| This begins the tale of “tour guide Todd” and el grupo espanol. (March 2nd-6th)
Thursday - day 1
I leave Keele and get on a train to London, which heads out a bit after 7:30 pm; it was a few minutes late, but nothing bad. I read a bit from the Sermon on the Mount out of Matthew, I love these passages! Then I snoozed a bit and hopped off at Euston station. I bought a day pass for the tube/bus and made off to find the hostel. I roamed a bit from Notting Hill, got a little lost, and asked for directions. Blessedly, the hostel I stopped at was run by the same company as the one I was staying in, so they told me right where to go, and it was only a few blocks further, right near Hyde park. I stowed my bag here and made my way to Victoria station via tube, then wandered through the thing until I found the Gatwick express train platform. Then I waited…and waited…and walked around the station, and went places I wasn’t supposed to (authorized personnel type-stuff) and looked around, then I broke down and bought some yummy Cadbury Turkish candy (soooo good.) Anyway I ended up waiting from about 10:15 till roughly 12:30-1am…and the group shows up! Turns out Monica’s bags were lost in transit somehow and they had been trying to work it all out, but earned nothing but a headache from their labors. All else was well, and I was more than a little excited to see my girl againJ The Spain kids monied up at an atm, all minus Lance that is. Even after several calls to his mom to straighten things out at his bank he was never able to take out cash at any atms during his time in England. This was an understandable aggravation for him, but it became a running joke as well, so it was actually somewhat funny by the end of the trip. The tube was closed at this point so we went out to a bus stand that was supposed to be correct, but it wasn’t…or more likely I wasn’t, haha! We just grabbed a fun black taxi and had it take us close to the hostel, and checked in the place. We bungled our way into our room waking up our room mate, who said his name was John (John Thom Vaughn actually, lol) He was 17, from the states and a high school exchange student in Germany checking out England during his spring break. 17 and roaming around Europe alone…kid’s got balls, I don’t think it’d be all that fun alone, but he’s brave if nothing else! Anyway, we ditched our stuff, made our beds, and went up to the bar for a drink. I split a sprite with Monica bc she was feeling a bit quesy-ish, Steph had one also, and the boys had a pint and yakked w/ some German guys. Monica and I stayed up for another hour or so talking alone while the others went to bed. It was good to catch up on things, and just love on her a bit, it’d only been three weeks since Italy, but it still seemed like ages. Eventually the need for sleep became priority, and we went to our bunks.
Friday – day 2
Steph’s alarm woke me up and I roused the group, we threw ourselves together and grabbed breakfast of cornflakes and toast provided by the hostel. Our roommate John ate with us and joined us on the first part of our adventure. From the hostel we took the tube to Piccadilly Circus. We snapped a few photos here, it is pretty much just an intersection with some big billboards and a statue, neat but nothing mind blowing. We wandered around that area for a while and saw some more monuments and statues. We made our way from there to Trafalgar Square. We took a bunch of pictures here, with the fountains, riding the lion statues which was a blast, and Steve and Lance got a picture with some uniformed schoolchildren, I’m not entirely sure why, maybe the kids reminded them of Harry Potter or something…We walked around this area for a while and I took them to a bunch of the trademark red telephone booths of London. We took some pictures there and walked around and looked at more statues and such spattered around the city as we made our way to 10 Downing Street, the home of the Prime Minister. On the way we visited a guardhouse area I had been before and got pictures with the guards, who aren’t allowed to show emotion or talk, and then we checked out the area behind the guardhouse. A lady who didn’t have good English skills tried to ask us something, I thought she wanted a post office, and Monica thought she wanted something to do with the Prime Minister, I have no earthly idea what she really wanted so after a minute or two of getting nowhere I apologized and told her I couldn’t help her. We then went down the road to the Prime Minister’s place took some Pics there, and then our friend John went on his way to see the Cabinet War Rooms. From here we crossed the road and ran into a group of hard hat bobbies with neon overcoats, Monica thought they were pretty neat so I asked them if they’d take a picture with the girls and they were nice about it and Steph and Monica got pic standing beside them. We then went to the Thames river, took that in a bit, crossed the Golden Jubilee Bridge and decided to ride the London Eye, the world’s largest Ferris Wheel. We passed several street actors/mimes on the way, a pirate a man dressed all in white as a statue who stood very still, ad a man covered in plastic bottles like some sort of warrior. There were some really cool statues created to represent some of Dali’s more famous images, so we took pics with those and then found the London Eye ticket area. We went into the ticket office and waited in a huge line, but it only took no more than an hour, and we made peanut butter sandwiches for a snack while we waited, that was an interesting experience, haha. They were selling books with pics from the London eye that were printed in