Well, in case you haven’t already figured it out from my not posting in over a month, I’m back home in the good old USA. I’ve been home for a month and a day already and yet I am still finding it so strange to be back home.

But first things first: My last two days in London.

11 June was spent hanging out with Louise and Elise and in honour of the end of my London Life we decided to go on an Elephant Hunt. That might sound strange considering we were in London, but in the past few months there have been these statues of Elephants placed all over the city to help raise money for the preservation of the African Elephants. We literally spent 13 hours going all over London trying to find as many of the Elephants as we could and take pictures with them. It was such a  perfect way to see the city of London one last time because not only did I see parts of London that I know like the back of my hand but I also got to see parts of London I never even knew existed and all while in searching for painted Elephants! The three os us set out from Oakwood around noon and we didn’t find our last Elephant till nearly 1:30 in the morning! We walked so much and by the end of the day our feet were killing us and we could hardly stand up but it was all worth it when we realised we’d found 148 elephants! Here, check out some photos of the ones we found:

This one was one of my favourites

The first Elephant we found that day

You could even buy miniature versions of them! I really should have bought one…

This one was called “Fish & Chips”

Cab Elephant, definitely my second favourite

And at 1:30 we found Union Jack, my favourite Elephant

It had been a long day…

After our day of Elephant Hunting it felt so great to get back to Gubbay and sleep.

The next morning rolled around and it was 12 June, my last day in London. But there wasn’t time for me to be sad, or to even think about leaving because of a little think I like to call the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. Now the official start of the World Cup was the day before, but for the English it began with the first England match, which just happen to be against the USA. It would be the first year I’m actually a football fan that both my mother country (USA) and my stepmother country (England) would face each other off.

The day began early with Elise, Louise and I meeting up for breakfast and to get our team gear ready. We all had our England jerseys and got a lot of red and white so we were all decked out and ready for the big match. Just look at us:

Louise and I with our custom jerseys

Three guess who I wanted to win

England Pride

The match kicked off at 19:30 so the three of us spent the afternoon just wondering through London along with the rest of the city that was decked out in red and white. I have never seen so many St. George’s Crosses in my entire life. When it was match time I saw even more. Now I’ve heard it said that English footie fans are the best in the world, and it is SO true! Even before the match kicked off it was a mad house and people were screaming and singing.

COME ON ENGLAND!

The match itself was really good, ending with a 1-1 tie. In a way I’m kind of glad the match ended in a tie because as much as I love England it turns out I can’t will the US to lose. I was all set to cheer on England but as soon as the American players took to the field and the “Star Spangled Banner” played I couldn’t help myself. I guess thats what it means to have two countries you call home, you can’t find which one is better.

Watching a football match on a massive screen with thousands of people screaming “COME ON ENGLAND” was by far the most perfect way to spend my last night in England. I couldn’t think of anything more English to do then cheer on England. After the math ended Louise, Elise and I found a pub and had dinner and a pint and that was my last night in London.

The morning of the 13 June I woke up with mixed feelings. I was totally gutted to be be leaving London, yet also excited to be heading back home, and also nervous. That morning I packed the last of my things into my three bags and then checked out of Gubbay Hall and left w117 once and for all.

My last time in Gubbay w117

I met up with Elise and Louise and the three of us went o Cafe Roma where I had my last English Breakfast. When we walked in the owner asked if I was leaving and then I had to tell him I wasn’t coming back because I was done with Middlesex University. When i told him that he showed the three of us a photo he had taken at Romme’s going away party. It was so strange seeing how only two months early our group was so large we literally took up the entire cafe and now there was just the three of us.

After eating my last English Breakfast Louise, Elise and I managed to get my three bags on the tube and we were off. The whole tube ride was spent with the three of us talking about all the amazing things we had done over the past few months and how much had happen. Eventually our ride had to end and before I knew it was standing at the Virgin Atlantic check in desk asking some lady if she was on the queue. To my shock she was American and had no idea queueing up was! That’s when it hit me, I was going back home where you don’t queue up and it’s not a loo, it’s a bathroom, and theres am/pm. I was going back to my old life and I didn’t want to leave my new life in London.

I said my goodbyes to Louise and Elise and needless to say it was the hardest thing I’ve had to do since I said goodbye to my family when I left for London back in January. I don’t know when I will see them again, but at least we can stay in touch so easily thanks to Facebook, Skype and good old snail mail. And with one last group hug I was off.

Seven and a half hours later, but only two and a half hours with the time change I was walking through the gates of JFK airport in New York City where I met my grandparents who took me home to my house, my dog, and my family. And of course a New York Pizza

And now it’s been a month since I arrived back in the United States and yet there still isn’t a day that goes by without me craving an English Breakfast or looking out my window and expecting to see the Trent Park Campus. Readjusting back to life in the US has been an adventure, I guess you could say. For the first week I was home I could sleep past 5:00 thanks to my jet lag, and after a week of eating the unhealthy food we Americans live off of I found myself incredibly ill. I have hard time crossing the street because I still expect cars to be on the left side of the street, and once and a while I’ll say something like “queue up” or “Turn off the tele” or “where’s the rubbish bin?” I also had a hard time referring to the World Cup (which I watched the last match of the other day while on Skype with Elise the whole time) as anything other then football, because I’ve only ever heard it called the Football World Cup, not the the Soccer World Cup.

And so ends the story of my study abroad in London. So much has happen in the past few months and I have seen and done so much. My life has been changed forever by this experience and I have changed so much. I have grown as a person and done so much. When I left home in January I was the shy type who you never would have picked for a programme in a foreign country and now I’m an outgoing adult who has experienced life in another country. I learned to live in a new culture and see the world in a whole new perspective. I have done things and seen things I would never have dreamed of doing in my whole life and there is nothing I would change about my whole experience.

And now I want to thank all of you who have read my blog and heard stories about my life in Europe. Thank you all so much for fallowing me on my travels and for your comments. I hope you enjoyed reading about my life abroad. And also a huge thank you to all the people who I met while studying in London. You may not know it but you have all changed my life and helped me to become the person I am today, so thank you.

So this is the end of my study abroad in London, but it is only the beginning of life travels. Who knows maybe someday I’ll be writing about how I’ve seen the world.

And so ends my life in London

For anyone who is still interested in fallowing me as I attempt to travel the globe check out my new blog: http://astoldbyjoey.wordpress.com/

Where to begin?

Last time I blogged I said that I was gearing up for the football World Cup and the Louise and I had gone to Lillywhites to purchase jerseys and whatnot. Well Wednesday we ended up going back to buy more things for the Cup, such as face paint, flags and signs. I am so excited for the World Cup! It’s my first ever and I finally found a sport I can get into. Basically it’s like the Super Bowl for an American Football fan, except the World Cup last a month long and the entire world competes! And it is expected to get crazy here in London for the big England vs. USA game. Already they have begun constructing a giant screen in Trafalger Square for people to watch the match on and I will definitely be there as one of the screaming fans.

Wednesday was also spent just walking around Central London for, what could be, my last time this year. Elise and I walked from Piccadilly Circus to Trafalgar Square to Westminster  and Buckingham Palace. Now the first time I saw Buckingham Palace it was the beginning of January and HM The Queen was not in residence and every other time I’ve gone the Palace has been flying the Union Jack instead of the Royal Standard meaning the Queen was not in residence, but this time was different. For the first time since I arrived in London I got to see Buckingham Palace flying the Royal Standard, meaning THE QUEEN WAS IN RESIDENCE! I can finally say I was at Buckingham Palace when she was! I know it’s not that big of a deal to most people, but this is the closest I’m probably going to get to seeing the Queen this year.

