Catching Up and Leaving the Beautiful UK

I apologize for slacking the last few days...I'll try to remember details :)

Thursday (May 23rd), we went to the Lloyd's of London. It was an incredible building...built with all the pipes and everything on the outside. Our tour guide said that the only other building with the same design is in France. Lloyd's of London is more like a market of insurance firms as opposed to just a single entity.

After Lloyd's we were done for the day. A few of us went to a nearby market and ate at Pizza Express. We had pizza surprisingly more often than I thought we would. :) We then walked back to the hotel to change and have a quick meeting to go over our time in England and what we would do differently. It was fun to look back on things.

Once our meeting was done, a group of us went to the British museum. It was really cool to see different exhibits of several countries. We spent about an hour there and then went to Nike Town...a super-sized Nike store. :) Unfortunately I didn't get anything there though because I knew I could get all those things back in the US.

We then went back to the hotel and ate at the restaurant that was attached....we had to fuel up before going out one last time :) We ended up having one last hurrah by having a few drinks at the hotel and then venturing off to a club. Haha it's hard to describe all that happened...but let's just say there were a few punches thrown, tears shed, dances, laughter, and in the end some memories that will never be forgotten.

Friday was a free day and we took the day to sleep in and then shop, shop, shop! :) I probably spent a little too much but hey, it was London, England! Haha there were several interesting moments while shopping but one of the more embarrassing ones for me was when I was paying for a few of my items. The cashier asked me if I was paying with cash to which I responded with "no, I'm using pounds." He kind of chuckled and said "yeah, ok." That sounds normal to me until I realized as I was walking out what an idiot I was. Haha when I think of "cash" I think of US dollars but in England "cash" is considered to be pounds. He was just wondering if I was using a card or not. Ugh anyways :P

We came back to the hotel and just laid around until dinner time and then decided that we were craving McDonald's so went walked there in the pouring rain. Which reminds me, I don't know if I've mentioned this before but I now know why Americans are overweight, especially when compared to Europeans. Their portions are super small for both food and drinks! Their large is our small/medium when it comes to drinks and they barely put in any ice AND they do not do free refills. It was sad lol. Along with that, they walk everywhere...at an extremely fast pace and there are stairs everywhere as well. I enjoyed it and I love the city life but I think London would be a little bit too big for me.

Saturday I woke up around 6:30am and a few of us met to take the tube to the airport. The tube wasn't nearly as busy as it had been, which was super nice because we all had our luggage. I didn't have any issues at the airport and my flight went smoothly. It was a little longer than the flight over but that was ok because I was able to watch 3 movies this time! I watched Silver Linings Playbook, Warm Bodies, and This is 40. All were pretty good movies :)

My arrival was a little emotional. One, because when I went through check-in I was able to go through the fast lane since I was a US citizen and the lady said "welcome home." I know they say that to everyone and it's not that big of deal but for some reason it just made me tear up a bit. Then...after I got my luggage my mom was waiting for me at the gate and I almost bawled right away haha which of course caused her to start crying. I was never really homesick on my trip but just seeing her made me realize how much I had missed her.

Now I am attempting to get back to US time....my mind is still functioning on London time. Hopefully this doesn't last too long. One thing that I am super thankful for is the sunshine! I have missed it so much! All that I have left to do is write my paper and put pictures up. I am truly thankful that I was able to have this opportunity and if I have any say it, I will definitely be travelling to England again...and hopefully many other places as well because this trip has sparked a huge travel interest :) I hope those of you reading this have enjoyed reading my entries and if you have any questions about things I would be more than happy to share!

Love you all,
Sharisse

The London Eye

Today we toured London some more :)

We started with a Continental breakfast at the hotel and then headed to the Museum of London at 10am. We talked with the director of Marketing and Tourism there and were able to tour the museum for a little bit. They had a few exhibits dedicated to the Olympics, it was really cool :)

After that we quickly walked to UBS and talked with Barry Roberts. He was born in Nashville, went through Harlaxton's summer program when he was in college and then ended up moving to England to work. He had an interesting accent...Southern mixed with British. He told us a lot about his bank and the work that he does there.

We went to an authentic Spanish restaurant for lunch and then went back to the hotel to change. We had to wear our business professional attire....and let me tell you, heels in a big city where you have to walk a couple miles here and there...not the smartest choice on my part. haha 

Once we changed we traveled to the London Eye. It's a big Ferris wheel type thing that overlooks the city. Oh my word...I was able to get some amazing pictures!! Which by the way, I apologize for not posting pictures regularly...I just haven't had the time.

After the London Eye we went to dinner at a pub called "The Court." They had phenomenal fish and chips!!! :) We all were exhausted though afterwards and had a hard time walking back to the hotel. Which reminds me!!! We took the tube today! This was my first time using it....and if it wouldn't have been for the guys leading the way...I'm fairly certain I would not have gotten anywhere! The tube is the subway of England and it's chaotic, especially during rush hour!! I love the city but don't think I could travel via the tube everyday.