about 10 languages, obviously it’s not an international tourist attraction;) haha! Tickets in hand we got in another line to ride the Eye, this only took a few minutes and we were aboard our “flight” as the announcer called it. It was an awesome experience and the views were gorgeous, London is a nice looking city from a few hundred feet up! The ride was somewhere between 30-45 minutes, and they had photos of us during the ride for 10 pounds each, I just snuck a pic of the screen with our image on it instead, haha! We thought about going to see the Dali exhibit, but it was more time and money than we wanted to spend since the Spain kids were only in England for a short while. We crossed another bridge over the river to Big Ben and Parliament, and took pictures of some crazily dressed punks on the way. We walked around the Parliament building, and tried to get into Westminster Abbey without paying, but apparently when I had done it the time before with the Keele kids we got away with something we weren’t supposed to be doing, who knew? We then made our way past an Abraham Lincoln statue, where Steve posed for a picture, and found the closest tube station and took it to Tower Hill. At tower hill we enjoyed the vie from the massive sundial and then crossed under the road to the Tower of London. We didn’t pay to go in and do the tour, again, too time consuming and expensive, but got some good pictures of the Tower bridge and crossed over that. We walked aimlessly and realized we were no longer on the map we had, so we back tracked and found an inexpensive restaurant called the “Chicken Cottage” or something along those lines. This was a strange establishment, it was some sort of Arabian fast food place. Monica and I split a pizza with sweet corn and Tandori Chicken, it was a risky combo but was really good! Steve had a chicken sandwich, and Steph and Lance had a more normal pizza to split. It was only 3-4 pounds and hit the spot, cheers to the Chicken Cottage! J We left and made our way to a tube station, passing some more random statues and a really strange house of horrors place. We took the tube to Coventry Gardens and Lance exchanged some of his Euros for Pounds. We walked around Coventry for a bit and watched a street performer for a few minutes, which was mildly entertaining, but kind of boring. While we were watching though, some chunky old man who appeared drunk hurriedly stumbled behind us quoting Shakespeare and acting like He was Romeo or something. That was a lot funnier then the guy we were watching, and eventually just started walking around. There were other silent performers which we more or less ignored, and then did some shopping. Some of the spain kids bought shirts and hoodies that said London on them, and then we went to an everything type of store called “Mark and Spencer’s”. Since Monica’s bag was missing she needed to replace a few things, and the guys and I looked at food while they did that. The boys bought food and then we took the tube to Knightsbridge, and went to Harrods. We looked around in there for around 15 minutes when they announced they were closing. We slowly made our way out and decided it’d be fun to just randomly ride one of the double-decker buses anywhere, since our day passes included the bus. We all piled into the top part of the bus and rode it till the driver flashed the lights telling us to get off. It was dark and we didn’t know where we were, a little disconcerting, but we made our way to a tube station, which was actually quite closeJ We took it to Notting Hill and walked off the wrong way for a bit, and stopped at a small grocery store and bought Monica some Dr. Pepper, which we stowed in Lance’s book bag until we got back to the hostel. On the way to the tube station to make up our walking the wrong way we witnessed a car wreck. It was one of those kinda exciting but sad for the people times. Lance was really excited about it so we walked by it, I just kept praying for the folks involved as we were walking, they seemed unhurt, but you never know. So we hopped on the tube and then walked back to our hostel. On the way we stopped at this neat little pub place called “The Swan,” that had some band and dancing going on, but it didn’t have any room, the bar and tables were all full. Once back at the hostel we chilled in our room for a little bit then went back up to the hostel bar to play cards and relax for a bit. I was hungry and Monica was having an upset stomach again, so I went out to find some sort of restaurant open. As it went, there was a small, I think Greek, restaurant about to close right down the road. I ordered some minestrone soup, I figured that’d be better for Monica’s stomach than a sandwich or something. I hung out waiting for the soup for about 15 minutes and talked to an older Englishman while I was waiting. He was a bit tipsy, but we had an intriguing conversation roaming politics and religion, it was mostly me listening to him, I enjoyed it! J The old fellow shook my hand and left, then the soup was ready shortly after. The cook said he made it better than the Italians do, I don’t think he was right, it was good but, I’ve had better, haha! I took it back to the hostel bar and we all shared it, I grabbed the leftover bread from sandwiches and we all dipped and enjoyed. After a few games of BS Lance and I went back to the room. He took a shower and I read a bit of the bible and got my bed all made up, and Monica’s all straightened away too since she wasn’t feeling well. I took my shower than and Lance and I talked for a little bit until the others came back from upstairs. We all chatted a bit, then went to bed.
