Our first adventure was off to Platform 9 3/4, for all of you Harry Potter fans you know exactly what I'm referring to! It was quite entertaining all of the things that the had to make the experience authentic. I had quite a few laughs at all of the things people came up with to do in their pictures.
After getting our geek on we were off the the Buckingham Palace. We planned it just right so that we would be there for a guard exchange. This is such an interesting tradition to see. All of the guards had their traditional huge black fluffy hats. There were also bands marching in all of the new guards. The whole process took about an hour. Every time a guest would enter or exit the palace it would be by carriage although it would have all of the windows covered, unfortunately. I made sure to confess my love to Prince Harry from outside the gates, we set our wedding dates and the invitations should be arriving in the mail anyway now. The road leading up to the palace was beautiful, the landscaping was amazing. From the palace we went to the Hyde Park. On the way we passed through a WWII memorial. This memorial was different from ones back in the states, because this is where a bombing occurred. Learning about WWII at Mulch Woolton is completed different and so much more fascinating that my experiences growing up. So much of the war happened at Liverpool's docks, Manchester, and London. These three cities are all places that the children are extremely familiar with. When they talk about specific battles they refer to buildings and ruins that are still there today. Just WWII alone is 10-15 weeks of the students history lesson in Year 5 my teach told me. I enjoy being here and seeing the respect and pride the cities take in their memorials to this day. Hyde Park was a beautiful place, and the perfect stop for our picnic. It made you forget that you were in such a large city. In this park was a rose garden with roses bigger than your head! They were also in every color you could imagine. It was quite picturesque. There was also a memorial walk through this park dedicated to Princess Diana, and naturally we had to do the loop! It was beautiful the whole way around, and different signs highlighting her life along the way. We were off to Piccadilly Circus from here, a great place for live music and some wonderful culture! Along the way I got distracted by some sparkly tiaras in a jewelry store though, after posing next by a few for pictures an employee came outside. I was quite embarrassed, but he was actually asking me to come in. He told me the story behind each crown and their store. This was actually jewelers who design the royal families jewelry! I was in shock. He continued on telling us all of the high light pieces they had for various members of the royalty. Although, you were also able to purchase a few of the items that the royal family was selling that goes to various charities depending on the piece. All of the jewelry in there had been worn by the royal family and had a picture of them wearing it at the event. Let's just say even the pieces that were for sale were quite a few shinny pennies. I spent a lot of time walking through gawking at the beauty of it all. After awhile of talking with some employees they took me into the back where they were actively making some jewelry for the Royal family. They also showed me where Prince Charles had carved his name into a glass display case back there from when he was in the shop one day! One of the jewelers working there had designed the diamond skull that the queen requested and was auctioned off for 150 million dollars to someone from the states. I had heard about this piece on the Today show back at home and it was amazing to meet the man who made it! This was all by so much luck of me gawking at some sparkly pieces, but wow I was so lucky to have stumbled across this amazing opportunity! We finally made it to Piccadilly circus after our little detour and it was so nice to sit back and enjoy all of the entertainment going on. I felt like I was in time square back at home. We got to enjoy some Dave Mathews Band and cold ice cream on this hot day at the circus. From here we walked through Camden market and Portobello road market on our way to Oxford Circus and Oxford Street. Oxford Street was like the Magnificent Mile, high end shops as far as the eye could see! Oxford circus was a lot like Piccadilly, but much more fancy. We didn't spend long here before we had to go back and get ready for our play! I went with five other girls to go see Wicked! This was my first time ever seeing Wicked and I was pretty excited to finally go see it. The play was at Apollo Victoria theater. We had great seats for the play, the stage was so intricate! I was amazed at all of the detail and how good the play was. I wasn't sure how the story line was suppose to fit into The Wizard Of Oz until the end, but it all pulled together at the end! It was so interesting to learn the back story of it all. I loved the play and hope I can make it back to London to see another one. After the play we were all starving and went out to get some food and drinks. It was quite delicious, but in London it seemed that the whole city shuts down at 11:30. We went to a few places hoping to stay out a little later before we began to notice that all bars and restaurants close at 11:30. Most definitely different from eating establishments back at home. This was kind of a bummer, but we still had our fun!
