Life at the manor between Travels

Before jetting off to Paradise in Greece my life was action packed here around the manor. The weekend prior to Greece, Laura and I celebrated our British mom’s birthday.  On Friday night we went out with the entire family to a pub just outside of Grantham for the largest fish and chips I have ever seen in my life. Hopefully the picture will help, when I say this was the largest fish ever put on a plate in front of me! It was a lovely night out and visits with the whole family, who truly has taken Laura and I under their wing and treat us like their own family.

 

On Saturday John and Jenny picked up us early and we went to York for the day. York is a cute old town in England with shops that line the cobble stone streets and have houses so old they lean to to where they almost make an arch over the streets. They also have an amazing cathedral like many other towns in England. We had lunch and tea in York and then headed back to the manor for costume ball, yes in November, better late than never right?!

Costume ball was a blast, Laura, Veronica, Danielle and I went as Miss America contestants, in which I was Miss Congeniality.  We had a high top fancy dinner with wine and dessert then danced the night away in the Great Hall.

The weekend was then followed by a week filled of three Term papers, two presentations, an exam and a quiz, but after that it was all about Greece!

C'est la vie

Rain, rain go away come again another day…. which was our song of the weekend. It sadly rained every day we were in Paris. We sadly put to rest four umbrellas that die from the wind and rain. Despite the rain Paris was beyond amazing, and the rain just makes me want to go back in the summer that much more.  Paris was one of the three school trips I’m taking while here so they provide all the transportation and accommodations. We left Wednesday afternoon from the manor and took the train into London. From there we took the Chunnel into Paris, the Chunnel is a train that goes underwater from London into Europe, sadly though the tunnel is not clear so you can’t see underwater. After arriving in Paris we got settled in our hotel room and just walked around in that area and grabbed a small dinner at a street stand. We got up early on Thursday and hit the streets of Paris. On Thursday we crossed one of our many things off our list, get lost in The Louvre.  The Louvre was once home to Louise XIII and is now home to artist work from around the world.  The Louvre is the more impressive museum I think I will ever spend time in. If one were to Google top ten things to do in Paris, getting lost in the Louvre is one of them, and that indeed is what we did.  The Louvre is home to Leonardo Devinci’s Mona Lisa, the Nike of Samothrace (winged Victory), as well as Lady Auxerre (a statue that represents the most beautiful women in the world, and a statue of Mary Magdalene. All these pieces were beyond amazing, there is no denying their beauty and artistic ability as artist. Not many people are can they saw the Mona Lisa original, although small, is still beautiful. The pure architect of the Louvre is what amazed me beyond belief. No pictures or words can do justice to the building.

               That night us six girls (Laura, Veronica, Talia, Holly and Steph) and our friend Terry stopped at the local store and got some wine and snacks and headed out to the Eiffel Tower. Every night the Eiffel Tower is light up, then every hour they do a light show in which white lights sparkle on top of the already light up Tower. The Eiffel Tower was everything I expected and more, it was one of the most beautiful sights I have seen while over here. We captured probably more pictures of the Eiffel Tower then one will ever need. We stayed there for hours, watching a couple of light shows.  Although it had rained earlier that day the night ended up clear and perfect for the Eiffel Tower.

               The next day we started off and headed out shopping. We girls got new pea coats in Paris. After that we headed off to see the Notre Dame. The Notre Dame was amazing cathedral; I couldn’t help but think of Disney’s movie the Hunchback of Notre Dame. The architecture again was amazing. We just sat there for a while taking it all in. Afterwards Terry left to hit up another museum while us girls headed off to our free Paris fashion show we signed up for. We found it online as one of the top ten free things to do in Paris, so we registered for it for us six girls. Sadly after getting there and waiting and have been pointed in the right direction, we find out that the fashion show is every Friday, expect for this particular Friday. So we scratch that idea and headed back to the hotel since I needed to register for my classes for spring semester. That night we dressed up and went out of experience French cuisine. We headed out to a part of Paris called Montmartre. After that we met up with more students from our school and wondered had some wine and explored the streets. Laura Veronica and I stayed out and danced the night away.

               The next day we got up early once again and had an amazing breakfast that our hotel has for us, we actually had this every morning, our group has full heartedly fallen in love with nutella. That day we managed to get some much in that it left us beyond exhausted at night. We got up and went to the arch de triumph walked down the Champ Elysee and stopped in at stores like Louise Vuitton, and Mercedes Bins dealership. We then took the metro back to Montmartre and went to the famous white church at the top of Montmartre over looks all of Paris. It was slightly cloudy and extremely windy so the view and experience wasn’t the best but the view was spectacular. We also went and saw the outside of the Moulin Rouge, for I have grown up watching that movie all through middle school and high school. It was neat to see the Moulin Rouge on the screen to real life. It was a neat experience to say the least.