Saturday – day 3
The last day in London! We all get out of bed and clean up a bit, and have breakfast. Then we strip our beds down and throw all of our sheets and blankets in a pile upstairs and check out. To save a bit of time, and about 10 pence, we bought our tube passes at the hostel, and then left to venture about! We said farewell to our friend Tom and took the tube towards Buckingham Palace. We got off at Victoria station and asked some people which way it was, they were wrong, and my expert remembering skills took us right to it! It was more fluke that my sense of direction took us there I think, but we got there even with incorrect directions! Once there we looked around and took many necessary and unnecessary pictures, and waited. We waited a good 45 minutes, and started asking people when the changing of the guard was. I attempted several people and came to find that everyone there either didn’t speak English, or refused to respond to my inquiries, which was a good laugh in itself! We spoke with a policeman on a horse and he told us that the guard changes every other day, so I’m not sure of they have a 48 hour shift, or they only do the big procession every other day or what…but regardless once we knew it wasn’t going to happen, we left for St. James Park. We went through most of the park, then peeled off to the tube station right beside the park, which we took to Harrods, kinda. We ended up traveling for ages from one underground place to another and prolly walking half a mile in the tube station tunnels…it was an interesting re-routing, since several tube lines were on delays. We eventually, by crazy tubing and some bussing as well, end up at Harrods! The second visit was much more fun than the firstJ First thing first we got cologne samples from the cologne room, which was a little tough on the eyes, there was a lot of smelly stuff in the air. Then we checked out the toy department, which was a lot of fun, we played with foam boomerang toys a man was demonstrating, watched a few other toy demos, there was a fellow doing magic tricks, and the best part, the stuffed animals! There was a giraffe, no joke, 10 feet tall if I’m a foot! I loved it! And there was an elephant about 6-7 feet tall and just huge! It was soooo neat! J There were big bears and polar bears, smaller birds of various kinds, monkeys, cows, a sloth, all kinds of stuff! We each grabbed an animal that was like us, I grabbed the sloth, Monica a monkey…I can’t remember the others, but we got a picture of us with our animals. It was pretty funny, and of course there were kids running around, we stood out a bit, but it was fine, haha! One poor girl that worked there had to dress u with fairy wings on, it would have been even more amazing if I was still just a tyke, but I loved it anyway! We moved from there and just looked around at other toys, Stephen and Monica played on the toy xylophones, and we eventually made our way to the pet department, we went through some really nice glass stuff, and ended up looking at fancy designer sunglasses before we left. Our next mission was to find the Hard Rock Café. Not just any, but the original. It was a somewhat aimless wander but we got there and it was worth it! Monica was the only one of the group that went in the actual restaurant (toilet break), but we all went into the Hard Rock store across the street and took the “Vault” tour. It was a small room, but it was amazing! We got to see guitars and memorabilia from a bunch of Rock and Roll greats, and I got to play one of the original Les Paul’s owned by Les Paul himself, one of Stevie Ray Vaughn’s guitars, and Jimi Hendrix’s black flying V! WOW! The “curator” was a pretty nice guy and very personable, he seemed to know a lot about rock history and the objects on display, and even gave me directions to the closest tube to Camden town, our next stop! We left the Hard Rock Store and stopped in a Starbucks to search for something one of Monica’s friend’s wanted, it was an unsuccessful search, so we quickly made our way from there to the tube, and then to Camden Town. We lost Steve in the tube station briefly, but quickly met back up with him outside of it with only minor reconnaissance efforts on my part. So Camden Town was PACKED, there were people everywhere, it was nutso! The spain kids were a little surprised at Camden Town, haha! It is quite a bit different then most of the rest of London, but they enjoyed itJ We first made our way to the food vendors, we were all hungry, and the Camden vendors give lots of food for good prices. Any way, we meandered to the food and checked things out, the boys and myself had Indian food, and the ladies had Chinese. We were able to grab a seat at a picnic table in the market, and happily enjoyed our food! When everyone was satisfied I took them around Camden market a bit. We went to cyberdog, the crazy raver/techno store, miscellaneous other stores and just sort of took things in. The tube was expecting delays so we decided to head back to the station a little early to insure that we didn’t miss our bus to Keele. On the way we looked at a few other shops and I bought a sweet for Monica, this banana and strawberry kabob thing that was dipped in chocolate and white chocolate. She had been kinda craving strawberries, and that along with white chocolate was great, two of her favorite treats! She shared that and we made our way onto the tube without any problems. We hopped off at Victoria station and then walked to the coach station, just a block or so