Hello from the other side...

I'm giving this a shot again!  While I still plan on making videos, I think it would be helpful to also write as well.

Over the last year, I have thought about what direction I want my life to go and it was definitely not in my current job.  So, I quit my job and now I am making my life mine again!  I know it might sound a little hippy -ish and generation Y, but really...happiness is important to me.  Over the past couple of weeks without a job, I have had a lot of time to think.  At first, I was applying to jobs that I thought I could easily get so that I would have a job...but after several interviews and lots of rejection e-mails I had a thought, "WTF am I doing?!"  I moved to Austin to do something I loved to do, and now I am just settling for anything?

This doesn't sound like me!

So!  I have now decided to push harder and try and get the jobs that I so desperately would love to have.  It isn't going to be easy, but then again who said life was easy, right?  So!  Won't you join me on my journey?

I'm terrible at blogging

*Note*
I will finish my posts about Peru, don't you fret little ones.

So, here's the deal.  I've never been great at writing.  I've never been able to sit down and write out something that happened to me.  This is why I've decided to switch from blogging on here, to making videos instead.  I will definitely post links to the videos and write a little something about them here.

I'm doing this for a couple of reasons.  1. I have a degree for video, so of course making videos will be easier.  2. It is MUCH easier to just explain on a video what is happening, rather than me having to sit down and recall everything all over again.

By doing this, I am hoping to be able to update more frequently so I don't have giant three year gaps in between posts.  oops.  I will be back with some videos soon!  :]

Cuzco and the Inca Sites

So! I'll start where I left off. I only got about 4 hours of sleep before I had to wake up again to get breakfast at the hotel and meet up with my group to fly to Cuzco. We took a bus there through town where I fell asleep. :) When we got to the airport we went to go look for my bag. Shout out to Charles for being my translator and helping me get my bag back! I guess there was someone else who lost their bag and wasn't going to get it back for 2 days! I got lucky.

The plane ride to Cuzco is only about an hour. However, the difference in altitude makes the trip hard. Cuzco is twice as high as Lima at about 10,800 feet. This is what you see when you get off the plane. 

You are literally surrounded in mountains. You can feel the difference in altitude almost immediately because you'll start to get a dull headache and feel short of breath. 

During the day we got acclimated to the altitude and explored the city on our own. I visited a market where there were booths of homemade things. It was very cool. I met up with some people in my group for dinner and ended up at a place that had an open rooftop. 

All of those lights are from the houses on the mountains. It was amazing. 

The next day we left the hotel at 7:30 in the morning to visit some Inca sites. It turns out that our guide Enrico is Incan and even knows the native language of the Incas, Quechua. We visited the Sacred Valley where we learned that it isn't sacred at all! It's just a name they used to get more people to visit. Haha

While we were there, we visited a Caccaccollo community that has been developing viable economic alternatives for women by letting them maintain their cultural heritage of weaving and benefit from the tourist who buy the products they make. They only spoke Quechua and were very nice women who showed us how to weave different textiles. 

This is Carlotta who told us about the different weaving patterns. 

After that, we visited the Pisac ruins which were beautiful! 

We hiked to the top of the stone building, which was slightly difficult because the altitude was higher than Cuzo. Physically, it isn't very hard. It is purely the lack of oxygen that causes you to take multiple breaks on the way up.

The last site we visited was Ollantaytambo which is actually the town we stayed in. It had huge steep terraces that we climbed up to see the entire town below. 

This is the last post I'll have until we return to Cuzco after the hike! The group is excited to start on it. :) ps. I'm the only American. Which surprises me a little bit. There's two couples from Canada, two New Zealand girls, and two guys from England. We all make fun of each other's accents. :D one of the New Zealand girls likes to say "stop it" like me. -_- haha 

Anyway! I shall post again after the Inca Trail hike to Machu Picchu. :)

Starting off with a bang!

Well! I was suppose to be in Lima this morning, but my first flight was cancelled last night. I rescheduled my flights for about 12 hours later so that I was suppose to land in Lima at about 10 at night....when I really landed at 11:15.