               Sunday we had to leave at one in the afternoon so we spent the morning hitting up souvenir shops and then got crepes with nutella and bananas before leaving and taking the Chunnel back to London.

               This week and weekend I have spent mornings up until two am consequent nights working on homework. I have had a lot of homework and exams and just need to get through Tuesday. This weekend besides homework our British family spent a lot of time with us. We went out Friday and Saturday. As well we had a costume ball on Saturday. Keep tuned for a posting on those after I finish my last term paper, as well as later on a posting on Greece, since five of us girls are leaving for Greece on Wed.

Only 27 more days until I’m back at home, so I hope everyone is preparing for my homecoming! Hahah

Miss you all!

Venice of the North and twenty one candles in london

For time wise I promise promise I will add pictures later but for now I'm rushing out the door to Paris, a dream come true!!!

I am becoming incredibly bad at updating my blog, and the only excuse I have, which I consider a good one, is school. Who know you actually had to study and do school work while studying abroad?! Crazy, right? I currently have around 12ish days left of class and in those I have three term papers, exams and three final presentations. But on the better note I’m leaving in a few hours for a five day get away to Paris, a dream that I never thought would come true; followed by a weekend with my British family, five days in Greece and nine days in Italy after Finals.

So what have I been up to the last couple weeks, well first off I turned 21 on November 2. Which in all reality wasn’t as big of a deal here because

1.      I’ve been legal for the last two plus months

2.      I spent my birthday studying British history

But my amazing mom sent a huge package of birthday decorations to Laura and her and a few girls surprised me and decorated my room to the maxium while I was at class. It was the greatest surprise and made me feel that much closer to home. I owe my birthday to those girls and my ever creative and sneaky mom. For my birthday we spiced up studying a little and had some wine with crackers and cheese that my mom had sent. We then went to London this past weekend to celebrate.

       We had a field trip down to London on Friday, the 5^th of November which marks a historical date in England in which a plot in history was to blow up parliament, which was unsuccessful. The fiveth of November in England is like the forth of July for American with fireworks everywhere. My friend Ryan from high school is studying in London this semester so he was gracious to host five of us girls for the weekend. We did a pub crawl on Friday night. Saturday we went shopping and then Veronica, Laura and I made Ryan and his roommates an amazing dinner, if I must say so myself.

Halloween weekend was a big weekend for us in England as well, not so much that it was Halloween for the thrill of Halloween hasn’t caught on in England has it has in the United States. Although us girls did dress up on Saturday night, I was Sandy from Greece, with brown hair of course.  That weekend we spend in Amsterdam with a group of 13 of us. It was a fun to travel all together, since we haven’t since our trip to Scotland. We all hit up the I Amsterdam sign which is famous in Amsterdam, we were able to climb it and take pictures with it which was fun. Amsterdam truly is the Venice of the north, for it’s a city all on canals. It was beautiful, like nothing I’ve ever seen before. On the other hand Amsterdam was an eye opening experience that took me a few days to take in fully. The red light district was something I’m still unsure of how I feel about. It’s a huge part of their culture in which I respect but it leaves me feeling uneasy. As many of you may or may not know prostitution is legal in Amsterdam and is advertised, the only thing is I didn’t realize how legal and advertised it was. Girls are displayed in rooms with glass doors lined in neon pink lights all up and down the streets, hundreds of these doors. In matter of keeping this post as clean as possible, I’ll just leave it as it wasn’t what I had expected. Another downfall of Amsterdam was that I lost my wristlet containing my bank cards and my camera… which is never good. If I were to ever go back to Holland or Amsterdam I would make sure I go during the spring or summer, for Holland is famous for their flowers and tulips which from pictures look like it’s from a painting.

Well I’m off to Paris, I promise I’ll update this soon after!

Tea and Wine

_{Well my excuse of not having a computer has come to an end; my new computer cord that my lovely parents sent me finally arrived. As many of you have heard my computer cord because, of the voltage difference sparked multiple times in the library, and died, ultimately causing my computer battery to die as well. So now with a charged computer I can write my blog postings and add pictures for you to see. What have I done in the last three weeks… I start with most recent and make my way backwards.}

