Poets' Corner and Other Cool Things

I can't tell you how good it is to be back in London. I loved Paris, but I feel much more at home in London, and I missed it in just the few days that we were gone.

This morning we took a guided tour of Westminster Abbey. We met with the rest of our group and dumb me forgot my Oyster Card (the card you need to take the underground and buses around London), so I resigned myself to going back to my flat and finding my way by myself, when my friend said that she forgot hers as well. So our program director kindly walked with us to Westminster. It was quite a beautiful walk, so I was okay that we forgot our cards, but it was still a tad embarrassing.

When we got there, we had a hilarious tour guide who told us tons of cool facts about the Abbey. One of my favorite parts was when he took us to the Poets' Corner, where there were so many burial sites of authors like Chaucer, Charles Dickens (although it was against his wishes), and Rudyard Kipling. It also has memorials for authors such as Jane Austen, Shakespeare, and the Bronte sisters. I had no idea this Poets' Corner existed, so it was a nice little surprise.

After Westminster we headed over to Trafalgar Square, where we took the obligatory picture with the lion.

It was scary getting up there. But it was scarier getting back down.

Sarah photo bombed me, but it ended up being the best picture of the trip thus far.

Then we went into the National Gallery and looked at more impressionist art. I continued on my tour of Van Gogh this summer (I've seen his paintings in D.C., New York City, Paris, and London so far) and saw his Sunflowers. I also loved his Long Grass with Butterflies. I could just stare at his paintings for hours.

But alas, I did not stare at his paintings for hours because, as my friend Sarah puts it, "my dogs were barking", and I was hungry. So we went home for lunch and I just hung around the flat until it was time to go eat dinner in a crypt. That's right, a crypt. We ate dinner while sitting on dead people's tombstones. But you forget about it quickly enough when eating the yummy food.

Our photography assignment today was to take a panoramic picture. I got this one from the steps of the National Gallery looking onto Trafalgar Square.

Tomorrow we will be doing a literary tour, as well as visiting Kensington Palace. It should be a treat!

My Weekend in Paris

Bonjour, mon ami! I just returned from a weekend in Paris, and boy, was it an adventure. We woke up super early to take a taxi to the train station, and I slept blissfully the whole way. When we got to Paris, we first learned to say "NO!" to anyone who asked us if we speak English. Then we made our way to a fancy-shamcy boat cruise. It was blistering hot outside, so being inside an air conditioned boat on the Seine River wasn't too bad. And the food was delicious!

Escargot. The sauce was so good it made me forget I was eating snails.

Steak and mashed potatoes. With tons of butter.

White peach gratin... mmmm...

After the lunch cruise, we made our way toward Montemartre for a walking tour. It was miserably hot, but our tour guide was very good, so it wasn't the worst experience I've ever had.

The third floor is where Van Gogh lived. 

The view of Paris from Sacre Coeur.

After our walking tour we went back to our hotel to shower and rest, since we had been up since 4:00 in the morning. We were scheduled to go to the Eiffel Tower at 9:30 but due to some complications (getting lost because we didn't have a guide with us) were late getting there. We ran to the line, which was very difficult to find, and they let us in, no problem. I was just happy I didn't have to climb any stairs this time. When we got to the top, it was definitely worth the hassle. Paris is stunning at night.

My friend took this picture of me by accident, and we couldn't stop laughing about it.

View from the top.

What a beaut.

The next day we started early so we could get as many things in as possible. We had a Paris Museum Pass, which let us in to a bunch of the museums for free and skip the lines. Which saved us hours. We saw the Hôtel des Invalides,  Musée de L’Orangeries (which has Monet's water lillies - they were beautiful), Le Jardin des Tuileries, and Sorbonne, just to name a few.

Some of my favorite things from Saturday in Paris was the Musée D’Orsay, which has an impressive impressionist collection, including Van Gogh, who is my favorite.

We also hit the Musée de Louvre, which I didn't get to go to last time. My friend and I got stuck wandering around the Renaissance paintings, it was kind of torture. But we did see the Mona Lisa, Venus De Milo, and Ramses II. So that was cool.

Horus makin' shadow puppets on the wall again.

We also headed over to Shakespeare and Company, a bookstore that was a gathering place for authors like Hemingway. It is now a bookstore and a reading library. It's so stinkin' adorable, with little nooks and crannies all around that you can curl up and read a book. I loved it.

While trying to find the bookstore, we stumbled across what we think was the Latin Quarter of Paris, which was so fun to walk around. There were restaurants, and gift shops, and bakeries up and down these cute little streets. We decided to get some gelato from one of the shops, and then headed over to the Seine to sit and eat our ice cream. It was the perfect end to the day.

