Hales is Goin' to Wales: London Calling!

This has been a fantastic week in the United Kingdom!

The trip to London was a great success. The only thing that could have made it better would be adequate sleep! Our coach to London left from Swansea at 4:30 a.m. on Friday morning, and arrived in London at 9:30. Upon arrival, we bought a map of the city and decided which landmarks were most important for us to see in the short amount of time we had. We had all day Friday, and most of the day Saturday to explore, as the coach was heading back to Swansea at 6:00 p.m. on Saturday night.

We started out the journey Friday by exploring Westminster Abbey Cathedral, and then walked a bit farther to Westminster Abbey itself. After that, we headed to Big Ben, The House of Parliament, and the London Eye. It was absolutely beautiful and so amazing to see these sights in person! We paid just under twenty pounds to take the trip on the London Eye, and I'd have to say it was the best twenty pounds I have ever spent! The views from the top were incredible!

After the London Eye experience, we enjoyed a cup of coffee at Starbucks, and then continued the journey on foot to St. Paul's Cathedral and finally the Tower of London. The architecture of all of these sights is amazing. When we made it to the Tower of London, it was about thirty minutes passed closing time, so we decided we were going to come back the next day to tour the inside. So, we took a journey on the underground to our hostel in an area called Earl's Court. The hostel was a whole other story, just like a hostel should be. We don't need to talk about it...

After settling in, we made our way to a local pub for dinner, where I enjoyed a yoghourt marinated chicken sandwich. Sound interesting, right? It was surprisingly nice. A group of friends from Iowa State University happened to walk by the window we were sitting at, and we then spent the evening with them. We made in an early night so we could get up early Saturday morning.

Our first stop on Saturday was at Abbey Road to experience the Beatles crossing first hand! We've got the picture of course! After Abbey Road, we walked past Hyde Park all the way to Buckingham Palace in hopes of watching the change of the guards. We were there plenty early, but there was absolutely no way we were going to see anything due to the massive amounts of people, so we continued on back to the Tower of London. We toured the tower, seeing the Crown Jewels, and many other awesome sights.

We took another walk across the Bridge of London and made it back to the area of the coach station. After dinner, we headed back to Swansea with many memories made in a very short period of time. I am definitely planning on traveling back to London sometime this semester to see more of what we missed. There are so many sights to see, I feel like we just scraped the surface.

This Thursday I will be heading to Amsterdam on a school trip. We are traveling through the night on Thursday and spending two nights in Amsterdam to explore throughout the weekend! I look forward to sharing more exciting stories next week!