barrel on Portobello Road! This is the largest street market in the world and they sing about it in the classic movie "Bed Knobs & Broomsticks."  It was pretty awesome, I bought a cool vintage necklace and some frozen yogurt (it is just sooo good!).
Oh and we ran into a interesting guy in the lobby of our hostel who used tarot cards to read our fortune.  It was free, thank goodness because apparently my life is so confusing that it isn't really in the cards.  We had a laugh though and pretty much tried to avoid him the rest of the weekend

:( Last Day in Spain

Spain has been my favourite trip so far, so it was sad on the final day to say goodbye.  The last day we slept in as late as we could because of how tired we were from Granada the day before.  Plus, we changed time so we lost another hour (it was very hard to figure out what time we wanted to get up when you had to figure out the time change plus the fact that Spain is already an hour ahead!).  We left and went straight to the beach for the last time and spent some time just laying out and soaking up the rays.  I had fun making words in the sand with the rocks i found on the beach.  We decided to attend mass at the big church in Malaga so we headed out there.  It was definitely an interesting service because A. I'm not catholic so it tends to get confusing for me B. The mass was in Spanish so I didn't understand what they said C. there were tons of kids running around and crying D. Some lady fell during the mass so that was scary E.  The frequency of the priests microphone was picking up some random lady talking on the phone or something and apparently what she was saying was funny.  It was a cool experience though.  Afterwards we found a restaurant to eat at because everything else in town was closing up for the siesta hours.  I ordered a Malaga salad that was pretty good.  It had potatoes, olivves, oragnes, etc.  We ventured over to visit the Picasso museum and luckily it is free on Sundays.  It was cool to see some Picasso art in real life in the city where he was born.  We still had time to kill so we ate some more deliecious frozen yogurt from LlaoLlao and people watched.  We decided to move over to the pier where the cruise ships come in to do the same in order to kill time waiting to head to the airport.  They had a cool pirate ship there so of course I pretended to be a pirate in front of it.  We made a secret hiding spot to leave our towels behind for Emily to pick up too so that was exciting.  At about 8:30 pm we headed over to the airport to get ready for our flight at 10:50pm.  When I was going through security they made me search through my entire bag to find this really cool shiny rock that I found at the beach and was going to use as a paper weight :(  That was really frustrating, and then my sunglasses broke so I was just having a hard time for a bit.  I got on the plane and zonked out all the way back to London.  We arrived at Gatwick and picked up some food to eat while we waited the 4 hours until the first trains go on monday morning.  We tried to sleep, but it was freezing and there was only enough room to sit.  This part of the trip is always annoying , but we save money by taking the late flights so it's give and take.  I arrived back at the manor at 7:30 am with enough time to shower, eat breakfast, and then go to lecture at 8:30.

Granada!

Granada by Frankie Laine

Saturday we woke up really early to head to the bus station to catch one to Granada-about a 2 hour bus ride from Malaga.  This was a great day trip and when we arrived we met up with Clare's friend from high school who agreed to show us around for the day.  We headed out to the city centre and right away I could tell that it was quite different from Malaga.  Mainly, it wasn't quite so tropical as Malaga because it wasn't on the beach.  Granada was much more brown and not quite so verdant---but also very beautiful!  Our first endeavor was the Alhambra.  Once again, it involved climbing up a giant mountain/hill!  Here's some info about it--""literally "the red one"), the complete form of which was Calat Alhambra (الْقَلْعَةُ ٱلْحَمْرَاءُ, Al-Qal‘at al-Ḥamrā’ , "the red fortress"), is a palace and fortress complex constructed during the mid 14th century by the Moorish rulers of the Emirate of Granada in Al-Andalus, occupying the top of the hill of the Assabica on the southeastern border of the city of Granada in the Autonomous Community of Andalusia.  It had some pretty spectacular views of the city!  And you could see the Albaicin which is a hill that led up to our next stop and lookout point.  Following is info about the Albaicin--a district of present day Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain, that retains the narrow winding streets of its Medieval Moorish past. It was declared a world heritage site in 1984, along with the more famous Alhambra.

It rises on a hill facing the Alhambra and many tourists journey into the Albayzin primarily for the spectactular views of the Alhambra from the viewing point by the church of San Nicolas". Next we made our way back down to the city center to visit the Cathedral.  It was pretty spectactular, but what we really wanted to see was in the Capilla Real, so we had to pay twice unfortunately.  In the Chapel, we saw where Ferdinand and Isabella are buried.  They were the spanish monarchs who gave Christopher Columbus the ships for his journey to the new world and they also are the parents of Catherine of Aragon.  Furthermore, they also re-seized southern spain back from the moors who had taken over.  After we got some more frozen yogurt (our new favourite!) and did a little shopping on the Albaicin where you can buy all sorts of souvenirs.  We ended our day of sightseeing with some tapas (appetizers--ours were tiny sandwiches).  In Granada, you get free tapas with the purchase of a drink, so we drank some delicious tinto de veranos and rested our feet!  All of spain is full of brick roads so my feet were TIRED!  We headed back to the bus to head home and made our journey back out to the hostel.  When we arrived we were hungry so we had some paella which is a valencian dish popular in spain.  There is a picture below because it is hard to explain--it was delicious!