Found another Elephant!

Lord Admiral Nelson’s Ship in a Bottle

Trafalger Square gearing up for the World Cup

LOVE THAT FLAG!

The Queen Mum

The Palace Guards are in their summer uniforms!

The Royal Standard

Buckingham Palace in the background

I love this photo

This could be my last photo in front of Big Ben

More Red Coats

Thursday was also a very eventful day. Now one of the things you HAVE to do when you’re int he United Kingdom is see Stonehenge, but until now I had never gone. Five months living in London and I didn’t go to Stonehenge! How is it that I never went before? Well that was about to change because early Thursday morning Elise and I left campus and made our way to Waterloo Station where we took a train to Salisbury. Salisbury is beautiful and only about an hour and a half from London by train, but Elise and I didn’t really plan on seeing the city to be honest, we just wanted to see Stonehenge. So once our train arrived at Salisbury we booked it to the bus station where we hoped on a bus to Stonehenge.

Now all of my friends who have already gone to Stonehenge say it is kind of a let down and nothing to get too excited over, so I didn’t have high hopes for what I was about to see. But I was surprised, I actually enjoyed Stonehenge. Sure all you can really do is just walk around it and take photos, but it is really fascinating to see something so old and so famous. For 4000+ years those stone have sat in the same location and now they’ve been there so long it seems like they are just suppose to be there! The way the moss grows over the rocks makes it look like it was nature’s design to have those rocks there like that.

STONEHENGE

After seeing Stonehenge Elise and I took the bus back to Salisbury and decided it would be fun to explore the area a bit considering we were there already. It was a great ”side trip” as Elise put it. We walk around the town and even went to Salisbury Cathedral which is one of the oldest in England! The Cathedral was absolutely beautiful, but the thing that I was most interested in was the Magna Carta.

A beautiful clock in Salisbury

A church, but not the Cathedral

The Salisbury Cathedral…under construction

The stain glass windows of the cathedral

Inside the Cathedral!

As a history buff the Magna Carta is fascinating, as an American the Magna Carta is oh so important (the United States Constitution is modeled after the Magna Carta) and as someone obsessed with the monarchy the Magna Carta was a massive change. The Magna Carta was written in the year 1215 (yeah it is that old!) and protected the King’s subject’s rights and bound the King by the law of the land. When King John of England signed the Magna Carta it was one of the first steps to creating a limited government in England and still holds power today! Needless to say I was speechless when I saw it through the bullet proof glass case. I even tried to read it, but alas I can not read Latin, especially on a 795 year old parchment, but it was still so great to see it.

After seeing the Magna Carta and Salisbury Cathedral Elise and I decided it was time to head back to London because we had things to do back there. So we took the train back and, after sleeping the whole journey, we were back in London by 17:30. What plans did we have for the night? Well we were seeing Avenue Q! Ever since I was in secondary school I have wanted to see Avenue Q but since the show is basically the adult version of Sesame Street under 18s were not allowed to see it. When I did finally turn 18 the show was no longer on Broadway so I thought I’d never see it but now I have seen it and the tickets were every penny. I have never laughed so hard at a show before in my entire life! It was such a great show packed with non-stop laughs. I don’t know who was laughing harder, me or the guy sitting next to me who was basically in tears from laughing so hard. If you ever get the chance to see Avenue Q I high suggest you jump on that! If you want a show full of laughs and the catchiest tunes ever (such as “Schadenfreude”) then you will absolutely love Avenue Q.

And now here I am again, preparing for another day in London, but sadly this will be one of my last entries posted from London because my time here is running out at an alarming rate. It’s already Friday and I fly home on Sunday. Where has the time gone? How can this be almost over? It doesn’t seem real that I will be leaving London and not coming back in a week or so. I can’t even begin to think about what it will be like to actually be in my own home again, let alone in New York. Last time I was there it was freezing cold and in the dead of winter and now it’s apparently really warm and sunny! It will be so strange to go back. I can not believe I am writing this now but my time in London is nearly over. It seems so strange that five months ago when I arrived here I was so nervous that all I wanted to do was fast forward through the next five months, but now they’ve gone by far too fast!

But at least I have today and tomorrow left here, so I’m going to make the most of it and live it up! I don’t want to spend my last few days in London being all depressed and upset, I want to have to time of my life! So now I’m off to LIVE IT UP!!!

Oh and only one more day till the big football match!!!!

So now here I am back in London with less then a week left here. I can’t believe that my time here has gone by so fast. It has already been five months since I arrived at Heathrow Airport right after that huge snow storm and now I’m running around a city I know like the back of my hand in shorts and trying to not get a sun burn. Where did the time go?

And now campus is so empty. While I was in Prague everyone left basically, so I had to say goodbye to a lot of people before I left. So now it is just Louise, Elise and me left here in London. I had to say goodbye to Erika, Aminta, Julia, Claire and James before I left for Prague but I didn’t really hit me then that I wouldn’t see them when I got back to London. Now that I’m back it has hit me that they’re not here. It sucks that I made such great friends here in London because now I have to leave them.

But there is still so much to see and do here before I go so let’s not dwell on sad moments.

Saturday morning Louise, Elise and I went to Portabello Road and I bought a lot of tea to bring back to the United States. I didn’t realise how much tea I’ve been drinking here until it hit me that I wont be drinking tea with every meal when I get home. We spend the whole day on Portabello Road because it was so nice and warm! The weather was perfect, but the heat had it’s draw backs. It made the tube unbearably hot! I can’t imagine how dangerous it would be if a train got stuck down there during rush hour with this heat.

Louise, Me, Elise’s Friend, and Elise with one of the many elephants that are all over London

London now is also filled with tons of tourists because universities and school around the world are over or ending so people are beginning their summer holiday traveling. It’s funny to see how lost some people get when trying to find things. It reminds me of what I was like when I first arrived in London, so confused by everything and completely out of m league. Heck I thought i’d never take the tube alone and then when took it from Oakwood to Southgate by myself for the first time I thought it was the greatest thing ever. Looking back now I laugh at myself because Oakwood and Southgate are only one stop away from each other. And now I know the tube map better then a map of New York City.

After spending the day on Portabello Road Elise and I went to see Billy Elliot. I know Billy Elliot is huge in the states but I think I could never see it anywhere other then London because it takes place in Northern England so I can’t imagine an American cast doing the show. It was so good too! I absolutely loved it!

Sunday was a very eventful day. Elise and I went to Kensington Palace to see the Enchanted Palace exhibition and along the way there guess who we ran into. Jane Lynch, the actress who plays Sue Sylvester on GLEE! She was walking down the same street as us and we didn’t even realise it was her until she walked by and smiled at us. From there the day just got better. We got to Kensington Palace and went straight inside for the Enchanted Palace exhibition. Basically Kensington Palace was transformed into a fairy tale palace filled with the different stories of the princess who have lived there over the years, including Diana, Princess of Wales. Each room was a different theme, such as The Room of a Sleeping Princess, The Room of Palace Time, and the Room of Flight, and throughout the palace there were seven dresses that represented seven different princess who lived in Kensington Palace. Each room was like something out of fairy tale and can only be described as “going down the rabbit whole.”

Now photos weren’t allowed in the palace, but I did manage to sneak a few…….(am I a bad person?)

