Let's get the flock out of here!

Kathi - I'll definitely be on the lookout for that! And I'm also really glad I get to experience fall! The pictures below from my trip this weekend also show some more fall beauty!

Day #24 - Tuesday, October 12

I woke up at 8:30 this morning (whoa, I know) to wait for a care package that Mom and Dad had sent me that was supposed to arrive. It came around 10 and I was more than thrilled to have Mac n Cheese, my favorite blanket (!!!), my peacoat, some more towels, and some other various items from home I'd been missing. I showered and bummed around for a little bit (mostly just laying in bed wrapped up in my blanket that smelled like home, while watching Grey's). I worked on a little bit of homework, and then had a lecture from 4-6. It was rather interesting...about a third of the class was drinking beer during the lecture. This is a country of people who love their drinks. They had two former students come in and share there experiences, which is always motivating to see what lies ahead. I got home from class and made dinner (my Mac n Cheese of course!). Today was Eric and my anniversary so we had a little Skype date night and I headed to bed!

Day #25 - Wednesday, October 13

Woke up today around noon, ate lunch, and headed to class. I had my Technology class from 2-4, where we learned about film editing called Cutting Edge: The Magic of Movie Editing, which is a BBC documentary. It was really interesting and informational! After that, my group headed to Peckham to work on gathering more information for our group project, and were there until around 8. Then I came home and worked on some research for class! Not a very interesting day, but that just makes the interesting ones more exciting I guess!

Day #26 - Thursday, October 14

Today was yet another uneventful day. I woke up and had class 10-3:30. In my morning class we did watch a really interesting and eye opening film...also slightly disturbing and "Big Brother" like. Click here to watch the trailer if you're interested! After class I came, took a nap, and grabbed some dinner with Paige. Then I came home, packed, read a bit, and went to bed!

Day #27 - Friday, October 15

I woke up around 8 today to go and wait for another package from home. Eric sent me a new phone (an iPhone to be exact!) because I've been really frustrated with the one I have, and since I'll be here a while I decided it was worth having a nice phone. After figuring out my phone and playing with it for a bit, I showered, ate lunch, and headed to class. I had my elective, Contemporary Typography, from 2-4, after which I headed to the tube station to get ready to leave for the adventure weekend put on by Butler (the program I'm studying abroad through). I called Dad to wish him a happy birthday and talked to Dad ad Mom for a bit while I was waiting to board the bus. We got on the bus around 6:00 to head to the Lake District National Park. It was a 7 hour bus ride there, mostly in the dark. As we were unloading in the pitch black at 1 in the morning and looked up and saw STARS. Having not seen stars in almost a month, I was a little giddy. No one seemed to think they were that exciting, but I was very glad to be away from the concrete jungle! 

Day #28 - Saturday, October 16

We woke up around 8 for breakfast. My morning activity that I chose was canoeing, on the one lake in the area. There were 7 of us plus the instructor canoeing, so 4 canoes total. We were out on the water for about 2 hours, doing some exploring. It was amazingly gorgeous. I can't even explain it, but I was in a total state of awe and happiness. Below are some of the billion pictures I took while out there. Enjoy!

The dock and lake we canoed on

Surrounding landscape

Beautiful 

I promise I was there!

More of the beautiful lake and mountains!

So much fun!

After canoeing, we headed back and ate our sack lunch at the lodge we were staying at. Here's the view around us while we were eating!

View from the front of the lodge!

