Days 1-3: Chicago
Since my flight toEngland
was from Chicago O’Hare, I hitched a ride with Niamh and Todd on Tuesday the 21st
and spent a few days in Chicago .
Since my flight to
On Wednesday I had the full day to either relax or explore,
so I did a bit of both. I decided to go
for a long walk, and ended up getting lost and taking an even longer one! I walked on Ashland
to Milwaukee , then took Milwaukee to what I thought was going to be
Damen, but accidentally wound up on North.
For some reason I thought that North must run in the same direction as
Damen, so I thought I’d eventually wind up on Chicago ave, so I walked along
North until I saw Humboldt Park and realized I was going the completely wrong
direction. I checked my map and then
took California to Chicago ,
then walked back towards Ashland
to get back home. I stopped at the
Bleeding Heart Bakery to pick up a latte (to warm my numb hands!) and a yummy
cheesecake brownie along the way back to their apartment. Since that night Niamh had class, Todd and I
went to the restaurant Han 202 for dinner.
It was pretty delicious. I highly
recommend the pork dumplings as an appetizer—so good! The rest of the night included watching Top
Chef and drinking Cupcake wine.
On Thursday I spent the day lounging around their apartment
and slowly repacking my things. My
flight was scheduled to leave close to 10:00 pm, so at around 5:00 pm I walked
up to Swim Café on Chicago to pick up a sandwich to go (Turkey and Cranberry~)
before I left for the airport. Niamh
came home and helped me get the last of my stuff together (thankfully, because
I was getting thoroughly frustrated packing that stupid backpack), then brought
me to the train metro station to catch a train to O’Hare.
Taking the train wasn’t terrible, but lugging around that wretched backpack and hauling it on my back through the airport before dumping it at the baggage check-in was awful. I was glad to be rid of it. Anyway, despite the winter storm warnings, my plane left on time. I was flying with Scandinavian Airlines and was surrounded by people speaking languages I had no hope of understanding, and I thought to myself, “So it begins.” Fortunately the first two countries on my list speak both languages I can speak, but after I leaveFrance I’ll be
completely out of my comfort zone (linguistically, that is).
The plane ride wasn’t horrible, but the smells of the airplane food made me feel extremely sick, so until dinner was completely over with I couldn’t get comfortable. I did sleep a few hours though, so when my flight arrived in Copenhagen I wasn’t in terrible condition. Catching the plane fromCopenhagen was easy and uneventful (which was
definitely not a bad thing). I took a
couple of typical photos of clouds during the flight—no shame.
Taking the train wasn’t terrible, but lugging around that wretched backpack and hauling it on my back through the airport before dumping it at the baggage check-in was awful. I was glad to be rid of it. Anyway, despite the winter storm warnings, my plane left on time. I was flying with Scandinavian Airlines and was surrounded by people speaking languages I had no hope of understanding, and I thought to myself, “So it begins.” Fortunately the first two countries on my list speak both languages I can speak, but after I leave
The plane ride wasn’t horrible, but the smells of the airplane food made me feel extremely sick, so until dinner was completely over with I couldn’t get comfortable. I did sleep a few hours though, so when my flight arrived in Copenhagen I wasn’t in terrible condition. Catching the plane from
Day 4: Arrive in London
My plane landed at Heathrow on Friday the 25th at about 4:00 pm England time (10:00 am Minnesota time). My aunt Kathleen met me at the airport, and
after a couple of hours of lugging my ridiculous backpack and gear through
trains and metro stops, we finally made it to their place in Wanstead. Since I was pretty exhausted from the flight,
the lack of sleep, and the stress that goes along with packing for a trip and
catching an international flight, I was more than happy to stay in watching
television. Sinead introduced me to the
show “The Only Way is Essex,” which is kind of like England ’s
version of Jersey
Shore , and honestly it
was kind of terrible but also extremely entertaining. Anyway, despite the lack of sleep, I didn’t
end up getting to sleep until around 2 or 3 am that night.
Day 5: The Olympic
Village
Finally caught up!
Today Kathleen, Sinead, and I went to the Olympic Village (which, for
those of you who don’t know, is where the Olympics are being held this
summer). Kathleen had come to the (very
right) conclusion that there was no way I was going to be able to travel around
Europe with that abominable back pack, so the
goal of our outing to the Olympic Village was to find a replacement for
it. So we did a bit of shopping! I went to Primark for the first time! Under normal circumstances I would have
bought a ton of clothes from there but since I’m trying to be responsible with
my money I decided against it. I did,
however, splurge at Boots and bought a few make up items and the perfume I wear
(which is practically impossible to find in the states) and perfume for my
mother. All of it was way cheaper than
make up and perfume in the states though, so I don’t feel too terrible about
it. After Boots we walked around a bit
outside and took a look at the stadium and then stopped for lunch at a place
called Wahaca. It was Mexican style food
and it was pretty decent, though the best part of the meal was the “Citrus
Fizz” beverage (crushed lime and torn mint leaves with sparkling water over ice).
After lunch we went to John Lewis to pick out new luggage for me. After quite a bit of indecision on my part, I finally settled on a tall and skinny bag on wheels. No more back packs for me! The bag is perfect; it fits all of my things and it’s not going to make me strain every single muscle in my body taking it from one train to the next. My favorite bit about it is that it’s hot pink. Like, hot hot pink. It’s fabulous. I am entirely indebted to my aunt for buying it for me because it’s going to be so much easier for me to get around with it and everything. After we got back to the house I basically hugged it for about an hour before transferring my things into it. I’m not even kidding.
After lunch we went to John Lewis to pick out new luggage for me. After quite a bit of indecision on my part, I finally settled on a tall and skinny bag on wheels. No more back packs for me! The bag is perfect; it fits all of my things and it’s not going to make me strain every single muscle in my body taking it from one train to the next. My favorite bit about it is that it’s hot pink. Like, hot hot pink. It’s fabulous. I am entirely indebted to my aunt for buying it for me because it’s going to be so much easier for me to get around with it and everything. After we got back to the house I basically hugged it for about an hour before transferring my things into it. I’m not even kidding.
Sinead and I went out for dinner tonight at an Italian
restaurant called Nuovo, and I ordered my first legal drink at a
restaurant! I got a glass of merlot to
accompany our appetizers of fried calamari and garlic bread, followed by my
main course of penne rosa . It was quite good, but the orders were huge
and we both probably left more on our plates than we could eat. After dinner we walked to a bar called The
Slug and Lettuce. There was a 30th
birthday party going on there so it was completely packed, and we were waiting
in line at the bar for practically ten minutes before Sinead saw a friend of
hers who was already at the bar and ordered our drinks for us. We got vodka & red bulls and it was my
first legal drink at a bar! How
exciting! We ended up taking a cab home
and now here I am, getting caught up with documenting my trip and making my first
post on this blog.
It’s getting late now
(2:40 am England
time), and I’m supposed to wake up early-ish tomorrow so I can decide what we
should do for the day. Clearly it’s
going to be a very tough and important decision and I ought to get some sleep
to be ready for that, so I’m going to wrap up this post right about… now.
Hi Emma, tried to respond to this the other night from my kindle. No dice!! Odd. Anyway, it's a fun read and I can't wait 'til you have wifi and can post again.
ReplyDeleteGreat stuff, Emma. Can't wait to read more.
ReplyDelete