GRAND TOUR: THIS AMAZING EXPERIENCE

Italy… what can I say. This country is beautiful. The sights, the sounds, everything about it. Rome is crowded, loud, and slightly overwhelming… but the history behind it all makes this great city a treasure. The Colosseum is amazing… even after seeing it thousands of times in pictures and textbooks, its still amazing how it can take you breath away the first time you see it live in color. When I picture Italy in my head I see Florence. The colors, and the building, the close streets, everything. Florence is quaint and charming. Venice has to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world. There is a feeling of peace and serenity as you walk through the maze of streets and bridges. There is always the background noise of the canals, and further our, if you listen hard enough, you can hear the beautiful sounds of the ocean. Venice has to been , (at least to me), a small piece of heaven on earth. Italy is a country of beauty and great history, and I feel very fortunate to share and learn of it.

Paris is a land of great culture. Everywhere you go you can feel that the Parisian have great pride in their nationality and in themselves. The famous architecture found in Paris is a sight behold. Like the Colosseum in Rome, the Eiffel Tower is simply breathtaking. As the sun starts to set, and the tower is suddenly shimmering each night… I don’t think there are many sights in this world that can rival. The great palaces of France… Fontainebleau, Vaux Le Vicomte, and the great Palace at Versailles, are so incredible. Visiting them is like stepping back in time and experiencing the lavish, opulent lifestyles that the French aristocrats lived. Famous for their gilded décor, and grand gardens, Paris is easily a place everyone should visit at least once in their lives.

England is like a breath of fresh air. The lifestyles in Britain and back home in the states are similar enough that you sometimes forget you are in a different country let alone in a completely different hemisphere. If it were not for the incredibly attractive accents (wink) you could forget all together. Like Paris the architecture and landscape is grand and opulent. London and the surrounding country side is the land of the grand manors and palaces, such as Blenheim Palace, country homes such as Wilton House, incredible college campuses, Cambridge and Oxford to name a few, and so much more. England (and the rest of the British isles) is comfortable, beautiful, familiar. Its like a “home” away from home.

SKETCHES

Well here they are... my favorites of the 30 sketches that were done.

LONDON DAY 17

Today was our last full day in London. Tomorrow morning we have to be at the metro by 5:00 am. I don’t plan on sleeping at all tonight. I think that will have to wait for the plane ride. But anyways… today we went to Buckingham Palace. This palace, like so many of the other palaces we have seen on this trip, is very large and very beautiful. It’s an unspoken rule that if you go to London you have to see the Palace so I was excited. As you enter through the Ambassadors entrance you want through hallways lined with paintings and marble statues and busts. Right before you enter the foyer that connects the grand hall and staircase you look out into a courtyard called the Quadrangle. From here you can see the four wings that make up the palace. From the Quadrangle you walk up the Grand staircase. This was really pretty because the banisters were made of pure gold and the rich red carpet gave it a very Royal feel.

After the Grand Staircase you enter rooms such as the green drawing room, the throne room, the picture gallery, and so on. It was all such a blur. Pictures were not allowed while in the palace (which I assume were for security reasons), but it was really a very beautiful place.

One of my favorite parts of the palace tour was the exhibit Queen and Commonwealth. This exhibit shows the beautiful gown that Queen Elizabeth has worn on her many trip to countries that are apart of the Commonwealth such as Canada, New Zealand and Australia, Singapore and Malaysia, and so many more. I wish I could have taken some pictures of these beautiful gowns but if you want to see some for yourself just go to…

http://www.fashion-era.com/royalty/queens-clothes-commonwealth-tour.htm#Queen_&_Commonwealth_

By the time we left the palace and the gift shop (where I got a few gifts for family), it was late afternoon and I still had a lot I needed to get done so I could finish packing and get ready to go home. Ashley and I wanted to see if we could maybe catch something of the changing of the guards but unfortunately it wasn’t scheduled for today, so we decided to leave but first we got a few pictures of the palace from the outside.

After we left the palace we decided to head over to Piccadilly Circus to do some last minute gift shopping and then headed back to the flat to pack. We tried for dinner together sometime around 9pm but it just didn’t work so we each grabbed something to eat and then… well that was it. Our time in Europe was over. Its now 2 in the morning and I’m tired but have to keep going. I’m excited to go home but I know that I will miss Europe. This truly has been and AMAZING EXPIRIENCE. See you next in the U.S. of A!!!

FREE DAY 3

Today was another lazy and relaxing day... or atleast it was supposed to be. I am glad to say that I got to sleep in a little bit today but the rest of my day had been catching up on scketches, postcards, and patterns. Not so much relaxing but... I still have a ton to do so this is most likely the only tidbit you will get today but I will add pictures of sketches and such as soon as I have a little bit of time. Tomorrow is our last day in London and therefore Europe. Its really bittersweet...