This is what flying just before sunrise looks like. :) very peaceful. 

This is from the door to the outside in Chicago. The airport was pretty clear, but there was still quite a lot of snow that you could see from the plane. When we got off the plane in Chicago, we all could see our breathes up until we walked out into the actual airport. 

After Chicago I went to Miami. That airport is so stressful! There was another flight to Lima that was suppose to take off 5 minutes after mine and was just a few gates down from where I got off. However, my flight was on the complete opposite side of the airport. I was SWEATING when I finally got to my gate. And then I waited in a huge crowd of people to get on the flight....seriously. There were A LOT of people on this plane. And everyone spoke Spanish. I think this was the moment I realized that this trip might be harder than I thought since I barely know any Spanish. 

So, by the time we all boarded the plane and the crew checked a bunch of random stuff, we were off to Lima! An hour and a half after our departure time, but we were on our way. I ended up not sleeping on the plane and watched a couple of movies, which I later regret. 

The plane landed at about 11:15. I went to go get my checked bag, but after waiting an hour, I realized it wasn't coming. I filled out a report with the plane company, and that was quite a process for each of us to figure out what the other person was saying. I was coming back the next day anyway to fly to Cuzco so I just told them to keep it at the airport instead of bringing it to my hotel. 

My cab driver to my hotel was really nice and told me stories from when he sailed in Europe. I finally got my hotel at 1:30 in the morning. It was a 22 hour travel day, which was terrible for my knee. Blah. 

This is from the coast of Lima. :) I'll have more to post tomorrow! 

Well, well, well....

A lot can change in a short amount of time.  I last posted in late August and since then I have injured my leg, went to the doctor multiple times, had an MRI plus X-rays, finally found out I tore my meniscus, and have had knee arthroscopy surgery (a partial meniscectomy).  Well then!  Recovery has been difficult just because I am an independent person and asking people to do everything for me has been tough.  It's been a week since my surgery and my knee is feeling pretty good though!  I went from not being able to walk, to crutches, and then to a cane.  I actually can walk without anything right now, but keep the cane around just in case.  :]

However, this month and a half long process has started to make me nervous for my upcoming Peru trip.  I believe walking around will be fine, but the hike may be an issue.  There is an option to take a train for those who are unable to do the hike, but I just can't bring myself to be okay with taking that.  I just feel like I made it all the way to Peru for this trip, and then I can't even do the biggest highlight.  I'll keep you posted on what happens.

How about some good news?!  :D

I am in Texas right now for Thanksgiving.  We stayed with my sister last year, but this year there's more of us so we decided to rent a house about an hour away from my sister's house.  It's beautiful!  It's high up on a hill and overlooks a lake.  :]  I'll post more about it later since we just got here yesterday.  We left Illinois at 7p.m. and just drive throughout the night.....needless to say we all slept very well last night when we were in beds instead of a car packed with stuff.  haha Today we are going wine tasting, because isn't that what all families do the day before Thanksgiving?  ;)  I'll leave you with a picture from the balcony of the house.  

Three years later....

Well!  It's almost been three years since I was living in England.  I do realize I never made a few posts still, but I think we'll all survive without them!  :]  Or at least, you will have to survive because I'm not about to write them now.  haha

I haven't done much traveling, except for a few trips around the midwest area.  I'm planning on doing another pretty soon, so I'll post about that one and the others soon!

I wanted to start up my blog since I am planning a trip to South America very soon!  It's especially exciting because it's another continent that I haven't been to.  I'm not sure if I've mentioned this on here before or not, but I'm trying to go to every continent before I'm 40 years old.  So far, I've been on three and I'm almost 23.  I'd say I'm making good time so far.  :D

Well, this was just a quick update!  Be on the lookout for posts with pictures!

sorry sorrrrry sorry

I am currently writing my last essay and studying for my in class essays tomorrow. I haven't had time at all to update this! But, I will have time thursday and friday when I'm in London and a long flight on Saturday. I will spend a lot of that time writing it out in Word and then transferring it. again, soorry. :[

The final weekend

So, I just have one more paper...mmm so Italy should be coming during this weekend when I have free time. I did change my picture to one from Italy so you aren't waiting too long.

