Bath and Brighton

Hey everyone! So this week was pretty eventful. On wednesday for class we went to Westminster Abbey. This was a really cool place to see and is very touristy, especially because it is where all the big royal events happen. There are also more than 2000 people buried there, including; Issac Newton, Charles Darwin, composers, musicians, inventors, royals, and a lot of other really famous dead people. Every hour they make an announcement for everyone to stop what they are doing and a prayer is spoken over the loud speaker. Westminster was a beautiful building, with really intricate architecture and beautiful artwork.

Center Court of Wimbledon

Then Thursday for my sociology of sport class we toured Wimbledon. Although most people in my class are not interested in tennis, I thought this was really neat since Wimbledon is one of the biggest sporting events in the world. The grounds were pretty even at this time of year and the courts were immaculate. We were not allowed to even touch the grass, let alone walk on it. The chemicals in our fingers could damage the grass. Heaven forbid! We got to see court 1 and Center court which of course are the big ones where the big matches are played, but we also got to see court 18 which was the one Isner and Mahut played the never ending game on last year. We also got to see the interview/conference room and the Wimbledon museum. I enjoyed it.

Roman Baths

Me and Cassie

Tea with  Mr. Darcy

Friday we went to Bath. We drove past Reading and through Pennsylvania to get there. I swear every state and city in the states is named after something here in England. Bath was a town built by the Romans because it had the only natural hot spring in England. The water in the Roman baths supposedly have a healing quality and are supposed to make people healthy. We toured the old Roman baths which was really cool because so much of it are ruins from Roman times. We were not allowed to actually touch the water because it is from the 1200's and is not purified. There was one spot where we got to try the water and it was nasty. It tasted like warm ocean water. I couldn't drink very much of it, either way I don't feel healed. After lunch at a traditional pub, we went to the Jane Austin Center. She is the author of Pride and Prejudice as well as a few other books. She lived in Bath for a few years and we took a tour of a house that was set up similarly to her house 100 years ago. She wrote two books, Persuasion and Nothanger Abbey while she lived in Bath about Bath, I bought copies of both of them as souveniers. Overall, Bath was a pretty cool trip.
Saturday the plan was to go to Buckingham Palace finally, but since the weather was bad I decided to postpone that trip so we just did some shopping and spent the day relaxing.

Royal Pavilion

Brighton Pier

With our Rock candy

Tiki alcoholic milkshake

Today I went with a few friends to Brighton. It was a great day and probably one of my favorites so far. We toured the Royal Pavilion which was an old palace that King Henry the fourth built. It was incredible, absolutly breathtaking. The design was based on Chinese architecture and designs. It was really cool to see. After this we had a relaxing lunch in an italian restaurant, we walked over to the Brighton Pier and the beach. Being on the beach was so relaxing and even though it was cold and the water was freezing, it was so nice hearing the waves and seagulls and smelling the salty air. It does not matter where I am, but the beach always manages to make me happy. The pier was really neat too and reminded me of the Ocean City boardwalk. It had rides and typical beachy food. We still had a little time to kill before our bus back to London so since it was cold, we sat in a bar and watched the Arsenal game. The day was really relaxing. When we got back to London we went to this bowling ally/restaurant that served alcoholic milkshakes. I got a passionfruit one with rum and it was amazing. I highly recommend them. It was a great end to a great day.


***My albums with the rest of my pictures are all posted on facebook!