FREE DAY 2: SCOTLAND AND LIVERPOOL

Today was so much fun… ok so the last 5 hours weren’t so much fun but other than that… it was great. WE got up early again because we wanted to go to the coast in Scotland and get some pictures before Kylee and I had to catch our train to Liverpool. Unfortunately it took us a while to figure out how to get to the coast and when we got there it turned out to be just a harbor. It was sad because I wanted to see some cliffs and the sea…but we didn’t have enough time to see if we could get to the real beach. At this point we had about an hour and a half to get to our train so that gave us about an hour to go shopping. Scotland Souvenirs are so cute and I wish that I had more money to buy for my family and friends… but at this point I have to be careful with my money so it wasn’t able to get much. One thing that I did buy that I am really excited for is a CD called… the Red Hot Chilli Pipers. So Great!!! They are a Scottish bagpipe bad that takes popular music at turn it into bagpipe music… but in a cool way. I loved it!

Kylee and I made it to our Liverpool train with minutes to spare and we were relaxed and excited to head to Liverpool. We were on a very tight schedule because we wanted to get to the Beatles Magic and Mystery bus tour but the last one was at 2:30 and our train got into Liverpool Lyme Street station at 2:24 so if our train was even five minutes late we were out of luck. Unfortunately that’s exactly what happened. We got to the Station about 2:31. We were really unhappy about this because we did everything that was in our power to get there on time… it just wasn’t working out for us. But we decided to try anyways and see if there were any other tours we could go on. When we got to the information station they told us that we could still go on the magical mysteries tour because it was so popular that they added another one so it could accommodate more people. We were so excited. We sill had about an hour and a half before the bus tour which left us with just enough time to go through the Beatles Museum

The Beatles Story Museum was so fun because it started from “day one” and literally went from where they all met each other… all the way to when they broke up, and went on solo careers and such. It was so interesting. I wish that we had had more time to actually walk through and really take a look around but we kind of had to run through quickly so we still had time to visit the gift shop (an absolute must for any Beatles fan), and then get to the bus for the tour. We spent some good time in the shop and got some great stuff but now it was time for the bus tour.

It was like two children at Christmas. Kylee and I sat towards the back of the bus and we were literally bouncing in our sears. We had so much fun jamming out to the Beatles and seeing where everything began. We went to each of the boy’s houses. Saw the places where they met, went to school, preformed their music while in Liverpool, and so much more. It was so much fun.

At this point we decided it was time to head back to the train station so that we could go back to London and this is where all the drama began. To make a long story short there had been a fatality, (which is actually quite common Im sorry to say), on the line that our train was coming on so our train got switched to another platform and it was leaving right now… WE BARELY MADE IT. In all the confusion we got separated for a minute and I waited to see where Kylee was… and the train doors closed on us… and oh it was just so frustrating, but we made it. Unfortunately what should have been a two-hour train ride turned into a four and a half hour train ride because we had to back track two hour and then ride to London where our train stopped at almost every port. Oh it was so stressful and we didn’t get back to London until 11pm or so and then to our flats until about 11:45 because of Subway confusion. Needless today we were so ready for bed. All in all the day was amazing though.

FREE DAY 1: SCOTLAND

SCOTLAND!!! We finally made it. Today was so much fun, I cant even tell you. Our day started out early again but that’s okay because we had a lot we wanted to get done. Kylee, Amanda, Beccah, Malory, Julia, and I got on a train headed and to Edinburgh, Scotland. It was a long ride but I was able to get some sketching in which as nice. The Northern England countryside is so beautiful. Right before we were to cross the England /Scotland border we got off at the Alnmouth train station, and after getting a little bit confused...

we headed into Alnwick Village so we could go see Alnwick Castle and the filming place of the first Harry Potter Movie (well most of the outside scenes anyways). We had so much fun here. The castle was actually really nice even though it was one of the earlier castles to be built, but we had the most fun out on the grounds.

You know the scene where Harry and his classmates have their first flying lessons…. well we found the spot where this takes place and we decided to have our own lessons. I’m sure we looked way retarded but it made it fun.

Just imagine the Brooms...

At about 4 we got back on a train and headed into Scotland. We got to Edinburgh at about 5pm and headed to our hotel, which was so nice. After last night’s drama and almost having to nix the trip all together, we were so happy with the room. There was plenty of room for the four of us who were staying there. We knew it was going to be a good weekend.

At about 5:45 we walked over to the city center square to go on a sightseeing tour of the city. Scotland is so incredible. Everything looks like a castle and I absolutely love it. The tour took us all over Edinburgh and it was so much fun. Edinburgh Castle is probably the most well-known and most memorable sight in the city.

After our tour was over we decided that we wanted to go on a ghost tour. We found one called Underground City of the Dead and decided that would be perfect. We paid for our tour and were waiting to go when one of the girls pointed out something we had missed on the sign. If you read the bottom it says… This tour can cause genuine mental distress. You join us at your own risk. UH…. What? Well it was too late to back out now so we had to go on. Never you fear (no pun intended) the tour was great. It was scary but so fun. Our tour guide Tonya was so great and she made it definitely worth the “risk”.

After the ghost tour, to “calm our nerves” we went to the Hard Rock Café for dinner. As a tradition of sorts I suppose. The food was so good and we had a great time. I waitress was so nice but she was so slow that we didn’t leave the restaurant until around 11:50 or so. Needless to say we were all ready to crash. Tomorrow is another busy day for all for all of us. Kylee and I head to Liverpool for some Beatles fun so see ya there. Night all.