I am going somewhere else this weekend!

The last place is Germany and Belgium. I'm going to visit the Christmas markets, so I'm really excited! I just loooove Christmas...it's my favourite. I can't believe this is my last weekend, but at least I'm going to do something instead of just sitting around waiting for it. Just 1 week and 1 day left in the UK. I can't wait to come home. :]

SNOW!

I promise promise promise to do a post on Netherlands and Italy...right after I finish all of these papers that the teachers just assigned. "Don't wait until the last minute to do your papers!" Then don't assign them at the last minute! blah anyway

Just wanted to post and say I'm in the library sitting next to a window and it just now started to snow! :D It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Only 1 week and 6 days until I'm home. Very excited for that to happen.

This weekend's trip

This weekend I am going somewhere where I have always wanted to go: Italy! It's pretty much my last big trip by myself (since I have another weekend trip, but it's a tour). It's very expensive over there, so I've been trying to budget money like crazy. I already have where I'm staying (made sure they serve breakfast), and a day tour on saturday. I still need train tickets, but I read everywhere that it's much easier to just buy them when you get there. I may just get a rail pass so I can just use it...but I may end up spending more money for it. :[ I think I'll just wait since I'm only going somewhere on a train one time.

I have yet another layover on this trip. This time to Switzerland! So I will have *technically* been in Switzerland too! :]

I plan on taking lots of pictures because it's all about art over there! :D

However, before I take this trip, I am going to see in Opera in London. Me and two of my friends are leaving on a 3:30 train to London to see La Boheme. I am very excited! I'm just going to stay around and hang out at the airport until my flight at 9 in the morning. I hope they'll be okay with me bringing my back pack to the opera since I have no where else to put it. =/ I guess we'll find out!

Scotland! with pictures!

So! I should probably add pictures before it's too late and I get too lazy to do it *cough*Netherlands*cough*. So! I have about 10 of them.


This is the night train I took. You could pay for a bed, but it's so much more...plus these seats were really comfy anyway! I decided to take the night train because then I wouldn't have to worry about a place to stay. My train was at 11:50 at night, but there was an earlier one at 9:15...which I should've taken so I wouldn't have missed my freaking tour! BLAH! I can't do anything about it now, but I am still mad about wasting the money. I'm going to be very poor after this, so donations would be nice! :D So, I went to sleep pretty fast and then...


woke up to this! It's so pretty and it seems to just go on forever! Plus, there's sheep everywhere! :] The sheep were very cute. It was nice to see big fields of green grass because I don't see that much in England. Even in some parks in London don't have it because they just have other plants and sidewalks in them. I took a lot of pictures from the train and I'm sure people were annoyed by it, but it was just so nice to see.


This is from the train station. It almost looked like a little town inside. Kind of Harry Potter ish. :] I had time to take pictures since I missed my tour and all. >:[ The station was still cool. I had to walk to a different one to go to Inverness, but it was less than 5 minutes to walk there. It wasn't as cool or impressive, so I won't put a picture up. But, a train and bus ride later (totaling a little over 4 hours) I was in Inverness! It just so happened that that weekend, the train going all the way to Inverness was out, so you only went an hour and then took a bus the rest of the way, BUT the bus had to drive to EVERY train stop on the way! BLAAH. I obviously slept...even though it was freezing on the coach!


This is in Inverness. It's right by the train station and it's called Falcon Square. I first saw it and was just confused. It's a unicorn...I still don't get it. Plus, there's birds below the unicorn and one has some other small animal in it's beak. Scotland has some pretty crazy stuff. Unless the unicorn actually means something and I just don't know.


