Hampton Court

 

We enjoyed the day at Hampton Court Palace. King Henry the VIII and his heirs (and six wives) lived there. It was really interesting to learn so much about it while being there! It's like history coming to life! It was so awesome to be where kings and queens walked the halls all the time! 

We made it to the center of the maze!

A Day about the Town

We went to Borough Market, Shakespeare Globe, Tate Modern, and Beare's Violin shop. That's about all I have time to say about them now, so I'll let the pictures do the talking!

Borough Market

We walked by St. Pauls. "Feed the Birds"

We walked over London Bridge

This is for Whitney and Alicia

Queen Style

Fun day today indeed. After sleeping in a bit Ruth, Galileo, and I went to a castle. Leeds Castle.

Ruth started on my senior pictures. She's amazing! 

The grounds there were stunning. It much reminded me of what I picture Mr. Darcy's yard looking like.

King Henry VIII,

Six wives he was wedded, 

One died, one survived, 

Two divorced, two beheaded

Keep Manhattan Just Give Me That Countryside

We woke up this morning and headed to the airport. After much difficulty all around, Ruth finally made it back home! So glad to have Ruth and Galileo here. While we were waiting Tyler and I played Ticket to Ride again on his iPad...and I won...again. (few times I've been able to say that) 

We packed into their cute little car...and I mean packed and made our way towards Cambridge. Wow it was so beautiful! 

We found a grocery store and picked up some yummy things to have a picnic with. We ate this food in Jesus Green. The sky was so gorgeous early on today!

We walked around Cambridge looking at some of the different schools. Kings College was my favorite. 

We were planing to go punting (boat ride) but it was beginning to rain and we were all very cold! 

I got so many breathtaking photos today! It was really neat to see places 800 years old! Thanks to Mr. Flaniken for giving me information and vibrant details about it before I came. That made it even better! 

Praise the Lord!

Galileo's passport, through much difficulty, all worked out and he and Ruth are flying out tonight as planned! Praise to God for working all that out for us! Pray that they'll have a safe journey and make it home safely tomorrow!

Lazy Day

Gotta have a good lazy day every now and then! Tyler had to work today so I slept in and I'm going to organize, read, do school, make bracelets....who knows! By sleeping in...I mean till 2:30. It was so nice. I feel like I'm ready to conquer the world now!

One thing that's been very, very nice this morning is listening to the recording of the Samford Orchestra Concert that I played in last week. If you'd like to check out the performance click here (the actual concert starts at 50 minutes). 

I thought today would be a good time to share with you some very British pictures I've taken along the way! 

Tower Bridge. If you look closely you might see Peter Pan Flying above! :)

Now the London Bridge Hospital is for people who were on the London Bridge when it fell.

Umm excuse me..I think you left off an A.

What's more British than a double decker bus?

Eye of London. It's huge!

Phone Booth!

These guys are all over. and yes. they're' real people.

"As always thank you for riding with us and please, mind the gap"

Happy Sunday

Yesterday was a very full day! First we hopped in the car and headed to Greenwich Village and walked through a lovely and huge park there. You might have heard of Greenwich Mean Time? Well that's where I was, where time begins. There was also a really neat look off point. 

 

Then we walked through some neat markets with lots of venders selling crafty things. That's also where we picked up some lunch. We had a lamb wrap. Sort of like stir fry with lamb and onions and lots of seasonings in a wrap. It was good!

We made our way to the dock to purchase our riverboat tickets. 

We had some time before our boat came so we walked around the Greenwich Naval Academy for a bit. It was very grand!

We then took a boat ride down the Thames River. We got to see so many things! We went under Tower Bridge and London Bridge, not to mention all the other things we passed! 

London Bridge, the Battle Ship, and Tower Bridge

We got off close to Big Ben and walked down to the Dominion Theatre where we were going to church. We walked through a couple of shops on the way then went and had a wonderful service with Hillsong. Of course, the music was outstanding. Luke, the preacher, talked about the woman at the well and how Jesus witnessed even though he was exhausted. We need to be ready to do God's work, even when we don't feel like it. 

After Hillsong we made our way back to the train station. We looked around a bit more then waited for our train to leave! We made it back home once again and enjoyed another yummy dinner!   

