Last Day In London..... :(

My last day in London came way to quickly for me. I was having so much fun and then it was over. Here is my last day in London.

Carolyn had gotten an OK from her boss for me to shadow her while she was at her job. She works at the archives of the Horniman Museum. It was pretty cool. Everyone I met, including her supervisor, was really nice and welcoming. I worked with Carolyn and her supervisor on their project.

Basically they were photographing pieces in the museum's collection. It was much more exciting then it sounds I promise. I got to help unpack, situate, and repack all of the artifacts we photographed that day. It was pretty cool being able to handle parts of the collection. I really enjoyed myself so much. After we were done for the day Carolyn took me over to meet a few people that handle documentation for the whole collection. Which is a big job since the collection kinda takes up a few floors of the building! They were all really nice and were willing to explain things to me.

After work we took the tube over to Westminster Abbey where Carolyn took me to see (or more accurately hear) Evensong at the Abbey. It was beautiful. It was just the choir and their voices harmonizing to create this wonderful wall of sound.

By the time that was over it was already 6 pm. so we decided to go home and start dinner before we both starved. once we had eaten we relaxed for a while around her flat. Once it was a bit later we went back out on the town and had a few drinks in a pub. It was a very nice relaxed last night in London.

Thank you Carolyn for making my time in London one of the best times of my life!

Museums, and palaces, and the TARDIS...Oh My!!

So first I have to admit, this may have been my favorite day in London.

We started our morning off early by heading out to the tube and making our way into town. Then we walked quite a ways over to the British Museum!!!!! For anyone who doesn't know...working there is like my dream job! It was so amazing and I was so happy to finally be inside that museum!

We saw the standard must sees...The Rosetta Stone, the Easter Island head, etc. and they were all really cool. I loved every minute of it. Then we went up stairs into the Egyptology rooms and we walked around and enjoyed the many displays of Ancient Egyptian artifacts. Then we walked on over to Victorian Britain. We saw lots of cool things there too.

After making a trip to the gift shop (no real shock there), we said goodbye to the British Museum and made our way over to the tube once again. From there we went over to Notting Hill and walked over to Kensington Palace.

First, Carolyn and I had a wonderful picnic lunch in the absolutely beautiful Kensington Gardens. it was so nice out that day and everyone was picnicking or playing in the parks. It was just so relaxing. When we finished lunch we walked further into the gardens and finally reached Kensington Palace.

Kensington Palace, by the way, was Queen Victoria's childhood homestead. No just so you all know....I love Queen Victoria!! She is my favorite Queen and I love her husband, Prince Albert, too! I always love hearing about them and their lives, so being at Kensington Palace sort of made my day. We went inside and explored the '"ictoria Revealed" exhibit that was throughout the palace. It was all about Queen Victoria and Prince Albert's lives together beginning at the moment that the young Princess became Queen. It was all very interesting.

Then Carolyn took me to the other side of Notting Hill down to Portobello Road. Portobello Road is a shopping street where tons of people put up stands filled with anything and everything along the street. It was fun to explore and look at all of the things for sale. Fortunately I was able to control myself and not spend too much money there.

We then had one final mission before going home for dinner....locating the TARDIS.

Ok so just in case some of you are not Dr. Who fans I will explain this for you. First off, TARDIS stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. The TARDIS is disguised as a blue police box. The TARDIS is the sentient being that functions as a time machine as well as a space ship for the Doctor. The Doctor is an alien from the race called the Time Lords. He is the last one of the Time Lords remaining since The Great Time War.  

This "mad man with a box" (as he has been described by some other characters) travels time and space with his companions (usually humans) saving the universe from peril and disaster one planet at a time.

Alright now that that's done....Carolyn and I discovered that their was a recreation of these old blue police boxes (the last original police box is in Glasgow, Scotland) and we could not pass up the chance to go see it. So we did. And we took pictures...lots and lots of pictures. Basically we were being nerds in public.