This is Inverness! This is on a bridge over the Ness river. It's from the Loch Ness. I was about 13 miles north east of Loch Ness, so unfortunately, I didn't get to see it. Next time, I will for sure not miss a tour! >.< It was still very pretty to see. There's a lot of older buildings and lots of mountains in the background...something I never see at home


SO CLOSE! :[ I have to go see it again. Not on this trip, but next time I'm around, it will be at the top of my list. It's probably not even that impressive to see since it's just a giant lake, but it's the meaning behind it. Also, quick story. My zoom stopped working so I went out, got a small screwdriver set and fixed it myself. Then, the next day we were in London for a school trip and it STOPPED WORKING! blah. So I figured it would just have to be okay in Scotland to not have zoom. But then while in Inverness, it just started working again! It's a early christmas miracle. :]


I almost bought kilts for people back home, but they were not cheap! The funny thing is, guys actually wear them around. I saw a couple of men in brown boots, kilts, and sweatshirts. I didn't take a picture because I didn't want to creep them out, but it was so weird! It was very cold up there, so I don't know how they could go around wearing a skirt. It's weird how you can think of stereotypes, but they end up coming true.





This is a small market I found on my way back to the train station. There were a lot of places with food and lots of random clothing. It was pretty much just like the market out in Canterbury, but with different accents. I still love Scottish accents! After staying the night with three other women, we talked in the morning. they were all from Scotland and were down for a weekend nurse training thing. During one of their stories, one of them said "lass". It was awesome.


The next morning I went to the train station and headed back to Canterbury (which took a total 10 hours O.O ). This is what it looked like outside. It had snowed soooo much over night. As I headed back down south it there was less, but still! I can't believe that happened! It made me excited for Christmas though!


This is a picture from more south when all the snow had melted. You can see some sheep. Just thought it was a pretty picture to share. :]

Scotland!

It's official. Scottish accents are my favourite. They kind of sound like English ones, but a bit of a twist. Australia is still pretty high on the list too. As I said before, I don't have my cord, so there are no pictures yet, but I will have them up tomorrow.

Since I was only here for a day and a half, I don't have many to show, but I'll still let you see them. :]

Today I was suppose to take a day tour, but somehow, my train got in way too late and I missed it. So that was 33 pounds down the drain. >:[ I was very upset about this and just decided to take a train up to Inverness anyway and walk around. Well, I guess this one weekend, they weren't having trains after a certain point so I had to take a train for an hour and then a bus for 3 more hours. By the time I got there, I didn't have much time to go around because it takes forever to get back to where I was staying. Overall, it has been a pretty bad trip, but I still got postcards and a couple of other gifts for people. I also got some really nice pictures because despite me having difficulties, it was beautiful here. Note to self, next time book a weekend tour from London and then relax.

I guess I'm glad I came up because it was really nice to see. It is however, VERY cold. It even started snowing today. It's just that I only have so much money left that I want to spend. Good thing I just have one big trip next weekend and then I'm hanging out in London a couple of times. Then, HOME! THEN, CHRISTMAS! :D

Look out for pictures tomorrow!

This weekend!

So, I just had my day trip to London to see St. Paul cathedral which was very pretty. Pictures were not allowed in it, which was annoying. I wouldn't mind if it was boring or ugly, but it was so pretty inside! But yeah. Everyone else headed back to Canterbury now and I asked to stay because I have a train to catch!

This weekend I'm going to Scotland. I decided to take a small break and go somewhere actually on this island. I'm taking a night train there so I don't have to worry about where to stay tonight. It's not for another 7 hours, so I'm here in a Starbucks typing this out. I didn't bring my camera cord this time, so you all will have to wait to see pictures until I get back late Sunday. It's only two days so you'll be okay! :]

Saturday I'm taking a day tour to Inverness and Loch Ness! I will find Nessie and become rich. And then I can have a place in London to come to. I seriously love London. Once you understand how things work, it's very easy to get around and amazing. I just love it. Not sure what I'm doing Sunday. I have something in mind, but we'll see how it works out. Then I come back to London and then Canterbury to go to school once again. I have a short paper due Wed, so I'll work on that on the loooooong train ride to Scotland.