                    _{This past weekend was our one weekend a month to stay at the manor, we have decided it’s much needed to have a weekend at the manor to get caught up on homework and relax a little and give our bank accounts a much needed relaxation as well. So Thursday we had a marketing exam that did not go very well for the whole class so we went out. We (a group of about 12 of us) went bowling then went out on the town in Grantham. I was so close to breaking a hundred in bowling but didn’t make it. Friday and Saturday pretty much consisted of hanging out in lounge area, watching movies and writing my large paper that had a rough draft due today, Monday. Sunday we got up and after working out and having brunch we had planned on going to the next large town over and going shopping, for they have really cute stuff for amazing prices. Our train was to leave at 12:45, so we called to have a taxi come at 12:15… after calling again it finally arrived at 12:35 making it too late to get to train station and head to Nottingham… so we lay around once again and watched soccer/futbol all day. Saturday also marked our ½ mark on this journey. A mark that is bittersweet. We then went to our family’s house for dinner. They had their one year old Grandson over too who was so much to play with. Our friend Veronica came over for dinner as well.}

                    _{Last weekend, Laura’s Mum and friend Tony were here, it was their second weekend here. They came into town Thursday and we went out to the Goose for dinner, which is one of the local pubs here in Grantham we usually go out to. We then got up on Friday and drove down to The Cotswold’s. The Cotswold’s are a collection of small countryside villages that have beautiful cottages! We had the most amazing relaxing, tea and wine filled weekend. We drove down to Stonehenge one day and saw…well… the large, old, no one knows how they got there, ROCKS; and it was in creditable! The drive down there was so pretty, the countryside of the UK is beautiful. As were the area that Stonehenge lays one. It was a perfectly sunny day that just added to it all. The following day we drove to Stratford upon Avon, which is the birth town of William Shakespeare. We saw five places that were in his family. Both nights for dinner we made dinner at our lovely cottage and had wine glass after wine glass, Mom you would be jealous. We also ate lunch at small cafes that were nice. Sunday night we all went to our family’s house for dinner and it was fun for Laura’s real mom to meet her British mom. It was a great night. Laura’s mom and Toni were beyond generous and nice to me. I loved having them here and it was sad to see them go.   It made me miss my family that much more.}

                    _{Three weekends ago Laura’s mom arrived in London. After dinner on Thursday Laura, Veronica and I hoped a taxi, rushed on the train and headed to London. Laura’s mom came traveling with her from Toni from college. They rented a Flat (apartment) in London and so we were to meet them there. On our way to the flat we passed them outside a pub having a glass of wine. So after lugging our luggage up over five flights of stairs( (and we figured we weren’t flying so why not go all out on packing and each had a suitcase) we joined them for a glass of wine. Their apartment was right across the river from the London eye and was in a neat area surrounded by pubs and the National Gallery in which we went to one day. We also went to Camden Town, changing of the Guards and Wicked!!! Wicked was my favorite part of London and one of my favorite parts of my stay here. The production was amazing! We dressed up and had Champaign before the show. It was just an amazing night.}

_{On a side note a few things have happened in the States in Which I must make note of:}

                    _{My mother had her birthday and though I wished her a happy birthday via every social media way possible…here’s one more.}

                    _{Also my little brother turned 19 yesterday. It’s still so weird to think he’s so old, not to mention towers over me in height and is in college!}

                    _{Finally I have to congratulate my cousin Kristi and her husband Brian in welcoming my newest  baby cousin Alexis Blakely Bissonette who was born on October 20th, 2010. I can’t wait to meet her when I get home.}

                    _{This weekend were heading to Amsterdam with a beyond large group or students, and I promise I won’t wait three weeks to update you on our trips. Until then..}

_Cheers!

Homesick

Laying in bed wishing I was home....sometime being so far from home isn't so spectacular.

Esta es la historia de Como me siento enamorado de Madrid, Espana.

September 29, 2010 air traffic control and baggage claim department of airports in Spain go on strike.  Airlines flying in, out and around Spain find themselves having to cancel hundreds of flights.  We spent all week walking on glass and checking the status of our flights. There was three separate groups heading out to Spain last weekend, one destinded to Ibiza, one to Barcelona, and then Veronica, Laura and myself to Madrid. The flights being cancelled included that in which seven of our classmates were on. Laura Veronica and I had planned to fly out to Madrid Spain the following day, September 30^th. 

            We had spent the first part of the week studying for our first British Studies two hour essay exam; covering over two eras of history and three questions in which to answer. After the essay was over it was vacation time and we were off to the airport, still unsure if we would be taking off or not.  We had dinner at the manor and then took a taxi to the train station. It’s here where our travels to the airport alone went downhill. About half way down the mile long driveway I realized I had forgotten my passport back up in my room, of course making the taxi driver turn around ( hey at least I didn’t get to the airport, right!?!) After arriving at the train station, we had another bump in the road and mistakenly got on the wrong train, heading forty minutes in the wrong direction. The ticket collector came around and clearly we didn’t have the right tickets, thankfully he gave us a print out of three additional train switches we could take to get us back to the airport. After a few shady stops along the way we made it to the airport, and only ten minutes later then we were originally scheduled, if we would have gotten on the right train in the first place. After all this we settled in for our night of  “sleeping” or in better terms attempting to sleep in the airport.