My afternoon activity was ghyll scrambling. I wasn't quite sure what I was getting into. We all got sent down to the equipment booth to get fitted. Layer one: fuzzy, navy blue, super tight onesie. Layer two: canvas suspenders about 2 feet too long for me. Layer 3: a 'waterproof' jacket 2 sizes too large. Layer 4: mens size 11 rain boots. I looked absolutely ridiculous and I'm really sad I didn't have my camera to document it (although it's probably for the better!). Then they gave us a life jacket and a helmet. Now I was thinking I was going to wading through a stream, and started to get a little concerned that we needed a life jacket and helmet. There were 16 of us total doing the ghyll scrambling, and we loaded into 2 vans to head to the ghyll (stream). Our driver was crazy and I was about to throw up before we even got there. Once we got to the area, we had a nice little 15 minute hike uphill in super hot layers. Wearing huge rainboots made it a little difficult to walk, and people kept commenting on how I looked ridiculously out of proportion. We got to the ghyll finally, and they started to describe what we were going to be doing. Essentially, a ghyll is a nature made water park...with rocks jutting out everywhere. At the beginning there were a couple of little slides in FREEZING cold water. After becoming fully submerged, my huge boots were full of water which made trudging along the gyhll a little challenging. Then we had a part of the ghyll where we jumped off a little ledge (not too scary), and then they sent us down a huge slide backwards (scary!!). And then the final task was possibly one of the scariest things I've done. We had to jump down about 20 feet into a pool of water, and get pulled up to another rock. I was the last person to go, and by that time I had heard 15 other people (boys included) scream while they did it. After some encouraging from the group, I plummeted into the the freezing cold water. What an adrenaline rush! I still can't believe I did it. I walked away from the experience with some bruises and a swollen knee (I was extremely untalented at walking in my heavy boots and face planted a couple times). Below is the video information video about what we did...this is the actual stream and actual things I did! Please check it out!

CHECK OUT THE PHOTOS AND VIDEO HERE!!

After getting back to the lodge, soaking wet and freezing, I took a super long hot shower and took a much needed nap. Dinner was served at 7. I had a really delicious entree called "Fisherman's Pie" which was a combination of a puff pastry top, mashed potatoes (I think?), some sort of mystery sauce, as well as salmon, lobster meat, mussels, and shrimp.

Fisherman's Pie

After dinner I put my knee up for a bit, and then there was a little dance get together in the lodge. I met a few really nice girls who are also studying in London and live kind of near me and we talked about taking some trips together so I'm looking forward to that! We went to bed around midnight. After a very exciting but strenuous day, I fell asleep the second my head hit the pillow.

Day #29 - Sunday, October 17

Breakfast was at 8:30 this morning, and then we headed out for our morning activity. I was originally going to go on a half day hike, but with my very sore knee and having heard it was quite the climb, decided on a safer option and went into the town of Keswick. It was a quaint, adorable town, right in the mountains. A group of us walked around and went to a couple shops, and I wandered around a bit more to take some pictures. Almost every little shop had Beatrix Potter everything, since we are in the area where her stories were written. I couldn't resist buying a Peter Rabbit tea cup! 

Lake District countryside...spotted with sheep! They were everywhere!

Keswick!

Streets in Keswick with gorgeous mountains in the back!

Delicious fish and chips for lunch. That is slowly becoming my favorite meal. Scooter loves it too!

Beautiful clouds, mountains, and trees. What could be more serene? 

More of the mountains

My new tea selection and Peter Rabbit tea cup!

After exploring Keswick, we loaded onto the busses to head home. We got back to London around 8, and back home around 9. I unpacked, Skyped with Eric, made some dinner, looked through pictures, and am now here updating my blog while drinking some Cranberry & Sanguinello Orange tea from my Petter Rabbit cup! I greatly enjoyed my weekend away and came away with a lesson...this one a bit more personal. Lesson #17: I am very, VERY grateful for my parents instilling a love of nature in me. As much as I complained about camping in high school, being outdoors is one of favorite things. I'm so glad I got the opportunity to go camp and visit national parks when I was younger. I lot of the other students kept saying how there was nothing to do - no phone service, no shopping, no internet, etc. But for me, that was the beauty of the weekend. There are so many amazing things to explore, and I guess I've never appreciated nature and lack of civilization as much as I did this weekend. Living in a city of 8 million people will really change your views on some things. Needless to say, I'm excited to camping with my parents when I come home!

English Language Revised!

adverts - commercials

alight - exit

wellies - rain boots

to hire - to rent