I just love traveling! So glad I went on that trip to France 3 years ago, because it definitely kicked me into gear to see and explore. I'm only going to 2-3 other countries after this trip, so I'm going to make the most of it. I only have 4 more weeks here, which sounds so short. I'm hoping it doesn't go by too fast!

I wish everyone at home best wishes! <3

I "fixed" my camera!

After an hour of googling and trying all sorts of things, I finally got my camera to start working. There's still something wrong with it, but it at least does it's job. I just have to be careful not to get anything in it. :] So! Since that happened, I decided to make a quick post and put up some pictures so far (meaning more than 10 because it's hard to not show some of these). I promise to finish my long one about the Netherlands this week!


This is from my 6 hour layover in Athens, Greece. I went off the plane and looked to see where I should be, and this is what I saw. I was like O.O But it was okay, because I just looked at the flight time and then saw it there. Also, I really wanted to get a stamp in Greece while I was there, but the woman wasn't very nice so I decided it was best to just leave it.


Whaaat?! They have these in GREECE?! This is pretty much where I sat the whole time and typed up the Paris blog and tried SO hard not to fall asleep. It probably didn't help that I decided to sit in the comfiest couch in the whole room. I was so tired, that on the plane from Greece to Egypt, I slept the whole time. Yes, that even means through the breakfast that was included in the ticket price. >:[


I don't know why I love these pictures so much. It's just kind of like "it's official! I'm in this country now!" It's weird to think about flying over oceans when I normally just fly over land at home. It is slightly scarier, but I don't notice most of the time because I'm sleeping. There's really nothing better to do when you travel by yourself. haha


This is outside of the Egyptian museum. I went the first day when I arrived. It was really cool to see some stuff that I had learned about in my art history classes. Plus, there's this hallway with just mummies. Very creepy. I've seen my share of dead bodies for awhile. They also had King Tut's golden mask, which I would've taken a picture of, but no one else was, so I thought it wasn't allowed.





This is a picture of the belly dancer that performed at this dinner boat cruise on the Nile River. Also a little tid bit, Egyptian food has lemon in it. Like, everything has lemon...even the potatoes. Anyway, she would grab people and make them dance with her. She probably got 6 or so people to come up...that includes me. Yes, I stood in front of everyone and made a fool of myself trying to belly dance, but I didn't care too much. When else is that going to happen, probably never. Plus, you only live once. :] She took pictures with people and she actually performed twice with another act in between her costume change.


This is what was between the belly dancer. This guy with a huge skirt on would spin around for like 5 minutes straight and just do random things. It must be something around here. It was really cool though. At one point in time he had a tray angled toward him with a glass on it. Since he was moving, it didn't fall. Then he put a bottle of water on the tray, opened it, and POUR IT INTO THE GLASS! O.O I have it on video, but I STILL don't believe how that happened. I understand physics, but that was seriously some Harry Potter stuff.

So, that was day 1, and this is day 2.


This is at the oldest pyramid in Egypt. It's 7000 years old. It's made of lots of little stones, and then the Egyptians realized that that was a bad design. So then they started building them out of larger, stronger stones. Every time I got my picture taken at a pyramid, the person taking it would always have me do this pose. I don't know why...but it got old fast. There was another pyramid in the area and you could go inside of. It wasn't anything amazing, but still cool to say I've done it. The opening was very short so I had to bend down to get through. And then there's just two rooms off of the hallway.


Today I also rode a camel! This is the camel I rode. He was very cute, but it made me sad because they lead them with the green rope and one end is attached to a ring in his nose. :[ Plus EVERYONE had whips and were hitting their horses and such. It just made me a little sad to see it happening. I was very nice to the camel to make up for it. He had such LONG eyelashes and was very tall. Getting on the camel was fine, but then when it stands up, it's terrifying. I was shaking because I swear I was going to fall off. I wish I had gotten a video, but I'm sure there's one on youtube somewhere. :]


So, this is me on the camel at the pyramids. :] The people doing the tour made me wear the scarf (which I got to keep), but it really wasn't that bad and ended up taking it off pretty soon since it was really windy. Camel was SO CUTE!