Kensington Palace

Room of Flight

Room of a Sleeping Princess

This once belonged to Queen Victoria while she lived in Kensington Palace

Princess Diana’s Dress!

After seeing all the beautiful rooms in Kensington Palace Elise and I headed to the Orangery where we had high tea. For those who don’t know what high tea is it is basically a light meal consisting of tea and finger sandwiches but it is a very English tradition. We had finger sandwiches, three different types of tea, and lemon cake. It was all so amazing! One of the things I really wanted to do while living in England was high tea and now I have done it, at a Royal Palace! I felt so regal!

A selection of snacks to have with High Tea

Being fancy, PINKIES UP!

Sunday night was a party night with Elise, Louise and I going first to B@1 and then we went out clubbing the night away. I’m going to miss the ability to just walk into a club, but at least I only have to wait till November when I’m 21 so I’ll be able to do it in New York.

And then there were three. Me, Elise & Louise

Sunday was a really productive day, but in a very depressing way. I began to pack up my room and get everything ready to go back to New York. Now my room looks so empty and it’s really depressing. So to cheer myself up and to escape from the dust that I kicked up from moving everything around Louise, Elise and I went out to dinner for Dutch pancakes. That’s another thing I’m going to miss about London, it is so easy to get food from all around the world without having to go far from your uni. I mean you can still do that in New York City, but the food is always better when you’re closer to the sources. For example: the Dutch pancakes last night taste more like really Dutch pancakes then anything we have in the United States.

And that brings us to today. Just got back from a very successful trip to Piccadilly Circus with Louise. We’re gearing up for the World Cup which begins on Saturday 12 June with a match between the US and England, and I’m still not 100% sure who to back…..

Well that’s all for now, so much to see and do and so little time!

What can I say, Prague was beautiful city! There is no denying it! It is like no other city I have ever seen in Europe and it’s gearing up to take the cake as the most beautiful.

The Czech Flag

I arrived in Prague around noon on Monday 31 May after my flight was delayed for two hours in London. Let me tell you sitting in an airport since 4:00 is not fun, and then add a two hour delay to that and you’re REALLY not happy camper. But I finally arrived in Prague, just a bit later then I planned. I met with my family friend Jan and his family at the airport and they took me back to there house. I would be stay with them while I was in Prague and it was nice to be staying in a house instead of a hostel where I have to share a room with ten strangers.

My first day in Prague began with Jan dropping me off at Anděl tram station where I took the tram to Malostranské Náměsti. The first thing I really wanted to see was Prague Castle and so I ran up the hill from Malostranské Náměsti fallowing the map I had borrowed from Jan to where I thought Prague Castle was. Now it didn’t help that all the signs for the different sights were in Czech. If you’ve never seen or heard Czech then let me tell you, it is NOTHING like English. See Czech is a Slovak language while English, French, Italian and Spanish are Germanic based languages, hence the reason some words seem similar in those languages. But Czech is nothing like that, when a word is spelt out it look nothing like what it means in English and because of all the accents that are used it sounds totally different then what you would expect. Now because the signs were in Czech I didn’t realize where I was, turns out I had gone the right way and was now standing right in front of Prague Castle, but because it looks so modern from the front and all the signs around it were in Czech I had no idea what it was. Leave it to me to be standing right in front of something and not realise it.

Prague Castle, which I didn’t realise…oops

Since I was on a quest to find Prague Castle I ended up wander all over the area around the castle not realising it. I did see some amazing things however, including the Czech Eiffel Tower. Yeah that’s right, there is an Eiffel Tower in Prague, but it is not as big as the one in Paris.

That point on top of the hill is the Czech Eiffel Tower

A Monastery

Some beautiful statues that are scattered all over Prague

After wandering around for a few hours I decided to head into Old Town so I walked back down to Malostranské Náměsti and from there I walked across the Charles Bridge, which is the oldest bridge in Europe. What a beautiful bridge it was too! It’s covered in statues and has these two massive towers at either end. It really felt like something out of a fairy tale.

One of the many statues along the Charles Bridge

The Charles Bridge

Another statue along the bridge

Once I crossed the Charles Bridge I made my way to the Old Town Square where I saw the world famous Astronomical Clock. The Astronomical Clock is a clock from 1490 that is covered in astronomical symbols and wooden figures. Legend has it that the man who built it made a clock so advanced for it’s time that it was the only on like it in the world. So the people of Prague, to stop him from building another in a different city, blinded the builder. In return the builder went back to the clock and messed it up so much that it took nearly 400 years for the people of Prague to get the clock back up and running again.

The Astronomical Clock

The Two Clock Faces of the Astronomical Clock

The rest of the night was spent walking around the Old Town Square and taking pictures of all the beautiful buildings before meeting up with Jan in a pub for dinner and some Czech beer.

The Church of Our Lady Before Týn

The Astronomical Clock Tower

The Buildings are all lit up at night

Old Town Square at night

Before I went to sleep that night I got the most amazing phone call from Julia, who was at the Lady GaGa concert in London. She called me while GaGa was singing “Bad Romance” which is bascially my favorite song ever written, so I got a chance to hear it live. Thanks for that Julia, you’re the best!

The next morning was an early start that found me taking the tram to Ujezd. Once in Ujezd I took another tram up to the hill that the Czech Eiffel Tower sits on and from there I headed up the tower. Since the Czech Eiffel Tower is so much smaller then the French one there is no lift to take you to the top so you have to climb the stairs up, which actually wasn’t bad at all because there was that many. Even though the Czech Eiffel Tower is smaller it is on top of a hill so it still offers the best view of Prague imaginable.

The Czech Eiffel Tower

Some shots of the view from the Eiffel Tower

Prague Castle as seen from the top of the Eiffel Tower

After the Eiffel Tower I head back down to Earth and continued my exploring of Prague. I took a quick tour of the St. Nicholas Church which is a baroque church that took 82 years to build! Now I thought I had seen the most lavishly decorated churches ever when I was in Rome, but this one takes the cake! I have never seen so much gold used in a single building my whole life!!!

Inside the chuch

What a beautiful ceiling

Lots of gold

Really, a LOT of gold

After the church I made my way back up to Prague Castle, which I know knew was Prague Castle after finding from Jan that I had been standing right in front of it. I managed to get to the castle just in time to witness the changing of the guard. After seeing the changing of the guard I headed into the castle. Now Prague Castle is like no castle I have ever been to before because it is a very modern castle, the youngest part is about 200 years old, and yet there is still so much history there.

One of the Guards of Prague Castle

The first thing I saw was the picture gallery which was filled with some beautiful paintings of the Madonna and child as well as those who lived in Castle in the past. From the picture gallery I heading to Old Prague Castle, which is the oldest part of the castle and hasn’t been changed for hundreds of years! I got to see the Great Hall, the Throne and even the Czech crown jewels!

One of the rooms in Old Prague Castle

The Great Hall

The Throne

The Crown Jewels

From there it was time for an exhibition on the history of Prague Castle that even included seeing a grave that was discovered beneath the palace. It was rather creepy to be honest, but very interesting at the same time. After the exhibition I headed into the St, Vitus Cathedral which is the largest part of Prague castle. Honestly it reminded me a lot of Notre Dame, but it was still very beautiful.

The inside of the Catherdral

After the cathedral was a quick tour of the Powder Tower where there was an exhibition on the evolution of the Czech Royal Guard. It was all about how they use to guard the royals and then the communist were in control and now how they are basically the Czech equivalent of the Buckingham Palace Guards, just minus the big hats. I spent the rest of the time exploring the different buildings that make up Prague Castle and even stopping into a cafe to have some hot apple cider and a traditional Czech cinnamon role.

