Side Note: London

Day 3 - In which Kristin, Tarra and I are intensely cultured and excessively diverted

On Saturday morning, Kristin and Tarra and I set out to the Primrose Hill neighborhood of London, a quiet, pretty, slightly more upscale area of the city. Our destination? The Museum of Everything, a recently opened museum of art by self-taught artists. The things on display were quirky and strange and very interesting, reminding me a lot of one of my favorite museums at home: The American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore.

We perused the entirety of the museum, then made our way via the tube to Hampstead Heath, a “large ancient parkland” full of long grass and picturesque, scraggly trees. We rambled around the heath for awhile like many famous Londoners before us (including John Keats, whose house is nearby), showing off our new coats and being silly and girly. One of us remarked that the heath was so ruggedly scenic it looked like a ridiculous artsy fashion shoot backdrop, and the next thing we knew, we had a mini “photo shoot” on the heath.

We continued strolling about until we found a bench where we sat and ate the picnic lunch (sandwiches and fruits from a local Sainsbury’s grocery store) we had prepared. We visited Keats’s house, and then climbed up Parliament Hill to take in the sweeping views of London at the top.

When we had had enough of the crisp fall weather and romantic scenery (it was like being plopped into a Jane Austen novel), we headed back to Kristin’s neighborhood for afternoon tea, which we took at a cute little tea shop called Bea’s of Bloomsbury. We were just a tad too late to get the full “high tea” treatment (where they bring a tiered platter of sweets, pastries, and scones with clotted cream out with the tea), but we did have a nice pot of black tea and some delicious bakery concoctions like cookies and muffins and pumpkin cheesecake.

After tea we went back to Kristin’s flat and prepared ourselves for another night out. Kristin had reserved us tickets to go see Billy Elliot at the Victoria Theatre, and Tarra and I were, for lack of a better word, pumped. The only problem was that the tube line that went to Victoria was down that day, so we had to take a series of buses. We got on one bus, but when we got off of it we were having a lot of trouble finding our connection. It was getting dangerously close to the show’s starting time, and eventually we consulted a map and decided we should probably just hoof it from where we were. We figured we were probably about a ten-minute walk away. How much time did we have left? Five minutes. Not wanting to miss a whole chunk of the musical because we showed up too late, we literally ran through the streets of London until we reached the theater. We missed maybe two minutes of the beginning of the show, but we were seated pretty close to the back of the theater, so we were able to sneak into our seats without too much of a fuss. The show was fun and cute and very entertaining, and incredibly British to boot.

Day 4 – In which I take an epic nap

After the show we ducked into a grocery store to get some late night snacks, since we hadn’t ever had dinner. I had to catch a ridiculously early bus back to London Stansted, so I decided to just stay up until 3:30 or so when a taxi could take me to the bus station. I bade goodbye to Kristin and Tarra (who was staying the rest of Sunday), got in my taxi, got on my bus, and slept all the way to the airport, where security was a breeze and I spent the better part of my time trying not to fall asleep before I boarded my plane.

I arrived in Schiphol, groggy but motivated, as I had a paper draft to turn out before the day was through. I made my way home, showered, unpacked, and ate a little something. I was still feeling pretty sleepy though, so I decided I would take a two-hour nap so that I would be alert to write my paper later. Big mistake.

I fell asleep at 2:00, and the next time I opened my eyes it was dark outside. It gets dark in Amsterdam around 4:30, however, so I wasn’t too concerned. But then I checked my clock - it was 10 pm! I was still feeling super groggy and disoriented too. I stayed awake just long enough to plead for an extension on my paper and finish some reading for class, then I fell back asleep around 2am and managed to sleep for another 6 hours. Traveling really takes it out of a girl.