Then we went back and cooked dinner before heading out again into London. We went over to West End and met up with a few of Carolyn's friends and went to go see Les Mis! Everything about it was fantastic. The sets were amazing, the casting was well done, and the singing was great. I loved it so much; finally being able to see one of my favorite musicals live.

Finally, after all that, Carolyn and I called it a night and went back to her place. There we ate Ben & Jerry's and Jammie Dodgers while watching.......any guesses?......That's right, Doctor Who!

Cuppa Tea and The Beatles

So my third day in London was pretty fun.

Carolyn and I started off by going to mass at this little church she found in SoHo. At first glance it doesnt look like much. Just another brick building on the street. But then you go inside. It looks like a small cathedral! It was so beautiful and mass was lovely.

Then we did a tiny bit of window shopping and then decided to make our was downtown to Twinings. In order to get there we switched things up a bit. Instead of taking the tube, we rode one of the famous red double decker buses! It was so much fun! We went up to the top and it was cool to see everything from a new angle. We were dropped off near the Thames and we decided to picnic for lunch before going to Twinings.

We then walked down a ways and finally made it to our destination. Now you are probably wondering 'What is Twinings?' Well I'll tell you. Twinings is a small old little tea shop. but not only can you buy just about every tea imaginable, you can walk to the back and sit down for a free cuppa (or two). I had so much fun there, and I even bought some new teas to try.

Then we walked down to St. Paul's cathedral and looked around. It was very nice. Then we sat down with a few Popsicles (or lollies) in the small park surrounding St. Paul's. What was strange though was that there were these two people walking around feeding squirrels. That's right folks...feeding squirrels. And I don't mean that they just threw some food on the ground for them. No, these people whistled and made clicking noises at them until the squirrels came up to them and ate out of their hands! Sometimes they even crawled up the person's arm! It certainly was a site to see.

We then walked past the Tower of London and admired it from the outside (too long a line to get in...tourists!). It was still really cool to see though. I even got a picture of Traitor's Gate. Then we walked across Tower Bridge and got to see a great view of London from there. It was really beautiful.

Then we kept on walking until we came across the Millennium Bridge ad we walked across it. For those of you who don't know...the Millennium Bridge was the white wire looking bridge that Voldemort's Death Eaters destroyed in one of the Harry Potter movies!

From there we walked along South Bank and I got to see two BBC Sherlock filming sites! Unfortunately, they were not filming there when I walked by so I didn't get to meet anyone famous. :(

Then Carolyn and I took the Tube down to the famous Abbey Road. And we were not the only ones. There were tons of people there taking pictures of their friends walking across Abbey Road just like the Beatles had done so many years ago. And yes, Carolyn and I both took turns walking across Abbey Road to get our pictures taking. It was much more fun then either of us expected. Although that may have had something to do with the 24 hour live cam on the site where both of our parental units were watching. :)

Then we called it a day and wen t back to her place, made dinner, and watched Young Victoria!
 

Shopping and an Opera

My second day in London started off in Camden Market where we did a little shopping.

Most of it was really touristy and whatnot, but it was a true London experience. We spent a good amount of time there checking out the different shops and talking and having a good time.

Then we took the tube to South Kensington where Carolyn, her friend Sara, and I had a semi picnic on a small area in the middle of a pedestrian street. It was fun even though it decided to rain a little in the middle of that.

We then walked to the Victoria and Albert Museum. It was so amazing. Unfortunately we didn't have time to see everything because the museum is just that huge. So we chose a few rooms that we really wanted to see and then we left.

We went to the middle ages and then we went all the way upstairs into the costume room. They had costumes on display from plays and operas and movies dating so far back!

They had costumes from things like "The Producers" and "Romeo and Juliet". They had ones from "Madame Butterfly" and so many more. It was really cool. They even had some stuff from the old silent film stars.

