Defying Gravity

Here we are waiting for tickets! It's pretty cold.

This morning we set off to The Apollo Theatre in Victoria and stood in line to get tickets for Wicked!! We waited outside for about an hour and a half until the box office opened and we got tickets! They weren’t even that expensive! I’m so excited to go see it! We also went to Syon House today. Robert Adam was the architect and his style was really busy. All of the furniture and ceiling carvings had immaculate detail. They were crazy, I tried to sketch things, but everything was too complicated. Anyway, I’m really excited to see Wicked tonight and I will have sweet pictures to post later tomorrow.This is everyone after the play. We loved it. It was incredible. I have never seen anything so great in my life. I was even in more awe than when I saw Aida. Aida is still my favorite musical though. I was sitting on the front row, right in front of the speaker, so the music was LOUD! It was just how I like it. It was kind of overpowering and made my seat shake. I think that made the whole effect more powerful and exhilarating. I'm serious guys, Wicked was amazing. Elphiba had such an amazing voice and she was perfect for the part. I loved being able to see their faces up close. I'm so glad I went it was the highlight of my trip-well, I don't know...I say that about everything, but it was definitely the highlight of my day.
This is Cassie and I waiting for the show to start. Yeah!
Lindsey, Sharele, and I were so excited to see it. This is us on our way to our seats. We weren't sitting by each other, so we had to take pictures before we parted ways.

Chatsworth, Tuesday June 19

Today was Chatsworth. We had another two hour train ride, but the best thing is that we don’t have to go on a long train ride again until we go to Paris. Yeah!! But seriously, Chatsworth was so awesome. We could actually take pictures inside. Maybe that’s why I liked it so much. We didn’t have a guided tour, so Lindsey, Kaari, Cassie, Chance and I walked through together with some funny old ladies. We were behind them for a while just laughing at everything they said, and then we talked to them. They became our little travel buddies, and we had some pretty good laughs. They are from Essex and they are best friends and it was so cute to see how close their friendship was. They are really old too, 85, 87, and 88. Meeting those ladies made my day.

Once again, I loved the gardens. They were beautiful. I think they were my favorite so far. There was a man made water fall thing that we got to play in. That was so great, I love water! There was also a section that looked like the mountains. It made me very homesick. I loved it though. There were rocks, huge rocks and dirt and trees and plants...everything you would expect if you were hiking in the canyon. We had a hay day. It was wonderful!

Monday in Oxford

Our train ride was only 1 hour today!! We went to Blenheim Palace. We couldn’t take pictures inside, so we all sketched a lot. I actually really liked this because I had to practice sketching and I had to do it really fast. I also got to try cream tea. I don’t know what this sounds like to you, but I was expecting something totally different. I was told it was a scone. I pictured a warm deep fried pastry, but it was more like a biscuit and you put clotted cream and jam on it. It was really good, just not what I was expecting. Once again, the gardens were beautiful. Lindsey, Chelsea, Cassie, Kaari, and Chance walked through them taking random pictures all over the place. We had such a great time. One of the gardens was called the Secret Garden. It was beautiful! There were so many cool plants and it was just over all gorgeous.

We found a grocery store!! That was the highlight of my trip. I was so excited to see a large store with good food and they had shopping carts and everything. We were so excited that we took pictures! Our only regret is that we didn't find it sooner. It was only a 10 minute walk from our hostel. we could have been eating good food all along! Oh well. I'm glad we found it at all.

Great Scot!

