Oh! The Places You'll Go

Life outside of London, Part I:

Ok so I’ve become a little obsessed with London. I mean who wouldn’t be when you have the V&A, natural museum of history, Kensington park and Hyde park right outside your door steps? Oh and food lots of food. For those who have never experienced Snog I pity you, you poor underfeed souls lost in the world without the magic of Snog. Oh right on to non-food topics.

So as any good traveling student would do I decided the time was right to break free of the city for other realms and other places! Where to first? Prague, Italy, Amsterdam, Greece? Well not yet, at least not till spring break rolls around (very soon actually). So instead I set my sights inside the UK to start with, actually inside England to be specific. (It also helped that this trip was already organized by those lovely people at FIE and FREE who could ask for more). So where is this surprise location? Wait for it…wait for it…STONEHENGE! And the absolutely awesome city of Bath after that, yay.

Well, 4 hours of busing it later as well as a few snacks (Colleen must be fed every 3-4 hours or else she gets cranky) we were out in the countryside admiring the rolling hills and quant villages. Our tour guide was actually pretty awesome for the ride. You know when you get those guides who sound like the teacher from Ferris Bullier? They just prattle on about “And so the Duke of Shirehill married his third wife…” blah blah blah. Ours was surprisingly refreshing and PACKED with information about everything, like literally everything. She was really funny too which when you’re stuck in a bus with someone at the mic for 4 hours at 8 am it a really important quality. Also, the most important part, she knew when to stop talking for an hour so everyone could take a nap. (Yes mom and dad I know you’re rolling your eyes but come on its college and were in a city of course we’ve been up all night!)

Ok so for starters, those are some REALLY REALLY BIG STONES. Like I mean absolutely massive! And they are just sitting in a field like someone just dropped them there and went “oh look lets make a pretty circle out of massive stones.” So we got the whole history of how they think the stones got there and what they were used for which was pretty cool. Apparently it took about 600 people to move the stone 2 cm in one day, yeah I’m so not surprised that it took forever to build this thing. So anyhow, sadly were weren’t able to touch the stones because people use to chip off bits of the rock to bring home and apparently that’s frowned upon, go figure. But I did find out that if you practice Druidism you can actually use the stones to worship on during the midsummer equinox, sorry Sister Ann Marie I think I’m changing religions… But it was really cool to be there and just experience the history behind the site as well as to get out in the fresh air.

Flat 16 plus a few ;)

So the group spent about an hour at Stonehenge just meandering around and taking lots of pics (see above). Then we jumped on the bus and headed to the city of Bath. Now bath is actually one of two cities in the world where the entire thing is a world heritage site, the other being Venice. This is because every building there is built in the Georgian style and all of the same stone which is like a yellow sandstone looking rock. It was cool to see in panorama because it was just like massive yellow throughout the entire city. Very pretty. Yeah, so we went to the Roman baths a la why Bath is called bath and no I don’t think they were being ironic. Oh for all you lit buffs ie: Steph, this is where Jane Austin lived for the majority of her life. Apparently she hated it and that’s why er books are all about the social season and women who hated it. Art imitates life huh.
Bath is also where the best hot chocolate in the world is. I am so not kidding. There is a little chocolate shop next to the church (made up of 60% stained glass, see culture ha) where if you are ever in Bath is a MUST to go and order the dark hot chocolate. Best. Thing. Ever. So good, so so good. I wish I could only drink that chocolate for the rest of my life, amazing. Ok so I guess enough about food….shopping! The city had some great little shops where I sadly didn’t buy anything, though there was a pair of heels calling my name sadly. Bussed back to London after that. Overall the city was so cute and pretty and full of fun things to do, see and buy. Great success!