After that we walked up to Hyde Park and took a stroll there. We walked over to the Prince Albert monument (since I love Albert and Victoria so much!). Sadly it was under construction but it was still pretty neat to see.

Then we walked all the way down to Harrods. On the way we saw a street skater pass by. You know how some people train for cross country skiing by walking with two large sticks to mimic the movements of skiing? It was basically the same thing only instead of walking he had these odd skates on him that looked like shortened skis that had wheels on the bottom.

Anyways, back to Harrods. So we went inside and Carolyn took my up the Egyptian escalators. We then waked around and looked at all the things we could not afford. I did eventually find something I could afford though; a small espresso cup and saucer with the Union Jack on it. So yes...I am now a patron of Harrods!

We then went back to Carolyn's flat to freshen up and change clothes before taking the tube back to Trafalgar Square where I then had my very first taste of Thai food. It was actually very tasty. I enjoyed it a lot.

We then walked over to the opera house where we sat down to enjoy the wonderful Puccini opera, La Boheme.  It was fantastic. Everything about it was so well done. The singers were phenomenal and the sets and lighting and..everything was perfect. The only small issue I had was that they sang it in English instead of the original Italian libretto. And even then, they performed so well that I wasn't too bothered by it.

Thus ends day 2!

London, England!!!

For all of you who didn't know, I just spent a wonderful week in London, England with one of my close friends, Carolyn. Also for those of you who didn't know.....I have been DYING to go to London forever!

Ok so day one.

After my bus to the airport being late and a horrible take off and landing on my flight...I finally touched down at Gatwick Airport, in the amazing city of London (well, slightly outside the city to be more accurate), around 3 pm. I was a little worried for a moment because there was a slight issue with communication between us. I thought she was meeting me at the airport and she thought we were meeting at Victoria Station. But I was able to get everything figured out and settled and took a train into Victoria Station where I finally met up with Carolyn.

We decided to walk around for a while instead of taking the tube to her place. The first thing we came across was Westminster Cathedral (yes there is a Cathedral as well as the Abbey everyone knows about).

 It was so beautiful inside. We then continued walking and catching up until we came across Westminster Abbey.

We didn't go in because it actually costs money if you aren't going for services, but the outside was very impressive. I can't believe that just a few short years ago, the Royal Family was in that very same place for the Royal Wedding!

Right near the Abbey was the Houses of Parliament building and...BIG BEN!!! (Fun fact, Big Ben is the name of the bell inside the clock tower...not the tower itself)

After taking many many pictures of Big Ben we crossed the street and took turns posing for pictures inside the red telephone booths!! Yeah...I was totally a tourist that day.

We then picked up some sandwiches and crisps for lunch on the River Thames. Yup, not even there for 2 hours and already picnicking on the Thames. We had a lovely view of the London Eye (which I most certainly did not go in...sorry Hannah) and part of the city.

After our late lunch we walked to, and then through, St. James Park; which was absolutely, breathtakingly, beautiful. There were so many flowers and colors, huge trees to sit under and weeping willows, and little ponds throughout the park. I can only hope my future backyard looks half as nice as that park.

Then we walked over to, wait for it.....Buckingham Palace! That's right, I can now say that I have been to Buckingham Palace. It was amazing. I mean, of course we couldn't get too close due to the gate...and all the guards, but I was still close!!

We then walked on down to Trafalgar Square. We passed the National Art Gallery and a good portion of  West End (English version of NYC Broadway) and we just walked around a little.

Finally, after all of that; Carolyn and I got on the tube and made the trip all the way out to her flat. By the way...the tube was actually really cool and fun to ride. And it was surprisingly easy to figure out how to navigate the lines and stations after the first few days (not that I ever went on it alone...I'm not that stupid). We then dropped my stuff off in her room and made our way back out to the grocery store, Tesco, where we bought all of our food for lunches and dinners during my stay.

At around 9 pm we finally had time to start cooking our dinner. Carolyn made a delicious Chicken Parmesan. We then sat around and relaxed after our busy day. We talked and caught up with each other until we both decided we were really tired and should get to bed.