Of course I had to get a jumping picture! My face looks a little odd, but it's the only good once since my tour guide wasn't very good at speaking english and I had to explain how to do this like 20 times. But hooray! I got one! I'm really trying to get one with my ISU Roam'n Redbird shirt at every famous place I'm at. The people back in the study abroad office will love me! Maybe even offer me a job there...eh? ;]



Okay, this is the last picture. This is kushari! I had this for late lunch/early dinner tonight. My driver told me this is something that people in Egypt eat all the time. It has rice, macaroni, another type of noodle, lentils, chickpeas, tomatos, and fried onions. It sounds random, but it's very good. Of course, there's lemon juice on the side, but I was sick of lemon, so I ate it plain. It was very good. :] It's nice to be somewhere that has vegetarian food because I am sick of cheese sandwiches. I think tomorrow I'm having falafel since my driver showed me the best place. So that's exciting.

No pictures today

So! I can't put pictures on here because I can't transfer them off my camera. I had a tour guide today DROP MY CAMERA IN THE SAND WHILE THE LEN WAS OUT! So it now will not shut and sometimes not open because now there's crap in it. First thing I'm going to do when I get into Canterbury is go to this camera place and try and get it cleaned out. ugggh So annoying. Plus he was annoying about it..he could tell I was upset but didn't offer to help pay for the cleaning or anything. He just kept telling me and trying to take pictures when I told him I didn't want to.

At least the memory card is alright. buuuut stiiiiill. >:[

I will write a longer post soon. The sun here makes me sleepy all the time and I want to nap.

Highlights so far:

- Belly dancing
- Riding a camel
- Getting Christmas gifts
- Eating kushari
- Seeing the pyramids
- Egyptian museum
- Getting tan, but not really since I don't think I look very different, but I could be and just not know it!

I wrote this 12 hours ago!

So, I already said that I wasn’t going to tell people where I was going, until I left! Well, I’m currently in the longest layover I’ve ever had (6 hours) in Athens, Greece. Where do you think I’m flying to after this?! That’s right, Cairo, Egypt. :] This time, I’m going to try and post a blog every day so I don’t have to write out a huge one for the whole trip like I’ve been doing.

I’m also currently writing the Netherlands one, so that should be up shortly too. Hope you all are enjoying my blog so far!

WARNING! This post is huge….make sure you’re comfy. :]

The first sight of France! This is from the ferry going to Calais. We drove to Paris from that point. This was the third time being in France. :] That’s probably the most impressive thing I can share at this point in my life. Haha But yes! After we drove to Paris, we dropped off our stuff at the hotel we were staying in Bercy. They said it was going to be centrally located, but it was on the very end of Paris….soooo that was odd. But it was still nice.


This is my three-year reunion! It was good to be back and see familiar things. I went on an organized tour though, so I didn’t get as much time in certain places, which was kind of annoying. But I know I’ll be back again sometime. Even if it is longer than three years just as long as it’s before April of 2017, because that’s when my passport expires! France is hard to describe to people. Paris is great, but I LOVE the countryside. I’d love to go back to the places I went to three years ago.

On the first day we just took a boat tour and had dinner somewhere. So it wasn’t too busy, which was a good idea since the next day ended up being a 14 hour day! >.<


Our first stop was Sacre Coeur. This is a famous cathedral in Montmartre that Amelie (one of my favourite movies) was filmed at. :] You had to climb stairs to get to the main level, but once you were up there, the view was crazy beautiful. You could see everything like Notre Dame (half of it is on the far left). It just seemed to go on forever.



After that we walked down to the Moulin Rouge!


This is Lauren and I being scandalous in from of the Moulin Rouge. I didn’t go there last time because it was a school trip and we weren’t allowed I’m pretty sure. We were only there for like 3 minutes to take pictures and such, but it was still neat to see it. I love windmills, so that was cool to see too.