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Today we got to go back into the primary school for the first time in what felt like forever. I'm so glad we got to go into the schools. We are done with our university seminars and will be going to school every morning from here on out. At this point we're expected to start doing a lot more teaching in the classroom. I'm excited to start doing more teaching at Mulch Wolton because there is such a difference in the school compared to the states.
After school two other girls and myself caught a bus to city center, with our bags packed from the night before, ready to go to London! It felt like in no time we were getting off the train and walking to our hostel. By the time we got there, we were all ready for some good food! We got an Italian dinner and yummm! It was quite delicious and filling. From dinner we went out exploring what was within walking distance of our hostel. We got pretty lucky and found several places we really liked, we spent the rest of our night socializing with some new friends we had met. This is my first overnight field trip experience and it was an overwhelming start with 57 2nd graders eagerly waiting for the train to pull into the station at 8:30am. It was a two hour train ride to York, and with 57 kids I thought we would never get there! In England there aren't designated school buses, but they can rent busses for hire like a taxi. When the schools go on a field trip, the students have to be dropped off at the station and picked up there by their parents. From the station we began our walk to the hostel. After checking in and getting settled in their rooms, which they were so excited about, we went to have lunch outside. We let the kids run wild and burn some energy after lunch because they had plenty to spare. The first museum we went to visit was a Viking museum. The kids were going crazy. This was a younger age of students than I have worked with in the past and they were all wound up about this trip. The museum had a setup of what an old Viking house would be like and the kids got to see what their daily lives would be like. It was hard for some of the kids to understand that a one room house would sleep 10-15 people in that era. We went onto a ride that followed a boy their age through his house and village. The ride was like King's Island, where you sit down and strap yourself in. The ride moves exhibit to exhibit and explains the scenario. The exhibits were very realistic and the students and I found it fascinating. At the blacksmith, you could smell the fire burning and see him working on his pieces. In the boy's home you could see his mom cooking and smell what was for dinner. Being immerged into the environment of the Viking era truly helped the kids relate, especially since it was a young boy telling the story. When we got out of our ride, we walked through the museum and listened to speakers. My favorite part was when an employee passed around what looked like a large brown rock. After all of the kids had passed it from person to person, she told them it was actually the largest fossilized human poop recorded in history. It even made the Guinness world records! All the kids were rather disgusted that they didn't find this out until after touching it, but I was crying I laughed so hard at their reaction. From the Viking museum, we went to an archeologist Vikings dig. The kids dug in four different levels, which represented four different eras, the lowest dig sight being the oldest of the four eras. I wasn't too impressed with this museum because they did not do a good job explaining to the children the meaning behind what they were doing/discovering. It seemed the kids were more just playing in sandboxes. We left and headed to the city wall. In the middle of York is a 2,000 year old castle. Around the castle was the city wall, which is still functional. We walked the perimeter of the city wall, which took quite a while with so many small children. We stopped along the way and explained all of the various functions of the walls. The boys loved learning the holes in the walls were used to shoot arrows out and they liked the trenches that surrounded the city walls. Experiencing these things in person truly caught their attention. From the city wall, we walked to dinner. Serving 57 kids was chaos, but interesting. Of 417 kids at Mulch Woolton, there is only one child with a food allergy. I found this fascinating. Last summer I had worked at a daycare with 18 kids in my classroom and 16 of the kids had food allergies, most with a list of things they were allergic to. So, you can only imagine my surprise when I found out that out of 417 kids, only one child had a food restriction and it was a nut allergy. Could this have something to do with how you're raised or the cultural environment? Putting all of these kids to bed was.... an experience we will call it. They were truly bouncing off the walls at this point. A special thanks to the parents who loaded their kid's suitcases with sweets. Since the kids were only 7 years old, this was the first night away from home for a few of them, so naturally they were homesick. Then you had some rooms who decided to stay up until 3 a.m. jumping on beds. Sleep is for the weak is what I am telling myself at this point after 12 days of continuous traveling. Who needs an alarm clock when you have 57 2nd graders? Not