And that was only day one of five! Stay tuned!

I Took a Stroll Down the Old Long Walk On The Day I-ay-I-ay....

....I Met a Little Girl And We Stopped to Talk On a Grand Soft Day I-ay.

First, if you haven't heard the song Galway Girl before (Mom? Dad? I'm looking at you :D) then listen to this before you continue reading. 

http://mp3.li/index.php?q=Celtic%20Thunder%20-%20The%20Galway%20Girl  (first mp3)

And here is a video of the same group (Celtic Thunder) singing the song live! I love Celtic Thunder!!

http://vimeo.com/47715493

Ok, now that we have all heard the wonderful song that I honestly thought everyone knew, we can continue on with my trip to Galway!

We didn't spend too much time in the actual city of Galway sadly. We stayed in a hostle in Galway sure, but the majority of our time was spent elsewere. Our first day was spent mostly on the bus getting to Galway and making stops along the way. We got in at around 7 pm so there wasn't much time to do anything in town.

The next day we spent on the lovely Aran Islands. It was so beautiful that day! It was nice and sunny and not too hot either; just perfect. A small group of us went on a bus tour for the majority of our time on the island. It was really cool to see all of the sites on the small island. We stopped off at some cliffs (not as high as Moher but still rather high up). We all had a great time that day.

Afterwards we all did a little shopping at the woolen shops and bought some cute sweaters. Then we all just walked around and enjoyed the island and each other's company. That night we all got back and had a delicious feast created my Carmel herself. It was amazing.

The next day we had to pack everything up and head back to Dungarvan. It was a nice weekend trip I just wish it hadn't gone by so fast.

Sheep!!!!

One of our other stops during our drive to Galway was to a sheepherder's farm where we got to see a demonstration of sheep herding and sheep dogs. It was pretty cool.

Here a re some pictures of the sheep dogs and the sheep! So cute!

It was pretty cool to see how it all worked and how the dog just knew what to do. We learned how they are trained first by voice command and then by different whistle patterns in order to know what the farmer wanted. 

After that we got to walk around his farm for about half an hour and it was nice and peaceful. We were all just really happy that after seeing sheep everyday we finally got to see them up close and pet them. :)

That was the last stop we made before arriving in Galway.

Hello, My Name is Inigo Montoya...You Killed My Father...Prepare to Die.

So our last trip as a whole Mercyhurst group was last weekend. We traveled west to lovely Galway! Not only that but Tom Keith and his lovely wife Carmel came with us too.

On our long bus ride out to Galway we had several interesting stops. The best stop was at the famous Cliffs of Moher! They were absolutely beautiful and yet terrifying. I am no fan of heights and so I was a little freaked out about the 800 foot drop down to the water and rocks below.

Aside from the fact that these cliffs are amazing and gorgeous, there are also a couple awesome Hollywood moments that were filmed on these cliffs. The first few pictures (excluding the tower picture) are of the left side of the cliffs. On this side a part of the sixth Harry Potter was filmed. Yup, I got to be where Harry and Dumbledore were!

The other pictures where they seem a bit sunnier (including the one with me in it) are of the right side of the cliffs. It was there that a scene or two of Princess Bride were filmed... Inconceivable! We spent a good deal of time at the cliffs just enjoying the scenery.  A few friends and I went and had lunch there as well and we had the closest thing to a real butter beer outside of the Harry Potter theme parks...ginger beer! 

After lunch we wet back out to the cliffs again and just walked along the edge on the path and talked and enjoyed ourselves. You have to be very careful up there though because the winds were up to 50 miles an hour while we were there and that's why they have a railing now, because people have been blown off the cliffs before due to wind. 

Some people were idiots and climbed over the railing and went right up the edge of the cliffs. I couldn't look because I thought any minute they would be blown off the edge. 

