To start this 3 month long European journey we decided to fly into London, England! Visiting England has never been super high up on my list, but the flights were cheap so we hopped on the opportunity, and I’m glad! For my home girls, Mary and Tiffany, England was their first foreign country. I think going to a place that speaks English was a nice way to ease ourselves back into the travel grind. It wasn’t just the 3 of us on this trip, we met up with another girl that we will be studying with, Ria!
After our direct 8 hour flight from Denver, we took the London underground to our hostel, St. Christopher’s Village. We arrived a bit too early to check in to we went to the attached bar, Belushi’s, for some drinks. We had to celebrate Tiffany’s unofficial “European 21st birthday.” The bartender even gave us all free Jäger bombs! After a few, we were able to go up to our room and take a much needed nap. Some travelers will swear that you need to push through the jet lag and stay awake all day, but we knew we would want to go out in the evening. Also, I believe you should sleep if you’re tired, it will put you in brighter spirits for the entire trip. We ate dinner at a Sherlock-ian themed restaurant where I had a fantastic vegan curry! Then, we went back to Belushi’s to an empty dance floor, but that didn’t stop us, and we ended up moving and grooving until 3:00 a.m! (don’t worry eventually people joined us)
The next morning, we went on a free walking tour. Free walking tours are an excellent way to start a trip in a new city that only cost a tip to your tour guide. The tour was excellent! Our guides name was Ivos and we took us to see 3 palaces, including Buckinghams, Trafalgar square, Westminster Abbey, Covent Garden, and St. James Park. Unfortunately, we could not see Big Ben because it is under construction and covered in scaffolding until 2021. St. James Park used to be a private zoo for the English royalty, but thankfully they have turned it into a public green space that still has a zoo vibe.
One of my favorite parts of the tour was Trafalgar square, where we learned that London has a Muslim mayor who changed the cross walk lights to gender neutral all inclusive symbols for pride in 2016. He’s stated that as long as he’s mayor they will stay that way. There’s a running joke in London that no one that lives in the city is actually from there. It’d be impossible not to notice the diversity in the city, which is awesome because it has really turned London into an accepting forward thinking location. I ended the tour with a steak and red wine pie with a Camden pale ale and truly couldn’t have been more content with my decision. We went back to the hostel and took another nap as we continued adjusting to our new time zone, then had Italian for dinner. Then we indulged in another night out dancing at Belushi’s!
For our last day in London, we had soup and sandwiches at Pret a Manger and booked ourselves a Street Art tour. London is made up of several smaller city segments. The free walking tour took place in the City of Westminster, and the street art tour was in the City of London. Our guide, Patrick, told us that most tourists don’t visit the City of London because there are not any major attractions in the area. There was, however, plenty of what we were looking for, street art. Each piece was beautiful and thought-provoking. We were glad we chose to go on the tour, because it was nice having someone there able to tell you about the artists and the inspirations behind their works.
We ended the trip in the best way possible! Three friends of mine that I met in Portugal, Martin, Jakub, and Chris took the day off work and traveled from Nottingham to go out with us! It was really special for me to have Mary, Tiffany, and Ria meet them! We all got super close when we met in Lagos, Portugal and accidentally embarked on a 40 mile bike ride. One thing people don’t like about traveling alone is not having someone to reminisce with about their adventures, however, this is already the 3rd time that I have been able to meet up with friends I met traveling. The whole group seemed to hit it off really well and we even found a speak easy (hidden bar) to start the night at.
Traveling Rays 