Spain: Day 3

The next day we spent in Malaga and it was really fun as well!  After a late night, we had to drag ourselves out of bed to get out on Friday morning but it was another lovely day in Spain!  Today I set out with a bit of a sunburn, so the locals kind of looked at me funny b/c A. they didn't think it was warm enough to go to the beach and B. they don't get sunburns---but I had fun so that was all that matters!  We met up with Emily and Clare again to explore the Alcazaba (fortress) and the palace.  It was absolutely beautiful as well, and I especiall liked the flowers beginning to grow there.  After that we all went to the Cafe de Madrid and Emily introduced us to churros con chocolate.  Amazing!  It was just like "american" churros except there was no sugar and cinamon and instead you dip them into this really thick hot chocolate stuff!  Muy sabroso!  Oh and we learned the "spoon test" which is to test the thickness of the chocolate.  You see if you spoon floats on top and if so it is perfect for this dessert!  I liked it a lot, but it was really intensely chocolate!  We went back to the Mercadona (grocery store) and picked up some more crackers, cheese, and mandarinos and then headed to the beach.  We all enjoyed another siesta on the beach.  That night, we met up again to hang out again in the city and try some more "spanish" food.

We'll I've Never Been to Spain, But I kind of like the Music :)

First day in Spain.  WOW!  It was sooo beautiful there!  One of my favourite places I visited.  We were so excited about the warm sunny weather than Amanda and I packed all sundresses and skirts to wear there which was awesome except all of the Spaniards gave us funny looks because they thought the upper 70 degree weather is cold.  Amanda and I woke up early and got ready to ride the bus into the city to meet up with Clare and Emily.  Emily acted as our personal tour guide the first two days in Malaga so we set off to the Castillo de Gibralfaro.  Here is a better description of it than I can give, "The Castillo de Gibralfaro in Malaga is situated above the Alcazaba and is connected by a path at the eastern end of the Alcazaba. It was built in the 14th and 15th centuries by the Muslim King Yusuf....The castle was constructed as a fortress to defend the Alcazaba against the spread of artillery use. The fortification includes the defensive devices of a large flanking tower, a rampart perimeter adapted to the terrain by zigzaging walls and an angled gateway."  It was an intense climb (another time in Europe when we found ourselves climbing a mountain) but the view was spectacular.  From here you could view the dock, the meditteranean sea, and the entire city.  We walked around for a good part of the morning and then we made the trek back down.  We stopped by a chino (type of store) and picked up some beach towels and then went to the Mercadona for a picnic lunch.  Amanda and bought some gouda cheese (really good), crackers, and a bag of mandrinos (mandarin oranges).  We met up on the beach and sunbathed, ate, and played in the water.  It was really awesome to go into the Mediterranean Sea because I never thought I would.  While we were there there were a lot of waves up at the shore which apparently is very unusual for this body of water.  The waves were pretty intense at some points.  Between Amanda and I, we ate almost the entire bag of oranges in one afternoon---they were SO good!  We also took a siesta on the beach and it was glorious!  We headed back at late afternoon to shower and rest because we planned to meet up at 11pm to go out (Spainards don't even start to go out for the night until like midnight! so crazy!).  Amanda and I went up to the city centre and did some shopping and ate dinner (they eat really late too) at 100 Manneditos.  It took us a while to figure out how to order but we found the sandwiches we got interestingly good. Clare, Emily, and some of Emily's friends from her school met us for Salsa Dancing.  We danced the night away and it was really fun!  It is always interesting to dance with people who don't speak English because we had to try to communicate using the little bit of spanish I know.  Overall it was just a great night!

En Route to Spain

Last Wednesday began my trip to Malaga, Spain.  Malaga is on the Costa del Sol of Spain, or in other words, it is a beach city on the southern coast.  It actually is just across the sea from Moracco which is on the nothern side of Africa.  Anyways, Wednesday started off with me attending our 8:30 British Studies Lecture but then skipping my seminar class so that we could catch the 10:10 shuttle to Grantham in order to leave by train to Gatwick Airport at 12:00pm (I'm sure my teachers understood).  Amanda and I caught a bite to eat at the Goose and proceeded out to wait at the train station where I took this photo.  It is part excitement about the beautiful weather in Engand, but mostly sheer joy because I'm about to go to sunny Spain!  Amanda, Clare, and I pretty much spent the rest of the day moving from one form of public transportation to another until we finally arrived at Malaga at about 9pm.  We took a bus from the airport to the city to meet Emily, our friend from Eastern who is studying abroad there.  It was so exciting to be reunited in Spain!  She took us on a general walking tour of the city centre and then sent Amanda and I off to our hostel further out of the city but right by the beach.  The weather was absolutely beautiful and you could just smell the green and verdant flowers and palm trees!  Amanda and I got off at what we thought was our stop but in reality we somehow went too far.  So we ended up walking around for about an hour looking for the hostel.  We tried asking people for help but first of all, we came across a language barrier because they didn't speak english and then even more so they just didn't know where The Melting Pot Hostel was.  Eventually we called and finally located it.  When we arrived we felt very welcome and our accomodations were pretty good as well.  I went to bed being able to hear and see the ocean out the window which was a very pleasant experience!