One of the buildings within Prague Castle

A painted ceiling from one of the Castle’s rooms

From Prague Castle I walked back down to Malostranské Náměsti and across to the Charles Bridge to the Old Town Square. I got to see the show the Astronomical Clock puts on every hour when the figures move around the clock and the bells ring the hour and then I decided to go up the Astronomical Clock Tower. Unlike the Eiffel Tower the Clock Tower does offer a lift for you to use but I decided to just take the stairs instead of queueing up for the really slow lift. From the top of the Clock Tower you have the best view of Old Town Prague and you can see so much from up there! Just look at the photos:

Prague Castle as seen from the Astronomical Clock Tower

After the Clock Tower I met up once again with Jan for dinner at another Czech pub and then passed out as soon as I got back to his house.

Wednesday morning I woke just into to see the rains begin. It poured the whole day so I decided it was a good idea to go to some museums. I went to the Jewish Museum in the Jewish Quarters first. I saw everything from a hundreds of years old Jewish Cemetery to a synagogue that had the names of all the Czech Jews who were lost in the holocaust written on the walls. It was a very depressing sight to see how many were killed.

After the Jewish museum I stopped in a restaurant for some lunch where I overheard an American couple complaining that the English menu had the Union Jack on instead of the American Flag. That’s when I realized the difference between a tourist and a traveler. A tourist goes somewhere expecting it to be just like home and reminds aloof from the culture and the people. A traveler on the other hand understands that different countries have different cultures and does not expect things to be the same, instead a traveler tries to embrace the culture and meet the people and see what life is really like in different place.

After a very good lunch of Czech sausage and pasta I hopped on the Prague Metro. The Metro in Prague, though small (it only has three lines), is one of the nicest Metros I’ve been on in Europe! The trains are so clean and much wider then the cars on the Tube. Also there is more seats so more people can sit down. Anyway, I took the Metro to Muzeum which is the stop that comes out right next to the Prague National Gallery. The National Gallery reminded me a bit of the New York City Museum of Natural History, both have a lot of stuff animals, but the one in Prague had some of the strangest animals I have ever seen.

Not really sure what this is….

A very odd looking goat thing

The Alien from Independence Day or a squid? Who knows

A Wooly Mammoth!

I thought these were the coolest stairs EVER!

I was only at the museum for about two hours before I left to meet up with Jan and his two children, Adam and Dora, and the four of us headed out of Prague to the town of Karlštejn. Karlštejn is the home to a beautiful castle and is about a half hour outside of the city of Prague. Unfortunately when we got to Karlštejn the last tour for the castle has already ended and so they were closing so I didn’t get to go inside, but it was still a beautiful sight.

The Castle

Thursday was another day that saw me leaving the City of Prague. This time I went to the town of Nové Město Nad Metuji, which is a little town near the Czech/Polish border that is home to a beautiful chateau. The town itself was also beautiful and high up on a mountain with a beautiful view of the village below in the valley that focused around a beautiful river. I even got a chance to take a tour of the chateau, but that was I realised something. Once you leave Prague there are very few people who speak English and so I had to find that out the hard way when there were no tours of the chateau in English. I still got to see the inside of the chateau, I just couldn’t understand a word the tour guide was saying.

The Mountain Side

The view from the Chateau

The village

The Chateau

I spent basically the whole day in this little town touring the chateau and walking around taking in the beautiful view that being so high up offered. After I had seen everything Nové Město Nad Metuji had to offer I met back up with Jan and the two of us drove to this World War II bunker which is now open to the public. It was really cool to see a World War II bunker, especially this one because it is so big! It is actually made up of several bunkers connected by a vast series of underground chambers. We go to go underground and see the inside of the bunker. It was so big there was even a makeshift train system that had been used to transport supplies from one end to the other.

Inside the Bunker

One of the rooms underground

A hole in the wall

The Bunker

After touring the World War II bunker Jan informed me that while we were underground we had crossed from the Czech Republic to Poland. I was now in another country! So when we left the bunker I took my picture with “Poland” sign. And that is how I spent almost 10 whole minutes in Poland.

Welcome to Poland

That night was my last night in Prague and so Jan and I went to a very famous Czech pub where I had a traditional roast beef goulash with Czech dumplings. Normally that isn’t the kind of thing I eat but it turned out to be really good, in fact it was definitely one of the best meals I have had in Europe.

Friday morning I went back into the City of Prague one last time. By now the rains had gone away and it was so warm and beautiful, too bad it was my last day because I would have loved to stay longer.

Look at how blue that sky is!

That afternoon Jan and his family took me to the airport and we said our farewells and before I knew it I was on a plane back to London.

And so ends the story of my last trip in Europe. Now here I am back in London, but only for a week because it’s almost time for me to fly back home to New York. I can’t believe it’s nearly time to leave, but I can’t wait to see what exciting things I do before I do go!

And now for the rest of my week in Paris!

So let me think where we are….I’ve gotten us up to Friday, 21 May. Friday morning began like any other for Elise, Claire and I with a stop at the local bakery for some croissants and chouquettes and then we headed off to Notre Dame. Now we had seen Notre Dame the day we arrived in Paris but we still hadn’t had a chance to go inside and we all really wanted to see the inside of such a famous cathedral! And it was so worth queueing up to get inside. The inside of Notre Dame may not be as beautifully decorated as the churches in Rome or as grand as Westminster Abbey, but the architecture is mind blowing! Although it is not a drop dead gorgeous church Notre Dame makes up for that with beautiful stained glass windows, arches, and countless other architectural terms I don’t even understand. There was one thing I wasn’t too happy about when it came to Notre Dame. While we were inside there was a service being held and, though I am nowhere near religious, I think it’s kind of wrong to allow tourist to be running around a church snapping photos while people are trying to worship. (That doesn’t mean I didn’t take any photos, I mean come on it’s Notre Dame!)

Notre Dame

Inside Notre Dame

Now that’s a window

I love stained glass windows

After Notre Dame Elise, Claire and I met up with Elise’s Parisian friend, Camille, and we went for lunch in St. Michel where I had the best lunch crepe of all time! And I had French Cider, which is very different from Cider here in the UK, French Cider, which is the drink you have with a crepe, taste much more like juice and I liked it so much more! After eating we walked through St. Michel a bit, at one point stopping for desert crepes (what can I say, I enjoy food….a little too much) and then we headed down into the crypt underneath Notre Dame. In all honesty the crypt was kind of boring. I was expecting something along the lines of catacombs (which we couldn’t see due to flooding), but what it really was just old stone structures from ancient Paris.

After the crypt Camille left us and Elise, Claire and I took the Metro to the Champs Élysées, the most famous street in Paris. The Champs Élysées is basically the French version of Oxford Street, filled with designer stores with astronomical prices. From the Champs Élysées we walked straight ahead to the Arc de Triomphe. And what a beautiful arc it is! I didn’t realize how big it is from just seeing photos and I was so excited because now not only was I standing in front of the Arc de Triomphe, thanks to those museum passes we purchases we could all go up to the top for free. The only downside to going all the way up to the top of the Arc de Triomphe, it’s 289 steps up. But I didn’t mind and in no time we were on top of the Arc de Triomphe with the city of Paris at our feet!

