GEA Part 2: London

The second part of our Grand European Adventure (GEA, as you'll recall) brought us to dear old London Town. We were all a bit beat from our 4.5 hour train ride from Edinburgh, so we dropped our stuff off at our hotel and took a rest. I had been raving about England's Indian food so I dragged C and A to the first Indian restaurant I had eaten in when I arrived in the UK: The Chambeli, not too far from our hotel. Though I was having pleasant flashbacks, C and A were not too impressed with their food, especially C, who didn't really want Indian food in the first place. So we let her decide what she wanted for dessert. We ended up with this:

Is that Strongbow and Krispie Kreme donuts? Yes. Did I have a stomach ache in the morning? Yes.

Well, we ended the night by watching Dane Cook stand-up comedy videos on C's netbook and laughed so hard we got a noise complaint and had to be yelled at by the manager of the hotel. Sheesh. Some people just don't know how to have a good time.

The next morning we enjoyed our hotel's complimentary breakfast before hopping on a tour bus to see some of London's most popular sights. Despite a bit of rain (typical), I had a great time showing off my neighbor city.

Our first stop off the bus tour was the Natural History Museum. Last time I went (in the spring), I went an hour before closing and only got to see the dinosaur section. This time we did the whole building. I spent most of my time taking lots of photos of taxidermic birds because I'm a bit of a weirdo like that. C and I clung to each other as we rushed our way through the insect room. We ended our visit there after being trapped like cattle on the upper walkway of the dinosaur room, surrounded by a hundred pushing, shouting children. I'll take velociraptor attacks over that any day, thank you.

Next up on the list: the Victoria and Albert Museum. We looked at a lot of beautiful artwork, my favorite being the front hall of statues. Can I have one of these in my house, please? Though we tried being all posh and whatnot, we couldn't help but act like kids when we found the most amazing and hilarious chairs in the universe. They spun around at crazy angles but somehow defied gravity and kept you from falling out. Much like the Segway of chairs.

After we stopped at a cute French cafe for drinks, and the cafe was so stylish I wanted my bedroom decorated like that place. I ordered a hot chocolate; they gave me a glass of steamed milk and a stick with a massive square of chocolate on the end. Some gentle stirring gave me hand-made hot chocolate minutes later. How fancy!

The night came to an amazing end when we scored some really nice tickets to see Chicago at the Garrick Theatre. Though I started off comparing the musical to the movie, and thinking the singers weren't as good, I soon got over that and was able to appreciate the enormous talent in front of me. The musical numbers were so much fun and full of energy. The accents were a riot. They sounded EXACTLY like Catherine Zeta-Jones and Renee Zellweger. You can tell they modeled their American accents off of the actresses. The true highlight of the show, however, was a rather strapping young back-up dancer named Sergio who had, it was determined, abs that could only be created in Photoshop. There was much talk of Sergio the rest of the trip. 

The next day we continued our bus tour to see all of the London sights. Yes, London is just THAT BIG that it takes multiple days of just riding around on a bus to see all the main attractions. 

We stopped off in Notting Hill at a Princess Diana-themed, Turkish (I think) run cafe for some snacks before adventuring through Kensington Gardens. The Gardens were simply gorgeous, though a bit labyrinthine. It took us over an hour and at least four different maps to figure out where the famous Peter Pan statue was located. Finally we found it. (Fun fact: Apparently, the statue was erected in the middle of the night so children would think fairies put it there. Super cute!)

I took C and A to Camden Market for a delicious dinner of wraps. Sadly the Turkish place I wanted to go to was closed so C and I got Jamaican jerk chicken wraps while A plowed through a massive box of random Thai food. We shopped for a big and haggled with rude vendors. C and A walked away with shirts and necklaces while I scored a cute strapless dress perfect for upcoming garden parties. 

And that, my friends, is how we ended our brief stay in London. The next morning arrived too quickly and we were whisked away to our next destination...the continent!

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GEA Part 1: Edinburgh

After endless pestering and complaining from various friends and family members, I am finally getting around to uploading my first blog post about my Grand European Adventure from July (also known as the GEA). I warn you these posts will be long, so if you're short on time, just look through the photos and try to piece it all together yourself. If you're procrastinating on homework or are bored at your job or you really like me and want to know all about my life, feel free to read the whole thing.

And here. We. Go.

So. I went on a Grand European Adventure. Okay it wasn't a super crazy adventure to fifty different countries or anything, but it sure was the most traveling I've done in a short period of time. It began in London, where I met two high school friends, C and A. These lovely ladies. Charming, no?