London Field Trip, Wicked, & Cadbury World!

Although technically I was just around the manor, last weekend was jam-packed with activities that kept me out and about until Sunday afternoon.  Friday we had a field trip to London where we toured St. Paul's Cathedral, the National Gallery, and the National Portrait Gallery.  It was a typical day in England, rainy and sort of miserable but overall it was fun.  The cathedral is magnificant on the inside and we climbed all the way to the top (really intense climb) and saw an awesome view of London.  We ate our sack lunches and then headed out to see portraits and paintings that we have been discussing in class, in real life (which was very neat).  In Trafalgar Square we also got to see the official countdown to the olympics which will be held next year in London.  We had a lovely dinner at a restaurant called Garfunkels before trekking over to the Apollo theater to see a performance of the musical, Wicked.  The walk was lovely because everything was really lit up in the city.  The play was awesome as well, just as cool as when I saw it the first time at the Fox.  Following this, we made our way back to the bus to take us home.  My group did stop by a McDonalds and I bought my only American Fast food purchase while in Europe which was my personal favourite, ice cream cone.  I just had to see if it was as good overseas!  We made it back at 2am and then I went to bed because I had to be back on the bus the next morning by 8am to go to Cadbury World.  I have come to love Cadbury chocolate since being in England because I have been introduced to the wide array of candy they make (besides merely the Easter eggs that they sell in the US).  It was really fun, we got lots of free chocolate too!  The Cadbury brothers who started the company are remembered for the stellar way they treated their employees during the industrial revolution.  They even built a town called Bourneville for their employees to live in.  It was a really neat tour and afterwards we got to go into Birmingham to shop at the Bull Mark shopping center.  The only way I can describe it is INSANE!  Seriously we went into Primark (cool store I shopped at in Nottingham as well) and you would have thought it was Christmas-except it was just a saturday in March!  Finally we came home and ate dinnner before going out to celebrate my friend Christina's birthday.  It was a good couple of days, but I was relieved on Sunday to be able to relax!

A little bit of everything (it's been a while)

So it's been a REALLY long time since I blogged last but I haven't been on any major trips so it's hard for me to remember!  Following are a few short blurbs about what I've been up to in the last two weeks.

Nottingham: On a Friday free from classes, Shelby, Amanda and I caught the train to Nottingham for a day of shopping and Robin Hood.  Here we discovered the BEST store ever-Primark!  It has super cheap clothes and it's cheaper than even walmart shopping (even with the exchange rate!)!  It was bliss :)  We shopped to our heart's content and worked to complete out "english" wardrobe.  Mine still needs work, but I found some great stuff to wear on our new tradition, "Dress Up Wednesday."  We started trying to dress up for school on wednesdays just for fun.  Except this last wednesday we all dressed down due to the British Studies test that afternoon.  Somehow taking a test in sweats is just more comfortable than doing so in a dress ;)

A frolic about the manor: Last week was probably the most sunny week we have had so far!  It was absolutely brilliant!  The picture on this blog is from one of our days of bliss outside.  We took walks down the drive, ran around barefoot, and did cartwheels (or I attempted anyway lol). 

Nottingham University: On one of our Wednesday afternoons we took a free school trip to Nottingham Unie.  Here we walked around and enjoyed their scenic campus and their busy library.  It was pretty cool to see students like ourselves in a real college setting in England.  It was similar, but also quite different.  There were way more students in the library so maybe they study more? lol

A night at the Greg: Last weekend we got a big group of friends to walk out to The Gregory, a pub just down the driveway of the manor house.  The Gregory is named after Gregory Gregory who built Harlaxton manor.  It was a fun night of laughs and conversation.  On the way back Amanda and I saw a frog which was cool.

School work: Lately I've felt pretty busy with school.  I had my research paper about John Donne due on the same day I had to present in British Studies about the role of women in the Industrial Revolution.  I still have a ton to read and then just this past wednesday we had a really hard British Studies exam.  The semester is winding down though really soon which is crazy!

St. Patrick's Day: We had a fun celebration after the test for british studies to celebrate St. Patrick's day in the school Bistro.  Here we listened to irish music and drank things with green food coloring in them.  It was pretty fun and a nice break from the stress of studying for the exam.