The Flagship Louis Vuitton on the Champs Élysées

The Arc de Triomphe

The 289 steps to the top of the Arc de Triomphe

The Champs Élysées from the top of the Arc de Triomphe

The City of Paris

After spending what seemed like a life time on top of the Arc de Triomphe enjoying the beautiful view the three of us headed back down the 289 steps and ended up reaching the ground just in time to witness the daily ceremony of lighting the Eternal Flame, which was actually pretty neat to see. They have all the living veterans from the last war France was involved in come and everyday they relight the Eternal Flame beneath the Arc de Triomphe.

The Eternal Flame

Elise, Claire and I then walked back down the Champs Élysées all the way to the bridge that is over the tunnel in which Diana, Princess of Wales was killed. People had written on the bridge messages of love and support for Princess Diana. It was a very touching site. We then had dinner at a cafe near the bridge and made our way back to the hostel.

For Princess Diana

Messages of love for Princess Diana

The day, Saturday, was our last day with our museum passes so we wanted to go and see as much as we could before they ran out. Our first stop that day was Hôtel des Invalides, which is where Napoleon’s tomb is housed. This was a major thing for me to see while in Paris because not only do I love British history, I also love French history, especially the French Revolution and the First French Empire, so it was a big deal for me to see the tomb of the first French Emperor, the man who held Europe in his iron fist. The thing that I loved the most though was seeing a group of French students walking into the tomb and just going “WOW!” I love the fact that the French still care about there history and that they do go see the Tomb of Napoleon.

Napoleon

Inside Hôtel des Invalides

The Tomb of Napoleon I

Emperor Napoleon I

Napoleon II, King of Italy

From Napoleon’s Tomb the three of us headed to the Musée Rodin to see the The Thinker!

The Thinker

I couldn’t resist…

After seeing The Thinker we headed off to another museum, this one a modern art museum, which I honestly wasn’t a big fan off. I just don’t understand modern art, how is a chair with a rock on it considered art? From the modern art museum we headed to a very big cemetary where we saw the grave of Oscar Wilde. I really don’t know much about Oscar Wilde, but I do know he had some great quotes!

“I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read in the train.”

-Oscar Wilde

The Grave of Oscar Wilde

After that it was time for some epic souvenir shopping and I finally got my Paris shirt. I don’t know if I mentioned it before but my goal is to get a shirt from every country I visit. Elise, Claire and I then headed back to the Taileries and we hung out there till sunset. Eventually we got hungry and made our way to find some food. At dinner Elise ordered escargot and somehow had managed to talk me into trying some. So now I was already to try snail but when Elise took it out of it’s shelf the shelf uncurled and was looking at me! Needless to say I freaked out and could not eat it. I don’t know how people can actually eat that stuff! YUCK!

Escargot

The next day was Sunday, my last day in Paris. It was also the hottest day in Paris, so walking around in jeans was not the best idea. To celebrate our last day in Paris Claire, Elise and I queued up for an hour and a half to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower. That’s right, I have been to the top of the Eiffel Tower! It was so worth the queueing up for an hour and half for tickets and then waiting for the lift to the top because one you get to the top you have the greatest view of Paris imaginable! That was defiantly the highlight of my trip, second only to Versailles.

She is massive in real life

The view from the top of the Eiffel Tower

The original Statue of Liberty

What you see when you look down

After remaining atop the Eiffel Tower for about an hour or so the three of us headed back down to earth. Elise then got a phone call from Camille saying that the Champs Élysées had been closed down the street was covered over in grass and trees, basically creating a field in front of the Arc de Triomphe! So the three of us raced to the Metro station and made our way there. Once there we were face to face with the most people I have ever seen in Paris. The place was packed, not only with tourist, but also with Parisian people who thought it was just bizarre that this was happening! It was so cool to see though. The most famous street in all of Paris suddenly turned into a field! BIZARRE!!

BIZARRE

Camille eventually made it to the Champs Élysées and met up with us but Claire and I didn’t have much time left. So the four of us walked away from the crowds to try and find a Metro station that wasn’t being mobbed. Along the way Camille bought us macaroons because she said we couldn’t leave Paris without first trying them, and now I can see why! They were AMAZING!!!!

After the macaroons the three of us said goodbye to Camille and then headed back to the hostel to pick up our bags. We then made our way to Gare du Nord where Claire and I said goodbye to Elise, who was heading off to Prague, and then we took a train to the airport. And then we flew back to London. It was my first time flying back into London, thanks to a volcano during my spring break, and while we were flying over the channel you could see Calais and Dover and I just laughed at how close the two are and it took me ages to get back to London last time.

And so ends my week in Paris. And now here I am, back in London, but only for a few more day. I leave for Prague on Monday so now I have to unpack my Paris stuff and then pack for Prague!

Elise, Claire and I

The Palace of Versailles

Ok time for part two of my week in Paris.

So last I left time I wrote I got up to our trip to the Louvre on Wednesday, and now for my favourite part of the story: VERSAILLES!!! Ever since I was in grade six I’ve wanted to see the Palace of Versailles which is by far the most beautiful palace I have ever been to. In fact it might be the greatest in the world!

The day began with Elise, Claire and I taking the RER from St. Michel to the City of Versailles and then from the train station it is about a five minute walk to the actual palace. The first thing I saw of Versailles was the massive golden gates that surround the palace. GOLDEN GATES! Come on, only the really amazing places have golden gates!

My first view of Versailles

And that wasn’t even close to the best part. Thanks to those museum passes we had purchased at the Louvre the three of us were able to get into the palace free of charge and without having to wait on the really long ticket line! Thank you museum pass! Once past the golden gates and the security check point we were standing in the court yard/main entrance area to the Palace of Versailles! It was here that Marie Antoinette had her first sight of the home she would live in while she was Queen of France. I can only imagine how it must have felt seeing this palace and knowing you’re going to live there!

From the courtyard we headed into the rooms of the Dauphin. The Dauphin of France is the title that was given to the heir to the throne when France was still a monarchy. It’s basically the French version of the title Prince of Wales. The apartments of the Dauphin were absolutely beautiful! We saw everything from his bed to his study to rooms that are now filled with paintings of members of the Family Royale. The was even paintings of a young Marie Antoinette, Archduchess of Austria and young Louis-Auguste, Dauphin of France!

The Apartments of the Dauphin

The Dauphin’s Bed

Louis-Auguste, Dauphin of France

Marie Antoinette, Dauphine of France

After seeing the Dauphine’s Apartments we got see the Chapel Royale where Louis-Auguste and Marie Antoinette were married. From the Chapel Royale we moved into several rooms filled with portraits of the members of the French Royal Family.

The Chapel Royale

A Baby Louis XIV

Cardinal Richelieu

Louis XIV or Captain Hook?

King Louis XIV of France

From there we headed into the state rooms which were decorated from floor to ceiling! Portraits were everywhere and even the ceilings were painted! It reminded me slightly of the Vatican where everything is decorated, except in this case it was royal and not religious.

Queen Marie Antoinette and her children

And then the next thing I knew we were in the Hall of Mirrors and that’s where I lost it. For so long I have wanted to see Versailles and now I was looking at the Hall of Mirrors which I have seen hundreds of pictures of over the years and now here I was. I’m not afraid to say that I actually cried a little. The Hall of Mirrors was absolutely beautiful! And the fact that the sun was hitting the windows just right so that the light was bouncing off the mirrors really made it feel all the more amazing! I can only imagine what it must have been like to see the Hall of Mirrors when the Royal Court was walking through it! Or when Louis XIV was coming out of his room into the hall!