me, that is for sure! The kids began waking up around 5 a.m. and once one was up, they woke up their entire room.. too kind of them, I know. We tried to contain them to their rooms until 7 a.m., but I wouldn't call that too successful. We were at breakfast downstairs by 8 a.m. eating and getting ready for another day full of learning. After breakfast we went to a train museum. This museum was actually really cool. We split up into groups of 5 for the museum. I had my kids line up like a train and we would say "Choo Choo!" before moving from one train to the next. They though it was the coolest thing ever! There were at least 25 different trains, each one you could walk in and see the engineer's room. My boys loved taking turns being in the engineer's room and I had to drive them out every time. I learned the first train to haul passengers was in England. Even better, it was in Liverpool and went to Manchester. After the museum, we got to go on an open window (burrr) train ride around York. The kids were pointing out all of the new things they knew about trains, persistently asking the conductor to blow the horn. We had accidentally lost track of time and we had to sprint, literally sprint, to the train station to catch our train. I had to carry 2 kids the last 100 meters; we were that close to missing it. After leaving the museum, it was time to head back to Liverpool and the kids instantly fell asleep as soon as the train took off. From this trip I got to know the kids really well on an individual basis and I also picked up numerous tricks for classroom management on field trips. This was a lot to take in, but I feel I learned so much from this experience. The respect the students have for their teachers in England most definitely helped this experience be a positive one for everyone involved, but I still feel like I am more prepared for my own field trips one day. I can't upload pictures with the adorable kids, unfortunately, but here is the pretty town of York: Here are some pictures from my 10 days of travel and all of my incredible experiences! Unfortunately, I was unable to load images with the mobile app while I was traveling, but better late than never. After a long week of travel I was quite tired, but I wasn't going to let that stop me from seeing some more local sights. I have been trying to get to see a fútbol stadium near Liverpool for a few weeks now, but hadn't found the time, so I caught a train from Liverpool to Manchester. In Manchester I went to see the Old Tarrod stadium. This is where the Manchester United play all of their games. It was nice to be able to see their field and go through their museum. I had lunch at their cafe and walked through their arena.
After getting back to Liverpool I got some groceries and packed my bag for my first overnight school trip with my classroom of 4th graders! We are off to York for two days. I am excited to see how the field trip and museums are going to go with 50 ten year old kids! After a long week of traveling we decided ending with a beach day would be a good idea. We walked with all of our luggage to the Olympic beach after checking out of the hostel. The Olympic beach was a very active beach we had heard a lot about. There were countless sand volleyball courts, fitness courses, and racquetball all on the beach. When we were there, they had a huge Marcat sand volleyball tournament going on. This was fun to watch, the crowd was going wild over each point! There were about 10 courts with matches going on, half girls and half guys. There were also plenty of people walking up and down the beach trying to sell you all kinds of things from dresses to drinks. The beach was so pretty and the water was really clear. I enjoyed this day of relaxing beach time.
There were some things about beaches in the states and Barcelona's beaches that were different. We didn't know until we walked up that Barcelona's beaches are nude beaches! This was quite a surprise, but we were also surprised that even though people were just in their birthday suits, it wasn't in a sexual way. It was normal and natural in their culture. Even the children were running around without swim suits on, playing in the water without a care. It was really surprising and different how open and accepting of each other they were. After leaving the beach, we had to head to the airport; our time in Barcelona was coming to an end. Barcelona is the first city that I have completely loved. I will most definitely come back. I thoroughly enjoyed how different each of the regions of the city were. You had a beach, countryside, gothic region, china town, industrialized area, and so much more all within a 20 minute walk. The city had so much to offer. I would love to teach and live for a year or two in a city like this. When we landed in Liverpool we were back to windy and cold! It was only 52 degrees outside and raining, a stark contrast to our day at the beach on the Mediterranean. We definitely weren't in Barcelona anymore! It was nice to unpack, do some laundry, and sleep in my own room! Friday was our day of sight seeing in Barcelona. We started out by having breakfast on the balcony outside of our hostel on this GORGEOUS day. Not a cloud in the sky, and it was already in the 80's. From breakfast we were off to the gothic quarters! Barcelona was divided into 5 different quarters, each a completely different style.