Then our weekend had an amazing change. After two hour delay we were finally taking off for Madrid, after all our upset in travel yesterday we finally made it Madrid, Spain and it was amazing. We had the ultimate girls’ weekend!

After getting settled in at our hostel we showered and headed out to explore. We headed to Sol, which lies in the heart of Madrid as well as the heart of Spain. We walked around seeing the Plaza Mayor as well as many other historical sites. The view was amazing. Old decorative buildings lining narrow cobble stone streets. We walked around and had a mini photo shoot of the sites until around ten o’clock. Ten o’clock is also about dinner time for the Spanish culture. So we headed back to our hostel and cooked spaghetti, I know it’s not a traditional meal from Spain but hey it was only three Euros when all said and done! We crashed soon after that knowing we had to big days ahead of us and getting little to no sleep the night before.

               Friday we woke up and went on a shopping mission. We went out back to sol which was shopping center with decently priced clothes. We did some damage in Spain, shopping wise! Spanish culture then calls for Siesta time from 2-4 everyday. During Siesta time one leaves works and heads home for a nap and then returns back to work to work much later then your standard 9-5 job. Our siesta time on Friday and Saturday was spent on the roof time doing nothing but soakin’ up some sweet Spanish sun rays! After siesta we got ready for the night.

               Laura and my friend from school, Sean, studied abroad last fall in Sweden and met a classmate Javier who is from Spain and currently lives in Madrid. We met Javier that night and he took us to el parque de siete tetas, in English, the park of seven boobs. The park contained seven large hills that overlooked all of Madrid. It was a view that my camera will never do justice for and I will never forget. We sat and watched the sun set , had a photo shoot and conversed in Spanglish with Javier.

  Javier is currently a Spanish teacher in Spain, working with elementary school age students and special education kid, which made it easier to communicate. We both were infatuated with each other language and the four or us spent time just conversing in both English and Spanish. And surprisingly I remembered more then I thought I would, not saying I’m good by any means but I was impressed by myself ha.

    After spending time at the park we went to his house and met his parents, who were so welcoming and had our laughing so hard. His dad kept trying to give us food and drinks. I could have stayed there all night with them. We then left to meet us with some of Javier friends. After drinking in another park, we headed out for the evening, or should I say morning. For in Spain the clubs don’t open until about one, one-thirty in the morning. Once it hit about five five-thirty in the morning Laura, Veronica and I had one thing on our mind… OUR BEDS! And we called it a night, arriving back at our hostel in bed around six in the morning, which to them is calling it an early night, crazy huh!? Needless to say the following morning we were pretty useless. We Laid in bed until Siesta where we laid out on the roof again.  Finally we got cleaned up for the day and walked around other parts of Madrid we had not seen.

    

Later in the evening we met up with Javier again. That night we went out for Tapas and Sangria, in which us girls had been waiting all weekend for. Let me tell you the Sangria was worth the wait and was amazing! We called it an early night that night, still around midnight or so for we had to catch a shuttle to the airport at 3:25 am on Sunday. The trip home was smooth, for we slept every part of the way home still trying to recover from the weekend. Con todo Madrid encabeza la lista de lugares que he viajado. Realmente han caído en el

I'm Safe, I Promise

    For those of you who have heard, as well as those who haven't I've added this blog to forward on the information that’s on our side of communication. I posted this also for my own blog memories of the trip. Just know through all of this I'm very safe where I am, as well as very cautious when I travel. Try not to worry too much about me. The next two weekends I will with Laura's mom too, so I know that will make my mom feel a little at ease as I hope it does to you as well. I'll keep you posted on any updates and hope you will do the same, as my lack of television and newspaper makes getting news somewhat tricky.

 

Dear UWEC Students in Europe, Fall 2010:

 

As you may be aware, the US State Department has issued a travel alert for U.S. citizens in Europe on October 3, 2010. This travel alert expires on January 31, 2010. The full text of the alert is below:

 

http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/pa/pa_5171.html

 

Please read the travel alert and follow the Department of State’s recommendations in order to maximize your health and safety abroad. Remember that the CIE already registered you for your time abroad at the State Department’s travel registration website.

 

Furthermore, please review the safety information found on pages 16-18 of your on-line Study Abroad Handbook, located at http://www.uwec.edu/CIE/sac/AcptStudents/uploads/GuidesF10/SAHandbookF10.pdf, and above all, listen to the safety and security information provided by your on-site liaisons.

 

If you have questions or concerns, don’t hesitate to contact us!

 

Sincerely,

 

Cheryl, Colleen, Karen & Samantha
UW-Eau Claire Study Abroad Staff