The Hall of Mirrors!!!

From the Hall of Mirrors we went to the King’s Apartments and the Queen’s Apartments. That’s right, the rooms of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette! And let me tell you, Marie Antoinette’s room kicks the crud out of Mary I of Scotland’s rooms at the Palace of Holyrood House!

The bed of King Louis XVI

Marie Antoinette’s Bed

Maire Antoinette…again, yes I”m kind of in love with her

The room after Marie Antoinette’s bedchambers seemed a little out of place to me in Versailles. It was filled with paintings of Napoleon as the first Emperor of France. I mean I guess it makes sense because Versailles is basically a museum about the Royalty of France and Napoleon was Emperor of France. There was even a copy of the painting of Napoleon crownings his wife, Josephine, Empress of France. The original is in the Louvre and was by far my favorite painting I saw there so it was really cool to see it again.

Emperor Napoleon I

From there our tour of the Palace of Versailles ended, because most of the palace is still not open to the public, that’s how huge it is! But that’s alright by me because it was a beautiful day and we were off to see the gardens. The gardens of Versailles are legendary! People from all over the world know about their beauty and their magnificence! I don’t even know how to describe the gardens, so here’s just  a bunch of pictures to show you what it was like:

While we wondering in the gardens we got a tad bit lost and eventually we ended at the Petit Trianon. What is the Petit Trianon you ask? It’s a little palace on the grounds of Versailles that Louis XVI gave to Marie Antoinette to use when she wanted to escape the pressures of court life at the palace. It is actually a beautiful little escape! It’s a different beauty then Versailles which is all about grandeur, the Petit Trianon has more homey feel to it, so I can see why Marie Antoinette loved it.

The Petit Trianon

Marie Antoinette as a child with her brother

Marie Antoinette…yet again

The music room

Marie Antoinette’s Bedroom at the Petit Trianon

My favourite and last picture of Marie Antoinette

The most amazing thing about the Petit Trianon is the Queen’s Hamlet which is this little village Marie Antoinette had built so that she could pretend to be a peasant. It’s basically nature without all the “yucky stuff” so she could role play. Yeah it’s strange but I guess when you’re the Queen of France you can do whatever you want. And this village was beautiful! It seriously looked something out of a fairy tale! I spent the entire time expecting a Disney Princess to come out singing with farm animals.

The Temple of Love

One of the houses in the little village

Just some really cool stairs

Does it not look like a fairy tale village to you?

So not only did I get to see a palace that exists in fairy tales but I got to see the little village that goes with it! Not a bad day if you ask me!

Though I spent a week in Paris and I did so much I really think that my favorite thing was Versailles. Probably because I’ve waited forever to go, or maybe because I have an obsession with royalty and Versailles is basically the mother of all palaces. But it really was a dream come true to see the Palace of Versailles, now if only I could live there…..

Stay tuned for more from my Paris holiday!

I’m not even sure how to start this entry, all I can say is PARIS!!!!! What a beautiful city!

PARIS!!!!!

My trip to Paris began, thanks to that freaking ash cloud, as very stressful. After days of not hearing anything about the volcano in Iceland or the ash cloud word broke that a new ash cloud was heading for the UK which meant they would have to shut down UK airspace again. Needless to say I was freaking out because with UK airspace shut down then there would be no flights to Paris and no flights to Paris would mean no Paris for me. Now if there is one place I’ve wanted to see more then London it would be Paris. Ever since I was a little kid I’ve dreamed of going to the City of Lights and seeing all it has to offer, and now thanks to some ash cloud I found out that might not happen! Not on my watch! As a back up plan Claire and I (who were flying into Paris to meet up with Elise who was already there for her birthday) decided to monitor our flight on the Easyjet website and at the first sign of it being cancelled we’d book Eurostar tickets, no matter the cost.

So now I wake up on the morning of Monday, 17 March, and check the website only to find out that all flights out of London Luton Airport had been grounded in the morning, including the 6:25 flight to Paris. This was the point where I started to get nervous, but our flight, which wasn’t till 15:30, was still on. After spending an entire morning watching the flight checker and seeing a flight fly to the south of France we figured it was safe for our flight so we made our way to the airport. And by 15:30 our flight was in the air over the English Chanel! TAKE THAT ASH CLOUD!

Now the flight to Paris is, by far, the shortest flight I have ever been on, in only 55 minutes we were landing at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and queueing up to go through customs. Once through customs Claire and I found Elise waiting for us just outside the terminal and the three of us made our way into the city of Paris! We had to take a train from the airport to Gare Du Nord (the station where I had to catch a train to Calais less then a month ago) and from there we took the Metro to our hostel in Crimée.

The view from our hostel, not bad, right?

Now this was my fist time on the Metro, and I wasn’t sure what to expect, because I have heard horror stories about it. In actuality….it’s pretty bad. Maybe it’s because Im use to the Underground which is always clean and nice looking, but the Metro is dirty and kind of creepy. The trains are all covered in graffiti, they smell horrible and there is hardly any sitting room, which sucks because those trains end up having people sardined into them. Oh and I saw a rat once. But as bad as the Metro was Paris made up for it.

After checking into our hostel the three of us (Elise, Claire and myself) were starving so we headed over to the part of Paris know as St. Michel, which is full of little restaurants and cafes, to get some dinner. The food in France….OH MY GOD! It was so good! But nothing can beat their bread! Believe me the French know how to make their bread! And their mustard! French mustard is all what we call Dijon Mustard back in the States, but it is so way more spicy in France then it is in the US, which was unfortunate for me who decided to take a huge spoonful all at once.

St. Michel

After we ate our wonderful dinner the three of us wondered around a bit until suddenly we were standing in front of Notre Dame! Yeah, the Notre Dame! What a massive cathedral it is! It looks like it could easily crush Westminster Abbey, both in beauty and maybe in size. Unfortunately it was late so we couldn’t go inside, but seeing the inside was saved for another day.

Notre Dame

After seeing Notre Dame we decided we wanted to see why Paris is called the City of Lights so we walked around as the sky darkened watching all the lights come on. Let me tell you, I know know what Paris is the City of Lights, it is beautiful at night!

A really cool  building we saw that I can not remember the name of

We even got to eat sugar crepes with a few of the Eiffel Tower all lit up!

THE CITY OF LIGHTS!

The next morning began with a wonderful French breakfast consisting of croissant and chouquette (like a I said, the French do great bread) and then it was off to Champ de Mars, which is the grassy ark area in front of the Eiffel Tower! Yes I was finally sitting in front of the Eiffel Tower in all her glory. And let me tell you, she is so much bigger then I imagined!

Three guess what this is…

After falling asleep on the Champ de Mars in front of the Eiffel Tower we decided it was time to eat again (yes we ate a lot on this holiday) and found a petit cafe that had a wonderful view of the Eiffel Tower. And they had the best French onion soup (I guess it’s just called onion soup…) I have ever tasted! After we ate we hoped on the Metro and took it to Opera, which is where the world famous Paris Opera House is located! For those musical fans, the Paris Opera House is where Phantom of the Opera takes place.

The Paris Opera House

The Opera House is so beautiful both inside and out. We saw everything from the theatre to the costumes used in past productions. I just can’t get over how grand this building was, modern day theatres can not compare to the splendor and beauty of this opera house, which looked more like a petit palace! I can only imagine what it must be like to see an opera performed there.

