I'm back from London!

Hello all! It's a beautiful sun-shiny day here in Galway, Ireland. Which is appropriate because the sun was nonexistent in London. Let me tell you about it.

I was supposed to have a morning class on Friday, and then I was going to catch my bus to Shannon after that. I showed up for class, but no one else was there. My assumption is cancellation due to graduation ceremonies. I guess I missed the memo about not having class; you would understand my confusion if you too saw the posted sign all week that read "Heritage students will have classes as normal on Thursday and Friday". Whatever. So I caught a bus downtown to kill some time before my bus left at noon. When I finally got to Shannon airport, I was antsy. I so badly just wanted to already be in London. My flight arrived around 5:30. It took me a slightly stressful shuttle ride and 40-minute train to the appointed meeting spot, but it was all worth it when I finally found Elyse. We were both absolutely thrilled to see each other. Friday night was chill, we walked around for a while before stopping to get dinner and then heading back to our hotel. We caught up and exchanged traveling stories. I heard fireworks outside, and Elyse told me it was Prince Charles' 60th birthday.

We ate breakfast on Saturday and then got ready for the day. There were no set plans, but we eventually decided to go to the Tower of London and London Bridge. We knew it wasn't far from us, a few miles. The underground was helplessly crowded, so Elyse suggested we walk, and I was fine with that. Well, I was fine with it until it started to pour rain. Already wet, we just kept at it, finally reaching our destination an hour and a half and about 4 or 5 miles later. On the way we saw St. Paul's Cathedral, a circus, a Remembrance Day parade, and lots of fun buildings and statues. Once at the Tower, it stopped raining for a little while, and we happily spent the rest of the afternoon in that part of London. When the sun went down, though, we quickly became cold and miserable, two deterrents to staying out much longer. We caught the underground back to our hotel, took hot showers, and I went out to find dinner and bring it back. We were exhausted, and neither of us felt like going 'out on the town', so we stayed in again, talking and goofing off and loading pictures on her computer.

Sunday was our only planned excursion. We got up early, grabbed food from the breakfast buffet, and walked to the pick-up spot for our guided tour to Windsor, Stonehenge and Oxford. Windsor castle was huge, and gorgeous, and slightly grotesque in its opulence. We grabbed sandwiches before getting back on the bus for the long ride to the middle of nowhere and Stonehenge. I had been there before, but it was cool to be there while Elyse experienced it for the first time. It was literally cool, or should I say cold, due to the whipping winds and the clouds rolling in. The rain didn't hold off much longer, and our tour group walked around Oxford with umbrellas and rainjackets. But what an experience! Oxford! THE Oxford! I bought a shirt-I'm wearing it right now- haha. I was totally thrilled. I know that makes me a nerd, but I don't care. Like I told Elyse, I appreciate everything academic. What I mean by appreciate is 'drool over'. Yeah, oh well. The day had been so long, and so once again, we got back to the hotel late that night and just sat. Eventually, we ate fish and chips for a late dinner, but then more hanging out. There was no pressure to go out and do anything; Elyse and I used to entertaining ourselves, just the two of us; we've been doing it for years.

Monday morning we took our time, getting breakfast, taking showers, repacking all of our madness, checking the train times, searching for a sticker to bring to my friend Mike. (By the way, stickers don't exist in London. In such a touristy town, you would THINK that you could easily find a sticker. Not true- not even at the airport!) To avoid more rain, we sat in Starbucks for a while, sipping coffee and talking about college, our future plans, our travels, and the lessons we'd learned from it all. More than London itself, the whole weekend was such a comfort to me just because I was with one of my best friends. She knows me, she gets me, and she loves me anyway. She knows how stubborn I can be (she is too, after all), she knows my habits, and how I view life. We can laugh together and be stupid and evaluate the world around us. It would have been hard to leave her at the airport yesterday, but I'll see her again very soon when she comes here to Galway!

I haven't unpacked yet, and I'm pretty sure I need groceries and to do homework. There are a few London pictures on the slideshow to the left, but check out all of them at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2068884&l=49955&id=44104357