Defying Gravity

Another day in the books of a splendid trip to London! 

Well....we went to see Wicked! It was totally wicked, mate! I can't get over how good it was! The story line was absolutely amazing. Every single detail had a point and later you would go "aahh! I get it now!" The acting was phenomenal (with slight British accents :) ). The singing was. wow. out of this world good! It was very well written, perhaps I'll now read the book. Everything tied in surprisingly well with The Wizard of Oz, but yet didn't tell details from it. I also really, really love the music. It's got a pop sound to it while still being totally a "show tune" feel. This has been another wonderful British day!

The set was unbelievable!

Underground Tube Station

A list of things I have noticed here so far:

The signs say "Give Way" instead of "Yield"

I love the way British people say "Actually" ..they make it two syllables instead one

You don't stand in line for something you stand in the queue

Instead of "exit" it's "way out"

Many British ladies sound like Georgie (the girl who plays Lucy in the Narnia Movie

The food isn't "to go" it's "take away"

Then of course the train tells you to "mind the gap"

One of the bigger train stations

Day One

Wow! London is something else! 

Tyler waiting for our bus

After Tyler and I got to his house, we went out to Central London to get papers ready and mailed out to Ruth, so she could get Galileo's new passport. When we finished up with that, Tyler took me down streets flooded with shops and flooded people. It was so neat! All sorts of shops! We went in huge stores like Liberty and Foyles ,the biggest book store in the world, and small shops like a used book shop and even a quaint little shop where we got some tea and scones!

After we finished up with that, we walked across the river to look at the Eye and Big Ben and had a nice Italian dinner. Running to catch our train, we made it in perfect timing, hopped on the train and enjoyed playing Ticket to Ride on Tyler's iPad. An hour later we made it home and I crashed! I had made it through the whole first day with nothing more than an hour of sleep! This is rare! 

(I took many more pictures, but for some reason it won't let me rotate the pictures....so more to come later!)

Flight

 So, my first flight happened to also be my first flight by myself. The night before we realized that Galileo's passport was missing, so he wasn't able to fly! He and Ruth, sadly, had to stay back. But I decided to come on! Everything went really well! The flight was pretty enjoyable, although I only managed to get under an hour of sleep. The view once we got into the UK was FABULOUS! I spotted several things from the air. (so glad I had a window seat!) I saw St Johns, the Eye, London Bridge, and many other amazing sites from thousands of feet in the air! Lucky me, I had an empty seat beside me...and I only spotted one other empty seat on the entire plane. And to top it off, a super sweet British lady was sitting in the next seat closest to me! So she told me everything I needed to do, and in return, I taught her how to work the tv.

When I got into the London airport, everything went just fine...until they wouldn't let me in the border. Since I'm a minor traveling for the first time they wanted to get a hold of Tyler, who was picking me up, before letting me through. Well, I didn't have his number, but he had called me the night before from his skype. So I gave her that number. She told me to sit and wait. So I sat. And I waited. And I sat some more! After quite some time she came back, telling me the call wouldn't go through. "Can we call him from your phone then?" "uh..no ma'am, my phone doesn't work here" "well...let's see. let me go try again, love" so I sat. And I waited. And I sat some more. And I waited some more! Finally, the nice lady said that her shift was almost over so she would take me to find Tyler. When I went to get my luggage, mine was the only one left from my flight. Well, at least I didn't have to stand and wait more! Then I went out and there was Tyler, thank goodness! Anyway, it was all very kind of them, but I was certainly wondering if they'd let me though before my brother reported me missing!

Preface to a Grand Adventure

Tomorrow I embark on a very grand adventure across the Atlantic ocean. This will be my first time on a plane and I can only imagine what the world will look like up there above the clouds. My sweet sister-in-law Ruth and my adorable nephew Galileo have been with us the past few days so that I can have travel buddies when I depart tomorrow night. 

Packing is going swimmingly! It was a much easier of a task than I hoped. Everything is coming along very well. I've got my camera ready, my computer charged, and my iPod full of music!

I pray that God will bless this trip, keep us safe, and help me to come away with a new perspective and many memories that will last a lifetime! 

Buckingham Palace