While we were up there walking around it started to down pour for about 10 minutes and we tried to keep our hoods up so that at least part of us didn't get wet but the wind just wouldn't allow that. So eventually we gave up and just ran around in the rain like a bunch of 3 year olds. It was pretty fun, not gonna lie!

After a few hours we all piled back onto the bus and continued on towards Galway.

Spring Break in Berlin (part 4)

On my last full day in Berlin I did a few exciting things.

First, a large group of us took the S-bahn all the way out to it's last stop outside of Berlin. What were we doing there you may ask? We were headed to Sachsenhausen; a concentration camp of WWII's Nazi Germany.

Walking through those gates, knowing what had gone on inside their boundaries, was certainly an experience. While an incredibly interesting site this was also a rather upsetting one. Once we were all there we were allowed to walk about on our own and take everything in at our own pace. 

The first place I had walked into at the camp was the Infirmary Barracks. There wasn't much left inside the rooms beyond the pictures and information that was provided. It was all so eerie because, even though most of the equipment was gone, you still kind of knew what had gone on there. Everyone has been taught about the Holocaust to at least some extent in school, so it's probably not hard to imagine on your own what type of stuff had gone on in these barracks. 

My next stop was even more upsetting than that had been...the Pathology Building and Cellar Mortuary. It was here that all of the autopsies were performed on the prisoners who had died in the camp. At first it wasn't so bad. Just like the other buildings the rooms were pretty bare for the most part. It wasn't until I went to the basement that things got upsetting. 

There were rooms that looked as it they had been mostly untouched since they had been in operation. The tile and concrete tables where autopsies had been performed on the victims of the camp were still in place. The cabinets that held all of the tools were still on the walls; everything was just so real at that moment that it was too much. 

After that I saw many other things in the camp including the prisoner barracks. I'm sure many, if not all of us, have seen a movie about the Holocaust sometime in our lives right? Imagine back to that movie; the Hollywood provided images of the tightly packed, ill equipped barracks that housed the inmates. Got that picture? It's most likely not far off from what I saw.

 Many of these barracks had been torn down, leaving the camp looking much more open then it had during the Holocaust. All that was left were metal frames of where the barracks would have been. All of which were placed very close together.

After spending a few hours walking around in the camp, a few friends and I went to grab a late lunch before catching the S-bahn back to Berlin. We all then went back to museum island where we all split up to do our own thing.

I went to yet another museum. (Are you really surprised anymore?) The museum I chose to visit was the Pergamon. This museum is a bit different from most museums. Mainly because instead of having tons of rooms filled with artifacts and descriptions, the Pergamon took actual architectural structures from ancient times and displayed them as well as recreate similar structures as part of the room itself. I know that probably was not a very good explanation so hopefully these pictures will help a little.

 This was the first room you came to inside the museum.

 This was an entire wall of the second room that led to the third room. Over 60% of this recreated gateway is made up of actual fragments of the gate it is mimicking!!

 One of the two mosaics covering 90% of two of the walls in one of the rooms.

Did those help? I hope so. Along with this unique feature, the museum did have a great collection of artifacts from ancient Rome, Eygypt, and Middle East. It was over all a great museum and well worth going to.

After that I made it just in time to meet up with my friend Carol in front of the Berliner Dom so that we could catch the U-bahn to the Berlin Opera House. That's right ladies and gentlemen...I went to go see an opera in Berlin!!! And not just any opera either. I just so happened to be lucky enough to be in Berlin while my favorite opera, Georges Bizet's Carmen, was playing!!

Here is the view from our seats!

It was absolutely fantastic! The sets were amazing, and the cast was phenomenal! The whole company was amazing and did a great job. I loved every minute of it.

And then Carol and I made our way back to the U-bahn station to take the train back to our hotel and we called it a night. 

The next morning we all woke up bright and early to make our was back to the airport and say goodbye to lovely Berlin. While I miss Berlin so much, I am glad to be back in Ireland.