So this past weekend, a group of us decided to go to London for a couple days. I left Bangor with seven other students Friday night and we took a train to London. Before I came to Wales, my experience with public transportation was the school bus so I was excited to try it. We only had one change and it all went very smoothly. During the day, a train to London from Bangor would only take three hours but our night train was closer to five. I wouldn't have minded so much except I forgot my mp3 player and only had a deck of cards to entertain me the whole way down. Immediately when we got to London, I faced my next adventure with public transportation: the Tube. I was glad to be with a group of people otherwise I would never have tried the subway system on my own. Fortunately, one of the girls in our group had been in London before and knew what we needed to do. By the end of the weekend I was a little more comfortable with the Tube, but I still wouldn't take it by myself. One thing I'll never be comfortable with is the electrified third rail. I stayed as far away from it as possible and tensed up every time someone walked dangerously close to the edge of the platform.
This weekend we stayed in a hostel called the Hyde Park Inn. It looked really nice on the outside, but the rooms were another story. Our group was divided amongst a few rooms and I with three others had a room of 16 "beds." These "beds" looked more like giant cubbies stacked three high with curtains, and I swear the room was about the size of our kitchen at home. I knew hostels weren't the nicest accommodations, but I guess I had envisioned the rooms to look more like the ones from camp or something. Though I was exhausted from all the trains it took me a while to get to sleep. The bed was uncomfortable and some people came in late at night and made lots of noise. But it was only for two nights and was cheap so I managed.
Saturday was awesome though. We walked around and visited Buckingham Palace and Trafalgar Square where we met up with some more students who had came a day earlier. Then we saw the outside of Westminster Abbey and broke back up into two groups. One group went to Wicked the musical and my group walked around some more. We saw Big Ben and Parliament and crossed over the Thames to get tickets for the London Eye. We ended up getting a package deal for the Eye and the Sea Life Aquarium. The Eye was amazing! It is 443 ft tall and one revolution takes 30 minutes. At the top you can see for miles and it has a great view of Big Ben and Parliament right on the other side of the river. It is a little awkward getting on and off because the wheel doesn't stop, so you have to get about 15 people into a glass capsule while it is still moving. However, it was a spectacular experience and one of my favorite moments in London.
After that we decided to walk over to the London Tower Bridge. It was getting dark by this time and everything was lit up pretty. Along the way we ran into lots of random cool things such as a the HMS Belfast (a Royal Navy cruiser from WWII) resting in the river and people making impressive sand sculptures. Reaching the Tower Bridge was satisfaction of itself just because it was really cold all day, and the walk was over an hour and a half. But the bridge was beautiful too. The bright blue beams stood out in the night and the top walkways connecting the towers were covered in pink lights. It was fun just to be at one of the most recognizable symbols of London and was the perfect place to end our first day in London.
Some of our group left early Sunday morning so there were only six of us that day. We took it easy compared to Saturday. We visited Abbey Road and tried to copy the Beatles famous picture. Then we did some shopping at the markets in Camden Town where we met up with a friend of ours studying at Central's London Program. We finished our time in London by visiting Platform 9 3/4 which was honestly a little bit of a let down to the Harry Potter fans of our group. You can't actually go on platforms 9 and 10 unless you are boarding a train at King's Cross Station so the "platform" is a five foot long section of a wall with shiny brick wallpaper that says "Platform 9 3/4" and has part of a luggage cart sticking out of it. Despite the mild disappointment, we still took pictures of us fake pushing the cart through the wall and headed back to Bangor mid afternoon.
I am so glad I went, and there is still so much I didn't see: inside of Westminster Abbey, Hyde Park, any museums... But I know I'll get to go again sometime this semester and I can't wait!
This weekend we stayed in a hostel called the Hyde Park Inn. It looked really nice on the outside, but the rooms were another story. Our group was divided amongst a few rooms and I with three others had a room of 16 "beds." These "beds" looked more like giant cubbies stacked three high with curtains, and I swear the room was about the size of our kitchen at home. I knew hostels weren't the nicest accommodations, but I guess I had envisioned the rooms to look more like the ones from camp or something. Though I was exhausted from all the trains it took me a while to get to sleep. The bed was uncomfortable and some people came in late at night and made lots of noise. But it was only for two nights and was cheap so I managed.
Saturday was awesome though. We walked around and visited Buckingham Palace and Trafalgar Square where we met up with some more students who had came a day earlier. Then we saw the outside of Westminster Abbey and broke back up into two groups. One group went to Wicked the musical and my group walked around some more. We saw Big Ben and Parliament and crossed over the Thames to get tickets for the London Eye. We ended up getting a package deal for the Eye and the Sea Life Aquarium. The Eye was amazing! It is 443 ft tall and one revolution takes 30 minutes. At the top you can see for miles and it has a great view of Big Ben and Parliament right on the other side of the river. It is a little awkward getting on and off because the wheel doesn't stop, so you have to get about 15 people into a glass capsule while it is still moving. However, it was a spectacular experience and one of my favorite moments in London.
After that we decided to walk over to the London Tower Bridge. It was getting dark by this time and everything was lit up pretty. Along the way we ran into lots of random cool things such as a the HMS Belfast (a Royal Navy cruiser from WWII) resting in the river and people making impressive sand sculptures. Reaching the Tower Bridge was satisfaction of itself just because it was really cold all day, and the walk was over an hour and a half. But the bridge was beautiful too. The bright blue beams stood out in the night and the top walkways connecting the towers were covered in pink lights. It was fun just to be at one of the most recognizable symbols of London and was the perfect place to end our first day in London.
Some of our group left early Sunday morning so there were only six of us that day. We took it easy compared to Saturday. We visited Abbey Road and tried to copy the Beatles famous picture. Then we did some shopping at the markets in Camden Town where we met up with a friend of ours studying at Central's London Program. We finished our time in London by visiting Platform 9 3/4 which was honestly a little bit of a let down to the Harry Potter fans of our group. You can't actually go on platforms 9 and 10 unless you are boarding a train at King's Cross Station so the "platform" is a five foot long section of a wall with shiny brick wallpaper that says "Platform 9 3/4" and has part of a luggage cart sticking out of it. Despite the mild disappointment, we still took pictures of us fake pushing the cart through the wall and headed back to Bangor mid afternoon.
I am so glad I went, and there is still so much I didn't see: inside of Westminster Abbey, Hyde Park, any museums... But I know I'll get to go again sometime this semester and I can't wait!
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