Normally they look like this.

Our first order of business was to take a 4.5 hour train from King's Cross to Edinburgh, Scotland. There we checked into the adorable Castle Rock Hostel, my first ever hostel experience. It was less this:

And more this:

Our first night in Edinburgh I took C and A to get some traditional (ish) Scottish food and drinks. We ate on the top floor of Deacon Brodie's pub, then went downstairs to catch up over a couple pints of cider. After not seeing these two girls for over six months, it was a lovely first night together.

The next morning I took us out for a full Scottish breakfast. Despite a lack-luster waitress who spent more time eating her own breakfast than serving us ours, we enjoyed the food immensely. Except for the blood pudding. A didn't like that much, though I can't blame her.

Our first mission for the day: bus tour and sightseeing. Despite being super touristy, I love the sightseeing bus tours. They're a great way to see all awesome buildings and castles and such in one go. We also walked around Princes Street Gardens and marveled at how humungous the roses were.

The next day started at one of my favorite cafes of all time: The Elephant House. It's a tourist stop, no doubt, but it holds many great memories for me. Not only is this where J. K. Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book, but the atmosphere of the cafe is just marvelous. Shelves loaded with elephant statues. Walls covered in pinned elephant drawings (mine have graced the walls on two occasions!). Big wooden tables and huge windows looking out at Edinburgh Castle (aka Hogwarts).

Edinburgh Castle was our first stop and the girls' first castle trip. We explored all of the quirky museums, jail cells, and armories. We ever got to hear the cannon fired (though I suppose we probably could have heard that from halfway across the city).  It was a lot of climbing steep hills and staircases, but it was worth it, if only for the picture with the hot guy in a kilt.

No, not that one! (Though that's Finley, by the way, and he's a lovely gentleman and I always take my photo with him when I go to Edinburgh Castle. Okay, flashback time!)

(Not much difference since last time. At least I've swapped light blue jeans for tights and adapted a sexy leg pose. Anyway...) This is the hot guy in the kilt to whom I was referring:

Yes, a real, live, living, breathing man in a kilt. I know, a rare occurrence in Scotland. Can't believe I caught it on camera. Anyway, foreword!

Post-castle we decided to visit the National Museum of Scotland. I wasn't too keen at first, until I remembered that my first visit there four years ago had only been a disappointment because they had been mid-renovations and half the museum had been closed. This time around was a lot better and the new additions were stunning. I was really excited to see the original version of the famous Corpus Clock that graces the city of Cambridge. You'll recognize it from the terrifying alien-esque cricket that graces the top. We all enjoyed (me, probably, most of all) the animal rooms filled to the brim with taxidermic animals. A had a bad habit of touching everything, including reaching over a "Do Not Touch" sign to touch something on display. So we found her a nice little sea coral with a "Please Touch" sign attached to it and made her get all of her touchiness out before we continued.

The third stop in our very full day took us to one of my favorite museums. Maybe I'm a kid at heart, but I LOVE the Camera Obscura Museum of Optical Illusions. Look at these photos of our visit there and try to tell me that you would not have done the same as us and reverted back to your hyperactive nine-year-old self.

A day of frivolity ended with an awesome night walking tour through Mary King's Close, a long series of tunnels that run stories below the streets of Edinburgh. Back in the day (the day being the 17th century) people used to actually live under the streets and there were multiple-story shops all below surface level. It was utterly eerie, very cold and damp and dark. No wonder people got the plague. I couldn't imagine living down there; it made my stomach curl. But it was a really fun, educational tour, and a unique insight into a city I know and love.

Our last day was brief and lovely. We packed our bags and killed time before our train by visiting the Edinburgh Writer's Museum. There I learned about Robert Louis Stevenson and had a nice chat with the curator about literature. Actually, he started a conversation with me by asking me, "What is literature?" and I had to keep myself from collapsing on the floor and yelling, "I'm on vacation from Cambridge to avoid this question!" But I guess it was a rhetorical because he kept talking and I was kept from having an emotional breakdown in front of a stranger. 

Annnnndddd, that's that. Oh, wait. We almost saw the Queen. But then we didn't. Instead we saw more men in kilts. Not a bad end to the trip. Not bad at all.

Hey, lovely reader! If you made it to the bottom of the page and are reading this sentence right now, that means you probably read the entire blog post. If so, that means you probably like my blog. And if THAT'S true, you should totally officially "follow" my blog. I'd really, really love it if you did. But if you're feeling lazy and don't understand internet stuff, just post a comment below. That's usually enough to make my day.

Coming Up Next!: London, Rome, Florence