In the gothic quarters was full of little shops and markets. We went to see the Sagrada Familia church! This church was amazing to look at, it was huge and stood out at the heart of the gothic quarter. From the church we went to a few different markets and got us some gelato. This was my first time having gelato and I had strawberry, it was so much better than ice cream! From the gothic quarters we walked over to la rambla and went to two different markets la boqueria, and Elans Ecant. These two places were fascinating! Full of culture and somewhere off the path that was full of locals. They were packed full of people and fresh food. This was my favorite place in Barcelona, I feel like I learned so much about their culture and tried their local food! From La Rambla we walked through the Arc De Triomf on our way to park güell. This park was decorated with different pieces of his artwork! We also got to walk through his house, it was all so pretty and colorful. The way the light reflected off all the glass looked so pretty, I enjoyed being able see all of the artwork and hike through his park enjoying our time! After park güell we went to Futbol Club Barcelona where I walked through the arena! I loved being able to see the arena for myself. Walking in the footsteps of Messi. I picked up a postcard of him to hang up in my room to remember this wonderful day! After our tour we went to clean up for our dinner. We went to dinner across the street from Font Màgica De Montjuic. We had Tapas and Flan for dinner, two Spanish classics! The fountain was a beautiful sight to go with our dinner. At the fountain there was also a HUGE festival going on for the fútbol game for Athletic club vs. Barcelona Saturday! There were three stages with live music and thousands of people. We spent the night here enjoying the festival and socializing with locals. We got lucky stumbling into such an amazing festival and really enjoyed ourselves! After our very long 15 hour bus ride, we arrived in Barcelona around 2PM. After checking into our hostel, we headed for monistrol de Montserrat. This is a mountain about an hour train ride outside of Barcelona. On this mountain there are several different monasteries. Honestly, looking back, we didn't do enough research into this hike, but it was an adventure! We took a ski lift over the valley to get us to the mountain where the monasteries are located on.
From the top of the mountain you could see Barcelona and even the ocean. It was breath taking. On the top of the mountain there were several different monasteries that you could hike around to! Unfortunately by the time we got to the top of the mountain we only had time to visit one of them. Inside the monastery were chandeliers from all the big family churches in Barcelona. Each generation of a family with a cathedral in Barcelona has their own chandelier in Barcelona. When it's time for the next generations to go up they take down the old one and put it up in this monastery. There were chandeliers dating back to the 14th century in this monastery! Inside this monastery there were also several famous family members of the Barcelona church buried within the church. We also saw several monks that were at the monastery. This was the first time I have ever seen a monk in person. There were various workers in the monastery that explained what the various monks were doing in each monastery. This was interesting to learn about and see it all in person. When taking our train ride up to the 3rd highest mountain in all of Spain I couldn't help but think why did they choose to put monasteries so far away and out of of the city. When we got there we learned that monasteries are generally on top mountains so that they are closer to God. When there is monasteries there are generally a few located on top of that mountain. This was a first time for me visiting a monetary and I was fascinated when learning about all about it! We caught the trolley back down to the train station and it was quite a journey! I am not a fan of heights whatsoever so taking a trolley strait up to one of the highest train stations was quite a fright! This trolley was shaking from the sting winds with a strait drop off the edge of this mountain! The view was so pretty, but I was more concerned about making it to the bottom! Once we got back into Barcelona we got dinner at a grill outside of our hostel! The dinner was quite delicious, France and Spain most definitely have better food than the U.K. After our long day of travel and hiking around the mountain top we all went to bed having experienced a lot of new cultural experiences It was an early 6am start after a late night at the Eiffle Tower. We were determined to go to the Louvre and beat the lines. We got there before it opened and got our spot at the front of the line. I was hesitant at first about going to the Louvre, overwhelmed by its size, wondering if we had enough time to see all the things we had listed, but we accomplished our goal! The Louvre was MASSIVE! We did get lost a few times, but that didn't stop us. We got to see the Mona Lisa, Nike, raft of the Medusa, Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss, Liberty Leading People, Venus de Milo, Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon, and THOUSANDS of other pieces of artwork along the way! Each room was bigger than a house filled with many pieces of artwork or statues. You could go there every day for a week and not be able to see it all. It was incredible to be able to see so much artwork under one roof! It's a must see for anyone who has time in Paris!