This weekend was amazing. We arrived in Edinburgh, Scotland Saturday morning after waking up at 4 and riding a train for 5 hours. To everyones surprise, it was freezing cold outside. We were definitely not dressed for the occasion. The manager of our hostel, Muhammad, picked us up from the train station and got us settled in our rooms. They were actually a lot better than I was expecting. They had a mirror and a TV! This is more than we have in London, it still wasn’t a wonderful hotel, but we only stayed one night and this room did the job. We ate breakfast/lunch at an Italian Café called Papilio’s. It was really yummy (or maybe we just hadn’t eaten in so long, that anything would satisfy us). After we were all full and getting used to the cold, we headed up to Edinburgh Castle. It looked so awesome in the fog and the grey sky. I loved it, it was just like I had always imagined Scotland to look like. In order to get to the castle, we hiked up a pretty big hill. When we got to the top, we came upon a construction fence that we couldn’t pass. We could see people going into the castle, but they were a fence and sidewalk away. We had no idea how we got so lost or how to get to where all the people were, but we went around and finally made it up there. Even though we did that hike for no reason, it was still worth it. It felt good to be in the mountains again. It was really pretty. Zach and Katie decided to climb fences and walls instead of walk around, so this is a picture of them when we found them. They were stuck on the other side of this fence. It was fun to see them try to meet up with us! The castle was really cool. It looked especially great in the fog. To me, it felt more like we were there during a war or when the castle was actually in use. After we toured the castle, we walked down the Royal Mile and shopped in all of the souvenir shops. We saw a lot of cool things, and saw a lot of people playing the bagpipes. I loved hearing the Scottish music in all of the stores. I really like that stuff, it makes me want to dance.

We ate Mexican food for dinner!! I was so excited! It was different than Mexican in America or even in Mexico, but it was still good. Then we went back to the hostel and watched TV and went to bed. It was really nice to just go to sleep.

I don’t know if this had anything to do with the bedding at the hostel, but Sunday morning, I woke up with an eye infection. My eye was swollen shut and I had a hard time opening it for the rest of the day. Hopefully the sheets weren’t infested! Anyway, we took a train to Prestwich and we were headed to see Calzein Castle, but our timing was off so we wouldn’t have time. So instead we went to the beach!! It happened to be the first sunny day in 4 weeks. We played in the water; it wasn’t even cold! It was fun to just hang out, collect rocks, and run along the beach all afternoon. I even got to eat ice cream on the beach in Scotland. It was a wonderful day. I love Scotland! This was the best weekend of my life.

Stonehenge

On Friday, I went to Stonehenge with Cassie, Kaari, Chance, Lindsey, Chelsea, and Lila. It was so cool. I was not expecting much, but it was AMAZING!! The sky was overcast and it was pouring rain. I think that made it look better than if it had been sunny. It was kind of mysterious. They rocks were beautiful and the history behind it made it such a neat experience. I'm so glad I got to see one of the oldest things on the Earth.

Thursday, June 14th

Today was awesome!! We took the train to Cambridge and had an all day tour of the city. Our tour guide, Sally, was so cool and enthusiastic about everything. She loved the history and was so excited to teach us about it. She took us to a really nice café for lunch. It used to be a church and it had been turned into a café called Michael House. I wanted to try something new, so I ate a grilled cheese and pear panini. It was really good. Sally took us to King’s College Chapel, which had amazing fan vaulted ceilings. There was also a really cool organ. It was in the middle of the chapel, so you could see it from both sides.

Later on, we went punting on the Cam River. The Cam surrounds the whole town and all of the colleges. Punting is like rowing, you get in a boat and someone stands with a long stick and floats you down the river. It’s like a gondola in Italy. It was really cool. Everything was so pretty there.

Wednesday, June 13th

What an adventure today was! I think it has been my favorite day of the whole trip. We went to Hardwick Hall, the old one that’s in ruins and also the new one. They were both pretty cool, but I didn’t like all of the tapestries on the wall in the new Hardwick Hall. When we were done there, we took the bus to Haddon Hall. I LOVED Haddon Hall. I honestly believe that it is the coolest thing I have seen in my entire life. Haddon Hall is the perfect example of what you think of when you think of a castle. It was stone and had turrets, and the huge arched wooden doors with iron hinges and handles. It was so perfect. I think Andie would really feel like a princess if she went here, I know I did. Another cool thing about Haddon…Princess Bride was filmed here in the courtyard. When Princess Buttercup is being presented to all of the people.

After the Haddon Hall tour was over we headed back to the train for our two hour train ride back to London. After being on the train for 2 hours and we weren’t about to stop and London wasn’t mentioned we wondered where we were. It turns out we got on the wrong train. We asked the people next to us where we were and when they found out we were trying to go to London, they just laughed and said, “We’re near Wales!” Our two hour train ride ended up being 5 hours! We made the best of it though. We actually enjoyed ourselves a lot. Holly, Cassie, Kaari, Lindsey and I played many games on the train and laughed at our mistake. That made our trip even more memorable! I never knew how much fun a misfortune could be.