away. On the way we stopped at a small convenience type store and some of the spain kids bought postcards and a chocolate muffin one of their native Spanish friends wanted from England. We all bought some sort of snack or another and then went to the coach station. We were able to get right on our bus and allsit together and stretch out at the rear of the bus, which was unusual, and quite nice! Monica and I shared a couple of aisled seats and snoozed most of the trip which was niceJ Some of the spain kids played cards and then eventually we made it to the Hanley station, where we got off and were able to quickly get on the 29 bus back to Keele. Once there we went to my room and relaxed for about a half hour while everyone checked their e mail and I made phone calls to track down Heath’s room key, where us boys were going to sleep while He was out of town in Ireland. I got phoned up the Barnes girls and headed over to fetch the key from Michaela. We all hung out at Bernes for about a half hour, maybe a bit more and talked with Jin, Sarah, Erin and Michaela. Turned out Michaela didn’t have the key on her but we made plans to get it from her later, so after a bit more yakking, Monica, the spain kids and I went to the Pig and Rat for a drink. Jaela and Allison were there, we talked to them briefly and chilled and listened to the open mic performers. One guitarist/singer was from the CU worship band, so I had a brief chat with him after his set, which was pretty good! Eventually it was last call at the Pig, so we made our way to the Union, and the security guy let us all in without too much trouble, since I was the only one with a Keele card. We yakked for a while and played some pool, then after a bit left and went to Jesse’s room where we met up with Michaela, talked for a short while, then followed Michaela back to her dorm and got Heath’s key. It was snowing then and was a lovely night in EnglandJ We then went back to Jesse’s and borrowed some blankets for the Boys sleeping on the floor. We went back and talked and relaxed in my room for a bit and Lance showered up, then I went to Heath’s room with the boys and the girls snoozed in my room.
Sunday – day 4
Whew, ok up and at ‘em, I don’t remember when I got up, but it was too early! I snuck across to my block and took a shower, then woke up Monica and Steph. Steph showered and Monica and I prayed for a bit, I was pretty excited, it had been a while since we had gotten to pray together, and while it wasn’t as long as I would have liked, It was still great! J Steph knocked on the door and we wrapped up, then I started breakfast while Monica showered and Steph finished her readiness. We had eggs thanks to Lance, and I made crepes! Mmmm, I do love crepes! We had the type I learned to make from the Spring’s, with the sugar cream cheese filling and fruit sauce. Everyone enjoyed the brekkie, and then the girls cleaned up and we got things in order and went to the bus stop. I had intended on showing my guests around campus a bit, mostly the keele hall area, but we didn’t quite have time for it, so we left that out. We waited for the bus a bit then hopped on and went to the Hanley coach station again. After a short while our coach was in and we boarded for Liverpool. On the way there we had the “pleasure” of talking to a girl from California. Honestly, she seemed like she was just full of crap, haha! She talked about how she couldn’t afford school in the US so she came to the UK, one of the more expansive areas in the world, and she gave us terrible advice on getting around Liverpool! Regardless we talked to her most of the way to Liverpool. Once we got off at the Liverpool coach station we made our way into town, without a map, we just blindly made our way into the days adventure! We made our way to several museums just in town and visited the “World Museum,” or something like that. I honestly thought it was kinda lame at first, but ended up having a good old timeJ It was directed more towards a childrens audience, but we all had fun goofing around, haha! First we saw an small aquarium area and started a search for the items listed in the museum program for fun. We saw a big exhibit about colors and vision, and then Bugs of all kinds, DinosaursJ, a big monkey portrait exhibit, and some exhibits of other dead animals. We also looked around at some space science and observatory type things, and made our way out. They had a city museum guide which I picked up and it served as a rough map of the city, so we had something to refer to as we wandered. From there we made our way to the city center and searched for a good place for lunch. We were hunting for a traditional English Pub, we were unable really find one, but we found a nice pub that was a little more modern, and they had good food at a decent price as far as prices in the UK go. The guys had fish and chips, I had a steak and ale pie, and the girls both had a chicken potato pie-ish meal, which was tasty, but I liked mine the best! We all had diff drinks, and I had dark cask ale, I think it was called John Smith ale, it wasn’t bad, and made the meal more “English,” haha. We relaxed in the pub for a long while and then made our way out. We went through the city and meandered towards the seaside, and the Albert Docks. We saw some large, impressive buildings as we went, and took lots of pictures, both “serious” and goofy. We had fun making silhouette photos that spelled OHIO and SPAIN out of our body shapes…it was pretty ridiculous, but a lot of fun, haha! We