Pink taxi cabs = my kind of city!

the London Eye Ferris Wheel...we didn't go on because it coast like 18 pounds which is like $38!
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Wow! Tonight has been a productive journaling evening seeing as I am on my fourth page of typing including journals for Poland, Madrid, and now London. Anyway, yes my most recent traveling expedition was to London, England. Let me further preface this journal by stating that I absolutely LOVED London and that I am already thinking of a way to someday live there, if even for a short period of time (example: summer internship). Well, moving forward Andrea, Stephanie (Steph), Drea (Andrea different) and I arrived in London around 11:00 p.m. on Thursday evening at around 12:30 p.m. after taking a shuttle into the city from the random Ryan Air airport our friend Chris met us at the station to take us to Pepperdine’s London House where we would be staying for the weekend. After a good night’s sleep we awoke in the morning, ate breakfast and began our day with Chris as our amazing tour guide. First we went to Parliament to see Big Ben, or rather hear Big Ben as the actual sounding of the clock is specifically called Big Ben. From there we visited Westminster Abbey and walked through London’s fabulous parks to Buckingham Palace. At Buckingham Palace we expected only to see the changing of the guards. However, we immediately noticed that something was going on as there was extra security, not to mention an abundance of people. We waited around for awhile, noticing that the Queen’s flag was on top of the palace, though not expecting to see her. Within about 10 minutes, however, her car pulled out of the palace and we were able to catch a glimpse of the Queen herself! Now while this isn’t really a big deal it the grand scheme of things, it was cool simply because they say many Londoners have never seen her and the one weekend out of the year that we traveled to London we of all individuals got to see her…right place right time I suppose!

Andrea, Drea, Me, Stephanie, Chris
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After visiting Buckingham Palace we walked through yet another park on our way to Piccadilly Circus which is the equivalent to New York’s Time’s Square, except slightly smaller. We grabbed Starbucks to warm up as the weather was a big chilly and wet. Still moving forward we headed towards the National Gallery. Though we did not go inside, the plaza in front of the gallery provided a beautiful panoramic of the city. By this time we were getting pretty hungry so Chris stopped at this place called Pret A Manager, which is located all throughout the city. It had delicious fresh food and instantly became one of our favorite places. Next we went to the British Museum where Chris showed us the main points of interest regarding Egyptian history. We saw the Rosetta stone as well as the mummy of Cleopatra. From there we went to Covent Garden Market where we looked at some of local market booths and ate the most amazing cookies of my life-Ben’s Cookies. Ben’s Cookies, well there hard to explain, but it’s basically as if they were taken out of the oven just before becoming fully baked, therefore the middle was jus perfectly gooey-not underdone-just extra soft! Just absolutely amazing! Anyway, moving forward from the cookies we next visited the St. Paul’s Basilica where Princess Diana was married. Although we only saw the outside it was very beautiful. Our final destination of the day was the famous Tower Bridge of London which I thoroughly enjoyed. Nearly fully exhausted by this time we headed back to the house to relax some before the evening began. We ended up watching the perfect movie for a visit in London-“Notting Hill.” Though I had seen it before it was just so fun watching it and thinking, “Oh we went there or we’re going there tomorrow!”

We were able to catch a glimpse of the Queen herself!

Parliament and Big Ben
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Well, our relax time didn’t last long as everyone else was set to go for dinner. Somewhat reluctant as we were completely shot from are express compacted tour thanks to Chris, we dressed slowly. However, upon arrival at the restaurant Chiquita we instantly perked up-we were going to have good Mexican food-yeah that’s right real Mexican food, not the made up German kind! Well needless to say dinner was delicious! Afterwards we went to a local club called Jewel. It was extremely chill and relaxing. After about two hours we decided to call it a night and headed back to the house to get an early night’s sleep.