We headed over to Notre Dame after eating lunch, but we didn’t get much time since we were heading off somewhere else again. But that didn’t stop us from taking multiple jumping pictures! I’m trying to get one everywhere I go so I can make an album called “Jumping around the World”. I think it’s clever. It’s hard to do jumping pictures with a self-timer and that’s what I have to use when I travel by myself, or else I’m not going to have any pictures of me in places!

***** This the Halfway point. Congratulations for making it this far *****


Just another jumping picture! We went to Versailles after Notre Dame. I loved that place when I went the last time so it was cool being back. Only things were different because furniture had been moved out in some rooms and replaced with really strange anime looking sculptures.





I guess they are trying to show that they get along with other cultures, but it was still weird. ALSO! We had to pay to get into the gardens because some event was going on. That was really annoying but the gardens really aren’t a place to miss when you go there since they are huge and amazing.


They just seem to go forever. Plus, there are fountains and other such things in between sculptures. We didn’t go through all of it, but we did cover more than I had before. That’s probably because last time we walked through a bit, then got ice cream until we left. :] But it was seriously the best ice cream I’ve ever had.


To make the day even better, we headed to the Eiffel Tower! It was raining when we got there so they had closed off the top, but later opened it when we were on the second level so we went up. That’s exactly what happened to me last time, so that was weird. It was SO WINDY up there. I was scared I was going to die….seriously. Plus, I forgot how high it is. You go up in the elevator and it doesn’t seem to stop going up for the longest time. I liked being up there at night because it was daytime 3 years ago, so now I’ve seen both.


To top it all off, we went on top of the Arc de Triomphe. I did not get a chance to do this last time (I couldn’t even think of the reason why, but I want to say it was because we didn’t want to pay, which is stupid). This is the Champs Elysees from the top. It was significantly busier than all the other streets.



The last day we went to the Louvre. They only gave us 2 hours! >.< You seriously need a full day there so that was annoying. I should be planning these trips, seriously. But anyway, I learned about these in my Art History class last year at ISU and it’s so weird to just see a picture of these by themselves because they seriously look 3 feet tall, but then you put a person next to them, and they are GIANT! I wish I had my notes with me so I could actually write more about them, but it’s okay because I’ll see them soon. :]

SO! That’s Paris in a nutshell! Thanks for reading it!

Craaaazy weekend trip

These day trips we've been taking are required for our classes, so we've already paid for them. But, there is one weekend trip that everyone goes on together. This was Oct 15-17.


This is from Windsor. I had never seen so many birds in my life. It was crazy. Those swans were HUGE! Windsor was really pretty and had some interesting places. We stopped by Windsor castle, but didn't go inside. Everything thought we were going to, so it was kind of weird. But I was okay not going because I found a gift stop during our free time (in which I also had some fish and chips) and bought a few christmas gifts. I'm hoping to be pretty much done by the time I head home, because I'll only have 2 weeks to get things if I wait. FYI everyone, gifts will be unique from awesome places so don't expect DVDs...because I'm most likely giving you a finger puppet from Zimbabwe. I'm not actually going there...just using it as an example.


After Windsor, we went to Stonehenge. It was cool to see it because now I can say I've been there, but overall it was pretty boring. You can see the stones from this highway that runs right next to it. And now it's all roped off so you can't even go inside and look at them. There an audio tour, but our guide said it wasn't very good because they would talk about something and then end it with, "but that remains a mystery" meaning they don't know anything about it. But it was a good place to get a picture for the Study Abroad office back home.

So then, after that day we went back to the hotel and did whatever we wanted. There was a store across the street and that was seriously it. So we had to get food from there. The next day we went to


BATH! This was a top favourite place we went to that weekend. The city of Bath is crazy beautiful and there's so much to do. We spend the whole day there. This is from the Roman Bath's...this is the main one. The thing around my next that looks like an old school cell phone is the audio tour, which was really nice, but sometimes got a little dry. It was still really neat to see it all. Then of course we ate some food and went shopping. I got an owl pillow which is so cute...and Harry Potter glasses because the next day we went to...