The Grand Staircase

The Opera Stage

Just a taste of how grand it is

After the Opera House Elise, Claire and I stopped in a little chocolate shop where we bought some of the greatest chocolates in the world, which we ate while sitting in the Taileries, which is between the Arc de Triomphe and the Louvre. It was so warm out and we sat around a pond facing the Louvre eating our sweets.

The next day, Wednesday, we set aside the whole day for the Louvre! That’s right the museum that holds more famous art works then any other museum I can imagine! I was so excited! Our day began with us wondering around the streets of Paris searching for an address where we could buy these museum passes we had heard about that allow you to get into the museums for free. After about an hour of wondering it turned out you could just by the passes at the museum so we made our way to the Louvre.

Once there you are hit by the sight of the giant glass pyramid that is the entrance to the museum. Now here’s something most people leave out, the glass pyramid is beautiful to look at, but once you’re inside it is like a greenhouse, especially when it is as hot as it was that day. But it was still pretty freaking amazing being inside that pyramid!

THE LOUVRE!

Once inside the Louvre the three of us were off! We saw so much in such a short time! There was everything from pots made in the Dark Ages to the apartments of Napoleon III! Needless to say the Napoleon III apartments were my favorite…

My favourite photo of the day

The Apartments of Napoleon III

Napoleon III

After seeing the apartments Elise, Claire and I made our way back to entrance to Louvre where we met up with Elise’s friend, Camille, who is Parisian. The four of us had lunch and then headed back into the museum (which by the way, European Union citizens who are under 26 get into museums in France for free….lucky Camille) and headed straight to the hall of Italian paintings. We saw everything from The Madonna and Child to Leonardo Da Vinci’s Madonna of the Rocks, which is my all time favorite Da Vinci piece. We also of course saw the Mona Lisa and in all honesty it was kind of a let down. I mean my whole life I’ve seen replicas of it and so seeing the real thing wasn’t really that exciting. Also it’s small painting that has it’s own wall and is behind a sheet of bullet proof glass which people queue up to see and they can’t even get close to. I found it rather odd how it is so famous and people come from around the world to see it when in the same room as the Mona Lisa there are at least 50 other more beautiful works of art that just get ignored.

My favourite Da Vinci work, The Madonna of the Rock

The Mona Lisa

One of the many Madonna and Child paintings

Oath of Horatii

My favourite painting in the whole museum, Napoleon Crowning Josephine

After seeing countless paintings we all headed off to see some beauty statues, including the Venus de Milo!

The Venus de Milo

Cupid and Psyche

By now we had literally spent all day at the Louvre, and yet there was still so much more to see. Unfortunately we were exhausted and so we decided it was time to go. It is basically impossible to see everything the Louvre has to offer in one visit, and so I can not wait to go back to Paris to see all the things I missed!

Alright, that’s all for now on my Paris adventure, but there is so much more to tell so check back soon for the rest of my holiday in Paris!

So let me start by saying that I am in love with Scotland! It is so different from England and the way of life there is so seductive! I would love to be able to go back for longer!

My trip to Scotland began on Tuesday when Erika and I boarded a 9:30 train to Carlisle from London Euston. Erika said the last time she went to Scotland she took a night couch and that it was the worst experience of her life so we decided to spend the extra money on taking a train, and it’s also a lot faster! Our train arrived in Carlisle around 12:45 and our connecting train to Edinburgh left at 13:03 so we didn’t have to wait long at all. The train ride took us through some of the most beautiful country side I have ever seen in the UK. Honestly the Scottish country side is so green and lushes!

The view from the train

Our train arrived at Edinburgh Waverly Station at 14:22 and I got my first look at the city. The first thing you see in Edinburgh is the castle. Edinburgh Castle is sits atop a hill overlooking the city and it looks like something straight out of a fairy tale! It really did! It’s this giant stone castle built over a thousand years ago and it overlooks everything! I seriously felt like I had stepped into a Lord of the Rings film or something!

Edinburgh Castle

In fact all of Edinburgh is built like that. In London it is the perfect combination of historical and modern, but in Edinburgh it is all historical. The buildings all look like they were built the same day as the castle and even the modern shops blend in so well!

Erika and I spent our first day just walking around Old Town and exploring the beauty of Edinburgh. At one point we stopped in a pub o have lunch and we ended up having an hour long conversation with a Scottish man about politics! Oh that’s another thing, the people are so nice in Scotland! People will just come up to you and have a conversation with you as if they’ve known for your whole life, when in actuality you just met two minutes ago. And everyone is willing to help you with anything you ask!

Some really interesting looking building

The Kirk

People use to be executed on this spot and now it is bad luck to walk on it

Hogwarts?

Our first night in Edinburgh was a quite and calm one. Erika and I went to dinner at a REALLY good French cafe (yeah French food in Scotland…..) and then we went to a pub and relaxed over a glass of Scottish Whiskey. Turns out I am NOT a whiskey drinker! That drink burned like FIRE!

The Palace of Holyrood House

The next morning the two of us go up early and headed out of the hostel by 9:30! Today was the day we were going to see the Palace of Holyrood House, the Queen’s residence in Edinburgh. I was really excited because it is basically the Scottish version of Windsor Castle, or so I thought. Turns out Holyrood House is a lot smaller then Windsor and the Queen usually doesn’t stay there for long. It’s basically a stopping point for her on the way to the Balmoral Estate in the Highlands. Even though the Queen doesn’t stay there for long it is still a beautiful palace. We got to tour the inside of it for a bit and we even saw the Queen’s bedchamber and the former bedchamber of Mary, Queen of Scots!

Mary’s bedroom is connected to her private rooms which is where her private secretary, David Rizzio, was murdered by her second husband, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. In the corner of the room you can still see the blood stain. CREEPY! Nowadays the room is filled with paintings of member of the Scottish Royal Family and things that belonged to Queen Mary, such as books, jewelry, and even a lock of her hair! There were two things in that room that really blew my mind. The first was the skull of Robert the Bruce (aka Robert I of Scotland)! Robert the Bruce, who is a hero to the Scots, died in 1329 making that skull 681 years old! It was so amazing to see the actual skull of such an important Scottish King! The second thing that I was fascinated by was this little painting that most people would just pass over and not think about. Turns out the person in the painting is none other then Mary Boleyn, younger sister to Anne Boleyn. For anyone who is a fan of the book The Other Boleyn Girl, such as myself, then you should know this is one of the few known paintings of the Boleyn sister that history forgot. I was shocked that it was on display in the room of Mary, Queen of Scots!

Robert the Bruce

Unfortunately I have no photos from inside the palace because it is a Royal residence and so photos are not allowed to be taken. However, at the end of the palace tour you can go into the ruins of the 12th-century Holyrood Abbey and I have pictures of that! Throughout history several Scottish Kings were buried in this Abbey, and the coronation of Charles I took place there, the abbey was abandoned after the roof caved in during the mid-1700s.

Holyrood House Abbey

After seeing Holyrood Abbey Erika and I walked though the gardens and looked at the beautiful scenery that surrounds the palace.

The Gardens of Holyrood Palace

After we saw everything the palace had to offer Erika and I decided it was time for lunch so we went to the Elephant House Cafe. For those of you who are Harry Potter fans you would be interested to know that the Elephant House Cafe is the cafe where JK Rowling began writing Harry Potter! Now I am a huge Harry Potter fan, and those books helped me to fight my dyslexia (they were the first books that showed me that reading could be fun and so I forced myself to fight my dyslexia so I could continue reading them) so eating lunch in the cafe was so awe inspiring! I was literally in the “birthplace” of Harry Potter! And from the cafe there is an excellent view of Edinburgh Castle that looks exactly like Hogwarts is described in the books so you can see how Rowling was inspired.