then ventured to the Liverpool Life Museum, which was ENTIRELY lame. We goofed around a little bit inside and warmed up a bit, then left to he Albert Docks. Here we went t the Tate Liverpool Art Museum for unfortunately only 45 minutes, and then went back out and walked around the docks more. We found the Beatles Museum and got pictures in front of it, but since none of us really were very interested in the Beatles or felt like dropping 10 pounds to go in, we headed back into the city from there. On the way the boys and I went onto parts of the dock we weren’t supposed to and got some pictures, but then had to hightail it outta there because there was apparently someone coming from across the way to yell at us! We found our way to a McDonalds and hung out there for a long time, probably an hour or more, but man, they make excellent apple pies! They deep fry them instead of baking them, so we had some and I shared an ice cream with steph, and it made for a good snack! After our extended visit at McDonalds we wandered to the bus station ad were there…for about 3 hours! It was so strange, you’d think it’s be boring, but actually it was a good time! We were all kinda drained from the several days of much walking and adventuring, and ended up playing BS and hearts in a very slap happy manner, and looking at each other’s pictures on our cameras. Finally we all loaded onto the double decker bus that was dropping us off back at Hanley on it’s way to London. We were a bit more split up this time, but it was alright. Monica and I grabbed seats together, but my seat was broken and reclined all the way whenever I leaned back, so we moved. The lady we ended up behind was a bit strange; Lance thought she needed an exorcism or something, her behavior was odd, but I dunno about an exorcism, haha. We snoozed part of the way back, and then talked a bit, and the Spain crew talked in Spanish too, which was fun to listen to and try to pick out bits. Eventually we arrived at the Hanley station and found a taxi to Keele. I jumped up front by the driver and the others piled in the back, and 12 pounds later we were walking up the Horwood hill to our sleeping places. Except Monica and I. We stayed up and talked, and talked and just spent the last bit of time we could together. It was soo good to just chill out and talk and hold her for a bit as we sat on the steps inside my block. We talked for a long time, and just sat together for a long time, and eventually decided it was time to get some sleep. I headed over to Heath’s place, and shoot…I was locked out! So I had to return to my room and crash on the floor by Monica, which was not comfortable, these floors are quite hard. We caught what Z’s we could though, despite the discomfort.
Monday – day 5
After a brief sleep of two hours I we were awake again and getting everything ready so the Spain folk could get a bus to Hanley and catch their 8 am coach to London. Eeryone was abit sluggish and behind, and the boys in Heath’s room set their alarm for 6:30 pm instead of AM, so I had to throw rocks at the window to wake them, which was annoying, but a little funny too! We trudged down to the bus stop and waited and waited…eventually the bus shows up, and we board and head towards Hanley. At the routine stop at Newcastle our driver gets off and is replaced by another driver…20 inutes later! Then there is terrible traffic and constant stops on the way to Hanley, and we arrived after the 8 am coach had already departed! This was a bit aggravating! We went to the coach ticket station, and found that it didn’t open until 9am, which was close to when the next coach to London was stopping in. I was a bit exasperated at this point, but there was nothing I could do but wait. So to pass the time while we waited the Spain crew kept in good cheer and made up little songs about their trip to England, and then showed me the dance they had been learning in a class back in Spain. It was really entertaining! I toom pictures of them dancing in the middle of the coach stop and then it was time for the ticket booth to open. We all went and I spoke with the receptionist who said that it was basically up to the driver of the next coach, which came in at 9:15am. Lance and I waited at the sop while Steve, steph and Monica grabbed some sandwiches to go from the small restaurant at the station. The coach arrived and I had monica see if she could sweet talk the groups way into the drivers good graces. Blessedly, there were JUST enough open seats for them to pile in! Whew! I was a bit worried, but the Lord provided another way for them. After some brief goodbyes, and a goodbye kiss from Monica the group was on the coach, and pulling away. It was sad to see them go, to see Monica go again…but such is life. I was happy to have spent the weekend with her, and all of them, so the sad departure was worth it. I then went to the little restaurant myself and ordered a hot chocolate to keep me warm while I waited for the 29 to take me back to Keele. I sipped on that and chomped down a snickers bar Monica had bought for me while she was there earlier, which was a nice brekkie, haha. I went to Jessops across the street and asked about getting my camera repaired, learned it would be phenomenally expensive, and then wait some more at the bus station. After a bit the bus came, I boarded and rode back to Keele, where I went back to my room, and went to bed after uploading some pictures onto facebook. I was beat and ready for bed again…it was an amazing weekend!!! :^(D) |