Lacock and Oxford! This day was Harry Potter filled. This is outside of Harry's parent's house. We also saw Slughorn's house, McGonagall's class room, the hospital wing, and the scene where Malfoy gets turned into a ferret. So much Harry Potter. I have lots of pictures, but I can show them all later.

This was just a quick update so I'm not too behind. Last weekend I went to Paris, so I will be updating soon with that. Currently I am in the Netherlands. It's weird because I've never been somewhere where I didn't know any part of the language. I don't even know how to say hello or thank you. So it's strange, but luckily everyone speaks it around here. Dutch just sounds fake anyway. I feel like they're not even saying real words. So yeah! Check back tomorrow maybe for my update about Paris. :]

I'm on a roll!

3 blog posts in one day?!?! It must feel like Christmas to all of you. :D

So, after Calais, I had another week of classes...only I was sick! I think I must've just gotten some sort of cold from being out in the rain all day. I had a really bad cough and my nose was stuffed. I got some Halls for my throat so I wouldn't cough as much. They kind of helped, but I still had a really hard time going to sleep at night because I could not stop coughing. It was a dry cough too, so it just hurt. I went out and bought some Vitamin C on Tuesday (they are chewable and taste like orange!) and have been eating them non-stop. I didn't go out at all and just tried to sleep as much as I could even if I was booking ALL of my trips during every weekend. Currently I have one last weekend that is free, but could be filled up very quickly once I hear back from a friend to see if they want to go with me. I'm trying to squeeze in day trips right now because I just don't have room! haha

It's (technically) Sunday right now, and I feel a lot better. I sometimes cough, but it's just once. At first I didn't think I was ever going to get better! This weekend is the longer fieldtrip that was planned for us. We're going to Windsor, Oxford, Bath, and Stonehenge. I'm excited to finally see these things I've been learning about in art history for the past year. It will be weird to take a class at ISU on art and know that I've already see a lot of the things they are talking about.


This past friday, we had our first away day trip. We went to Dover which is about 30 minutes away. This is part of the Dover Castle. It was VERY foggy that morning, so some of my pictures are kind of crappy, but it did get better by the end of the day. This kind of looks like Hogwarts, so I like it even if it is foggy. We had a tour of the Secret Wartime Tunnels there and then we were free to roam around. Pictures were not allowed in the tunnels, so I don't have any, but it was still really cool. I guess everyone knew about them when they were used, but they were called a secret because people didn't know what was going on in them.


This is the main part of Dover castle. There's different buildings all over so it kind of reminded me of a campus where the buildings were buildings for classes. It is also found on a GIANT hill that you had to go up. But annnyway.

We went up to the very top of this (by STAIRS) and looked out to everywhere. It was really pretty to see the town of Dover below us. It was still kind of foggy, but very nice still.



Dover is a nice little town to visit, plus it's close to where I live.


I did take a TON of pictures of rooms on the inside of the castle (kitchens and bedrooms and such), this was the best part! These are the White Cliffs of Dover. They are on the shoreline of the English Channel and are made of chalk which is very strange. I kind of wish I had gotten a piece that fell off on the trail there, but I guess it'll have to be okay! It was a VERY steep trail up, but it was beautiful once we got up there.


Just as a comparison, that's Dover Castle...a.k.a. where we had just walked from. We had to walk down into the town and then walk back UP to the Castle. At one point in time, it got really sunny and hot. I bought and drank 4 bottles of water within 3 hours. blah.

I hope you all caught what I was doing there with the all cap words. By the end of the day, it felt like I had climbed Mount Everest. Seriously...all that uphill and stairs made my calves want to not be part of my body. Even now, they are very sore. Walking around doesn't hurt, but the second I'm going on stairs it's slightly painful. Hopefully it won't last too long. And now I leave you with this last picture from the White Cliffs. It's the Cliff, the port, and the English Channel.