Just Touched Down in LondonTown

Hey Readers,

Since I was late on last week’s post, I will be gifting you guys with a special double post. This week’s destination was a quick trip to another island you might of heard of the United Kingdom. I went to London to visit my friend Allison (previously mentioned in the last post) who is studying at University College London for the semester. Back at home, Allison attends Smith College and is a chemistry major. Although I’ve known her since the 2nd grade, we really didn’t start becoming friends until the 8th grade. Anywho, UCL boasts famous alumni like the revered freedom fighter Ghandi himself and Ramsey Hall where Allison lives is where one of my favorite bands, Coldplay first met (can you say hallowed ground?).

I arrived at the Cork airport on Friday morning ready to take the hour flight to London only to be bogged down by flight delays. Our flight was so supposed to leave at 10:30am and we didn’t leave until 2:20am (Thanks a lot Ryanair). I received a 5 euro refreshment voucher for my time which was just enough to by a lackluster sandwich. We finally left and made it to London where I immediately started making the hour journey to Allison’s dorm. She picked me up at the train station and we met up with one of her friends from Smith who was visiting from Oxford. We got thai food which I had been missing a lot since there are no thai places in Cork. The next day, we headed to brunch at this place called Ottolenghi where they had some really great french toast! You know I never turn down brunch and this french toast was served with a yogurt and a blackcurrant compote rather than maple syrup (It was a great combo). After brunch, we headed to Borough Market, my personal favorite part of the trip. It is a giant and very crowded food market with tons of stalls with all different types of food, produce, and free samples! I was in food heaven and Allison and I wasted no time devouring the free samples. We then headed to the famous St. Paul’s Cathedral which was massive and then headed to King’s Cross Station to Platform 9 3/4, the entrance to the Hogwarts Express. My inner Harry Potter fan came out and we got to take pictures as if we were rolling luggage through the secret passageway like Harry and Co. We chowed down on burgers for dinner.

The next day we walked all the way to the famous Tower Bridge (aprox. 10 miles!). and browsed the mummy exhibit at the British museum. We went to Camden Market, another large food hall, for lunch where I got a philly cheese steak which I hadn’t had in a long time. We rested our aching legs for a little while and then we grabbed dinner with one of Allison’s new friends in Ramsey Hall and Alex, one of our mutual friends from our USN days who is also studying in London. I hadn’t seen Alex in a while so it was nice to catch up. We turned in early for the night since I had an 8:30am flight on Monday morning. I arrived back in Cork safe and sound and had 2 classes that same day :/

I had a great time in London and thanks Allison for letting with stay with you. I’m off to the Ring of Kerry this weekend, about an hour and a half away from Cork. Until next time,

Keep Calm and Explore

Elena

*Still having computer issues so pics to come: Stay Tuned

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 25th, 2016 at 10:38 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.