The Elephant House Cafe, where JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter

The view from the cafe, can’t you see how she was inspired

After eating in the cafe Erika and I went on a tour of Mary King’s Close. A close is a small street that was used a lot in medieval times in Edinburgh, but the interesting thing about Mary King’s Close is that there is now building built on top of it! That’s right, there are buildings built on top of medieval street, so it was like going underground when in reality you were on the ground level.

After the tour Erika and I wandered around Edinburgh some more until we decided to go to the cinema. We ended up seeing Robin Hood which I guess sort of ties in with our day of visiting historic Edinburgh. After the film we had dinner at a wonderful Spanish Tapas restaurant.

Thursday morning was another early morning and another morning with a castle. This time we were seeing Edinburgh Castle which I had been looking forward to ever since I first caught sight of the castle when our train arrived. The castle itself can only be described in one word: AMAZING! By far the best castle I’ve been to thus far in Europe!

Once you get behind the castle walls you are instantly hit with the breathtaking view of all Edinburgh laid out at your feet. Talk about feeling like royalty!

The first thing Erika and I did was see St. Margaret’s Chapel which is not only the oldest building in the castle, but also the oldest building in all of Edinburgh.

The inside of St. Margaret’s Chapel

We then got to see Mons Meg a GAINT cannon that was capable of shooting a target 2 miles away! Next to Mons Meg is the famous One O’Clock Gun, which is fired at 13:00 everyday. It was used as a way to help sailors in the Lock set their clocks but now it is just tradition.

Mons Meg

After seeing the guns Erika and I wondered around the castle a bit feeling like fairytale royalty. We then headed inside to see the crown jewels. The Scottish crown jewels, or the Honours of Scotland, are very different from the ones on display in the Tower of London. For one thing these are much older, because the English crown jewels were destroyed by Cromwell when he took power during the English Civil War, but the Scottish Honors were saved because they were actually buried under a church until the monarchy was restored. Also the Stone of Destiny is on display there! The Stone was used as part of the coronation ceremony of Scottish monarchs until 1296 when it was stolen by the English and taken to Westminster Abbey. It remained in Westminster Abbey until 1950 when it was stolen back and returned to Scotland. Now during a coronation is brought down to Westminster Abbey for the coronation and then returned to Edinburgh Castle.

After seeing the crown jewels Erika and I walked to the Royal Apartments where we saw the rooms that belonged to the Kings and Queens of Scotland. We even saw the room where Mary, Queen of Scots, gave birth to her son, the future King James VI of Scotland under whom the Scottish and English crowns would eventually become one. If you’re a history dork like me then you’d understand why I was so excited to be the very room where the man who would unify the crowns and Scotland and England was born!

The Room where King James VI & I was born

After seeing the royal apartments and the banqueting hall Erika and I had a traditional Scottish lunch in the Queen Anne Cafe which is in what use to be the castle kitchens. We had wild boar sausages and tatties (mash), and it was SO good! After our lunch we went to see the castle dungeons which held prisoners of war right up till the end of World War II. There was even a door on display that an American prison had carved an American flag onto when he was held there during the American Revolution. YEAH USA!

After seeing the dungeons and then a exhibit on the Scottish army Erika and I decided we had seen about as much of the castle as we could see in the time we were there so we headed out. We ended up going to the National Museum of Scotland where we saw the Tomb of Mary, Queen of Scots! Needless to say I snapped a picture, although I’m not sure if I was allowed to do so….

The Tomb of Queen Mary I of Scotland (aka Mary, Queen of Scots)

After the museum we head to another pub where we relaxed for quite a bit before heading out to find a resturant we had read about. Leave it to Erika and me to get lost looking for the place. So we ended up in a great Italian food restaurant which we fallowed up with a cocktail bar. And so that was our last night in Edinburgh and it was so great!

The next morning we were on a 10:54 train to London and saying goodbye to beautiful Edinburgh, Scotland.

I only saw a small bit of Scotland but it was so beautiful and I would love to go back and see more, such as the Highlands! Hopefully sometime soon I’ll be back to do more!

Did I mention the Scottish Pound is different from the English Pound? Same currency, just different notes! This is a Scottish Fiver for example

Well another thing I can check off my list of things to do in London, Madame Tussauds! Now I’ve been to the Madame Tussauds Wax Museum in New York several times, but ever since I want to the New York one for the first time I’ve wanted to see the London museum. The London Museum is the flagship museum and it has so much more then the New York branch, for example a room full of British Royalty!

Julia and I went on Monday to the museum hoping it wouldn’t be too crowded…we were wrong. The place was packed and we had to queue up for 45 minutes to get to the ticket till, but it was worth it. And the best part, we got in for half price. See Julia had a coupon that gave us a buy one get one free admission so instead of paying £25 each we only had to pay £12.50 each! HOORAY for saving money!

After paying we headed in and we saw EVERYTHING. We saw everything from modern celebrities, to style icons, to athletes, even the Queen! It was such a great experience and me and Julia had such a great time. We took so many pictures with all the different wax figures.

Here, check out some photos:

John Wayne and Me

David Beckham

Not sure who this person is…

Me running with the Olympic Torch

HENRY VIII!!!

Queen Elizabeth I

King Charles I, before he was beheaded

Me, Julia, HM Queen Elizabeth II and HRH The Duke of Edinburgh

Julia, Michael Jackson and Me

Britney Spears

There’s hundreds more pictures I would love to post but I can’t put them all on my blog, that would take ages! But basically I recommend Madame Tussauds for anyone who is in London. Especially because it has so much more then the New York museum!

After the museum Julia and I met up with Megan and the three of us decided to check out Abbey Road. In all honestly I’m not a Beetles fan, but I thought it would be neat to see Abbey Road, or at least it would give me bragging rights. Too bad Abbey Road is actually a VERY busy road and so it was nearly impossible for anyone to take a picture walking in the cross walk. But I did managed to get a picture of the zebra cross walk!

And so the rest of the day was spent hanging out with Erika and Louise because it was Erika’s 23 birthday. We spent the day hanging out in central London before going to The Rose and Crown for a birthday dinner.

And now here I am, getting all set for Scotland! That’s right I leave in the morning for Edinburgh until Friday! I am so excited!

Well that is all now! I’ll write more when I get back from Edinburgh with all my Scottish adventures! Until then!

Another thing I’ve done recently: I found Platform 9¾! Now for those of you who have been living under a rock for the past decade, theres this book called Harry Potter that basically changed the reading world as we know it. Platform 9¾ is from Harry Potter and ever since I arrived in London I wanted to go to King’s Cross and find it, but alas I have been too busy to do so…until now!

Now, intersting story about Platform 9¾. In the Harry Potter books and movies Platforms 9 and 10 are right next to each other and only separated by a series of brick barriers and the only way to get to Platform 9¾ is to run through the barrier. However in real life Platforms 9 and 10 are separated by train tracks thus there is no barrier between the two, so after the Harry Potter crazy took off a Platform 9¾ was built between Platforms 8 and 9.

And I have to say, asking a conductor how to get to Platform 9¾ was the highlight of the moment because it reminded me of that scene in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone when Harry asked a conductor how to get to the platform and he replied “You’re having a laugh!”