The next morning we went and got crepes at a cute little restaurant and then went to the Arc de Triomphe, which has some amazing views. It's almost better than the Eiffel Tower because it's central, so every direction has an awesome view.

Then we walked down the Champs Elysées and got my favorite treat - macarons! I got passionfruit, rose, and vanilla raspberry, and mmmm, they were delicious! I have to say, I think the rose one was my favorite. If you turned a rose into a delicious treat, that's what it tasted like.

Then we headed over to Maison de Victor Hugo, which was where he lived while in Paris, and they have now turned it into a museum. While trying to find the exact apartment, we ran into this, so feel free to listen to the lovely french music while reading the rest of the post:

The museum was really cool, and I found out Victor Hugo was not only a talented writer, but a decorator and furniture designer as well. We found this cool piece of furniture, which Hugo made for an auction to help poor children. He got 3 other well known writers of the time, including Alexandre Dumas, to donate their inkwells, pens, and a handwritten letter, and made this stylish table, complete with their names. Unfortunately, the table didn't sell in the auction, so Hugo bought it himself.

There was also his writing desk in his bedroom, and I found out that he actually preferred to stand up as he wrote. You can see from the chair next to the desk that there's no way he could have sat down to write at this desk. It was a very neat museum, and it was absolutely free, which made it even better.

After the museum, we headed over to the Notre Dame and Saint Chapelle for a quick walk through. We ended our trip by sitting by the Seine. It was such a great trip to Paris, but I am excited to be back in London for my last week!

Our photography assignment for the weekend was to find our name from letters and shapes around the city, so here's what I cam up with:

Au Revior!

Daleks and Detectives and Chicken, Oh My!

Well, hello readers! Today was a day that I had been looking forward to basically since we got our itinerary.  We had our second class session! I just loved sitting in a stuffy classroom with London's adventures awaiting me right outside. 

Okay, okay.  So class wasn't that bad, but it wasn't what I had been looking forward to.  We got to take a tour of the BBC! A couple of my favorite shows are made by the BBC, so I was super excited to get a look behind the scenes. We walked inside and I was greeted by this:

Well, helllooooo Matt Smith!

 Before the tour started we took pictures with some of the Doctor Who props around the waiting area.

Daleks: Man's best friend.

David? Matt? You in there?

 For the tour, they showed us the newsroom, and a few people on our tour got to do a news broadcast. They also showed us the room they film The One Show, and we got to sit on the green couch they sit on for the program. Then they took us to a radio drama production studio, where various people on the tour got to act and make sound effects for a short radio drama. There was an adorable old man who played the narrator/butler and he did such a good job, there's no way he's never done radio before.  He was perfect for the part, and I wish I had a video of him, but I don't.  So you'll just have to imagine this one for yourselves.

After the tour, a few of us headed to Baker Street, to find the infamous Basil.  Unfortunately, the detective mouse was nowhere to be seen, but we did find another familiar face while we were there.

Baker Street is an awesome place to visit if you love Sherlock Holmes. Even the tube station is decorated with silhouettes of his face and statues.

 When we made it to 221b Baker Street, there was a huge queue to get into the Sherlock Holmes Museum, so we checked out the gift shop. It was a pretty neat shop, complete with all of the Sherlock Holmes accessories you could imagine.

Like deerstalkers

Pipes

And, of course, lollipops

 The museum itself was situated at 221b Baker Street, and was set to look like Sherlock and Watson's flat.  It had so many little details, which made for an awesome experience. We first visited Sherlock's room:

 And then his study:

 Then we made our way to Watson's room:

 And Mrs. Hudson's room:

Don't ask me why she has a bronze bust of Sherlock Holmes in her room.

 There was an adorable bulletin board with messages people had written to Sherlock.

 Then they had a whole floor of wax figures.  When I walked into the first room, there were figures from various stories in the series, and I totally freaked out.  I thought they were real people.

Moriarty. I prefer the Andrew Scott version. Did you miss me?

 Outside the museum there was a cute little restaurant in honor of Mrs. Hudson. We didn't go in to try it, but it looked like a fun place to visit.

 Afterwards, my flatmates and I went to Nando's and shared a whole chicken. And it was delicious. But Phil wasn't there, so it wasn't quite as delicious as the last time I went.

Well, I'm going to have to say goodbye to London for just a few days as we journey out to Paris. I won't be able to blog while I'm there, so you'll just have to wait until the weekend is over to read what I've been up to. I know the anticipation is killing you.