Now we are just back at the hotel, obviously relaxing in the lobby since I'm using wifi. I've definitely realized how good I have it with my electronics at home. I'm not quite sure what we are doing the rest of the night but probably just hanging out at the hotel :)

LONDON!!!!!

Today we left Harlaxton at 9am for London!! :) We arrived around 11:30am and checked into our hotel...the Royal National Hotel. It's fairly decent. I am rooming with two other girls (my roommate from before and another business lady). The triples here have 3 twin beds in the room haha it's quite interesting.

One everyone was settled, we had free time to explore. A group of us took the open bus tour and it was AMAZING!!! We saw all sorts of museums, Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, the Buckingham Palace, and so much more! I was disappointed though because my phone died halfway through the trip...and that's how I've been taking pictures! ugh. Oh well, we'll be able to visit places again. I seriously cannot write enough or show enough pictures to even begin to share the beauty of this city. :) I'm still in shock.

Now we are just relaxing in the lobby as it is the only place we can get wifi. Haha definitely a bunch of spoiled kids here because we don't know what to do without our wifi.

I think I am going to go to bed early tonight though because we have an early day tomorrow.

Relaxing in Stamford

Yesterday (May 20th) was a fairly relaxed day.

We took a coach to Stamford and visted the Burghley House. It was beautiful on the inside! There were rooms filled with paintings and rooms that had painted walls themselves. I took many pictures but again pictures do not do it justice. Along with touring the house, we also walked through their "Garden of Surprises" There was a section that was filled with random sculptures and another section that had a lot of water fountains. 

After the tour we dropped the nursing and sociology students off and we just walked around the town. It was a lot of fun. We went to an Inn and had fish and chips :) We ended up running into this guy that was originally from Florida but grew up in the UK. He was pretty cool.

In the evening we all spent time in the Bistro as it was our last night at Harlaxton. It was a lot of fun but it was a little sad leaving.

Cambridge: Lovely City...Ugly Birds.

Well...looking back on things I should have known today was not going to be my day...

First off, my roommate and I left the curtains open last night so the sun blinded us this morning around 6:30am and we thought we were late. Fortunately we were able to go back to sleep. When we did wake up, I decided to wear my black long sleeve soccer shirt with jeans...because it's typically been overcast. Of course...today it decides to be absolutely gorgeous!! GRRR 

We took the coach to Cambridge and I fell in love with it right away! Cambridge is basically a city owned by the University. If you aren't familiar with their system it was explained to me as follows: There is one University known as Cambridge within the University there are 31 colleges and you can only apply to one college. If you do not get in, you have to wait a year to apply again or even to apply to a different college. Oxford also works in this manner but you can only either apply to Cambridge or Oxford. I found this to be very interesting! All of the colleges that I was able to see...King's, Queens, Trinity, etc...were absolutely gorgeous!! 

Soo remember how I said this day was not my day...but yet I fell in love with Cambridge...well here's where that part changes. We got there around 10:30am and had until 1pm because that was when our guided tour started. A group of us decided to go on a boat tour. The boats are known as "punts" and are similar to gondolas. Travelling down the river was breathtaking! We were able to see all the colleges and hear about which famous scientist, engineer, etc., went where. Anddddd being a river....there were geese around. and ducks. I can now officially say that seagulls are no longer my arch nemesis...but ducks are! (For those of you that don't know, I'm deathly afraid of birds). Well anywho, this duck comes up to our punt...and I am so very conveniently sitting on the edge close to the water. I don't know what this duck was thinking but all of a sudden he started keeping up with us and was swimming right beside us for a good while. Of course I am leaning in close to the person beside me, freaking out. Everyone thinks it's funny and that I should be taking pictures of the duck and our guide even said that if we were to get in a fight that I would win. HE SHOULD NOT HAVE SAID THAT! Because nearly 2 minutes afterwards the duck starts quacking more and decided to try to jump/fly or whatever into the boat and pecked at my feet while it was flying about and then swam away!!!!!!!! IT WAS SO SCARY! As you can imagine, everyone was laughing...and I started to laugh as well but then it finally set in and I started crying...talk about embarrassing. But it doesn't end there....5 minutes later another bird decides to swoop down by us and flew right over my head, causing me to scream. Our guide mentioned that I seemed to really not like birds but they seemed to love me. haha he then suggested that I switch places with the person I was sitting beside so that I could be in the middle away from all fowl. And if you were to guess that after that no bird came near us, you would be right. It was annoying.