After spending all morning in the Louvre, we went to have a picnic at the Eiffel tower! We got fresh baguettes, fresh cheese, and fresh macaroons. We took some time to enjoy our last sights of the Eiffel Tower and watched some of the Roland Garros tennis going on! Fresh baguettes in Paris are delicious, and incredibly cheap.. about 50 cents! Paris also had delicious fresh croissants. We frequently went in to to get a snack at the bakery each time we passed one to try something new! On our way to the picnic we went to one of the attractions I wanted to see in Paris, where Princess Diana passed away. This was an underpass that to this day is lined with flowers. On the walls of the underpass were wonderful things written about the impact she made and how she will not be forgotten. Even though this was right near the Eiffel Tower, it was a silent and peaceful place. People came to pay their respects. After attending Princess Diana's exhibit at the Cincinatti Museum last summer, it felt right to be able see where such a horrible tragedy occurred. After our picnic at the Eiffel Tower, and relaxing listening to the live musicians on the lawn, we went to see the Sacrè-Coeur Cathedral on top of the highest hill in Paris. This was quite a hike up with several boutiques and shops on our way up. Inside the church was amazing stained glass work and an active prayer church. It was completely silent inside and their were nuns leading a prayer at the front. We sat down to watch and take it all in for at least 30 minutes before heading back outside. There were people inside talking about how far they've traveled just to visit this church. It was amazing what people went through to get there, and I was glad to be beside them. When we went back outside we could see all of Paris, every monument, statue, and building we had hiked around to see. We sat outside and reflected on each person's favorite sight and all of the differences we had seen in Paris! Reflecting on Paris, it was different from what I was expecting. To be honest, the locals were rather rude and didn't want to help with directions at all. French people came off to be very snooty and let it be known that they were better than others. Everyone was dressed in extremely high end clothing from head to toe. It definitely was not acceptable to be out in public in sweats or jeans. The women had on huge heels and would walk around like it was nothing; my feet hurt for them. Once we got back from Sacrè-Coeur, it was time to start packing up and catch our 15 hour bus ride to Barcelona. Our trip to Paris had a lot shoved into two days and I feel like I could have spent at least a week here exploring more of the city, but until next time Paris! Bonjour Pari! We arrived in Paris at 6 am, and after a few tries to figure out how the subway works we finally made it to our hostel, which is really nice. Shout out to my mom for the great find! The subway at 6 am was standing room only, so you can only imagine how crammed it got later in the day. After checking in, we listed out all of the things we wanted to see and/or do with our next two days in Paris!
We decided a hop-on-hop-off tour would be the best way to see everything in such little time. We took the subway to the arch. This arch represents France's version of the tomb of the unknown soldier. The detail and size of this arch was fascinating! When we arrived, they were doing their French version of a Memorial Day ceremony. This was so interesting to watch. From there, we continued down the avenue the Tour de France has finished on since 1975, the Champs Elysees. I know my dad would be jealous! It doesn't take long in Paris to notice all of the CRAZY drivers! They have sides of the roads, but no division lines for the lanes, making road rage a very common occurrence. We also went to see Grand Palais where Chanel puts on fashion shows every year. After this we went to Notre Dame, which was STUNNING! The stained glass was so pretty and the stone carvings outside were so detailed I couldn't believe it. I would recommend this stop for at least a few hours to anyone visiting Paris! It is also right near the Louvre, which I never knew was so large until I was walking by it. The museum took up an entire square block and was four stories tall. The size from the outside was overwhelming alone.. I don't doubt people can get lost in there very easily! Some more beautiful stops along the way we're Musèe d'Orsay, Palais Garnier, Saintè Chapelle, Panthèon, concierge, point Neuf, national museum of modern art, and hôtel de ville! These are all wonderful sights to see, not to mention all of the things we passed along the way visiting these sights. Needless to say, it was a long day with a TON of walking! We finally headed back to the hostel and went to change and shower! Jess and I decided at the last minute that we had to take everyone's advice and see the Eiffel Tower at midnight. No one would tell us why we had to go to see it at midnight, but simply said its Paris' best kept secret. We got there a few minutes early and got some crapes to enjoy while laying in the lawn with hundreds of other tourists. When the clock struck midnight . . . it was like a fairy tale! I don't want to spoil it for anyone else who would ever visit Paris, but WOW! This was the most beautiful sight I have seen so far. It honestly made my entire trip. In addition to the surprise, people were popping champagne, there was a proposal, . . . it was all so much to take in, but I could repeat that night forever. |