After our (my) dreadful boat tour we had a tour of the city on foot. It wasn't too bad, just that I had to use the restroom the entire two hours and our tour guide was a grumpy old man who would speed walk and wouldn't let anyone stop to use the bathroom. A few of us ended up leaving the group when we had 10 minutes left because we couldn't hold it any longer....needless to say we lost the group and had to venture back to our starting point. Haha it was quite the adventure in Cambridge.

Our final stop was in Madingley at the Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial. We got to see all the tributes to the fallen Americans and watched the flag lowering ceremony. It was interesting to see American things in the UK. 

We made it back to Harlaxton around 6pm and ate dinner. Now we are just relaxing and having another movie night :) We'll see how the movie selection goes tonight.

Rest Day...Kind of.

Well, today we finally had a rest day!!! It was much needed. We had class at 9am but then the rest of the day was ours to do as we pleased.

After class I took a nap for two hours then had lunch. A few of us girls then went to Grantham to a market. Some parts were similar to the Shipshewana Flea Market but not near as big. Then we came back and worked out...finally!! haha the college actually has a lot of equipment available for use. 

We had dinner tonight at Gregory's...the pub at the end of the lane. We had burger's and fries and oh my goodness, it was delicious; very fulfilling!! The walk back was pleasant as the weather was wonderful! The sun was starting to set and we could actually see it because the clouds were gone. It was also nice to walk off our food. There was a wedding at the manor tonight so we were able to see a few of the guests arriving as we go back. Unfortunately we did not get to see the bride or groom.

Once we got back we decided to do laundry and watch movies. Which was all well and fine...except that our laundry had to go through the drying cycle three times until it was completely dry. On top of that...we decided to watch "The Haunting." If you haven't seen it, you can tell by it's title that it is supposed to be a scary movie...but it wasn't all that bad. The actual scary part, and the main reason why we choose to watch it, was due to the fact that the mansion where the movie takes place was at Harlaxton! It was really creepy to watch the screen fill up with extremely familiar scenes such as the land surrounding Harlaxton, the lane going up to the manor, and the outside of the manor itself. The inside of the place was filmed at a different location but it was still creepy. And, the fact that my imagination runs wild did not help as we were walking through the halls.

Well, hopefully I'll be able to sleep tonight! :) I'm sure I'll be fine because even though we didn't do too much today, I am still very tired. Tomorrow we head to Cambridge...I'm excited! It's hard to believe that I am halfway through my trip already!

Nottingham, Football, & Perhaps Not Enough Sleep

Wow! Today (May 17) was such a BUSY day!!! 

We started out at 9am with a guest speaker, Mark Morris, who was the Head of SME Real Estate of HSBC Bank in London. He talked a lot about HSBC and how they are the world's leading international bank.

From there we ate lunch and then took the coach to Nottingham. The first place we visited was Experian and had a tour of the company by Barry Westbury, who was the head IT person. Experian is a hard company to explain other than that they are custodians of data and information for companies ranging in size as well as storing personal credit scores. They have databases located in Nottingham and in Texas, US. This place was loaded with security! Every time we went through a door, Barry had to scan his card and we all (our group of 14 plus Barry) had to enter and have the door closed in under 17 seconds otherwise alarms would go off!! haha it was intense.

After Experian we went to Nottingham Forest Football Club. This has definitely been one of the highlights of my trip! We went to the gift shop first and of course I bought myself a jersey :) We then went to the press room and their marketing guy came and talked with us about the club. He told us how the club has won the Euro Cup two times in a row and was in the Premier League but then were relegated down. We walked to the pitch and there were a few guys playing on the field. The stadium was not as extravagant as I thought it would be but it was still gorgeous! Our tour guide offered to take a group picture of us....and he said "short ones in the front" and definitely called me out haha as did the rest of the group. Haha I was like hmm ok guys....then the tour guide couldn't figure out where the camera button was on a phone and asked me to show him so I go "oh, here, it's the one that looks like a camera." haha and of course I did not mean that in a rude way but the whole group died laughing and the guy was like "ohhhh ok, just being a short little smart ass, eh?" haha it was funny. As we ended the tour he asked if any of us played football and I was a little toward the back so one of the girls said Sharisse does. haha he asked who Sharisse was and when I raised my hand he was like "Ohhh haha that figures!" 

Once we left and got back to Harlaxton we had dinner and then had yet another speaker, Dr. Jim Lewis, who was a world expert on the Lea Valley and London's Olympic site. It was interesting but everyone was exhausted....even our professor was falling asleep haha. 

After the lecture we all took a short nap and then went out to Grantham. We went to various clubs and had a lot of fun! It's been quite the experience being able to go to pubs and clubs. At one of the pubs I saw a sign that said "If you don't look over 21, we will card you to prove you're over 18." I freaked out at first because I was like oohhh no! I'm only 20 haha and I thought we just had to be 18...but then I realized I was good. :)