ALSO MY PICTURES FOR SOME REASON WILL NOT DRAG WHERE I WANT THEM TO, I'LL FIX IT A BIT LATER...
London,
I hate waking up early more than anything in the world; I really hate waking up early and hearing your roommate say, “I need to shower and pack still”. Those were Ron’s exact words at 7:30 AM the day we were suppose to leave for London. Knowing he was going to do this would have been great to know the night before. Right off the bat I was grumpy and off to a semi bad start. Our plan was to be out of the apartment by 7:45 to catch the Metro that would take us to the train station… Well we left our apartment around 8:15 AM and rushed to the Metro. When we arrived to the waiting dock it looked China town, it was so crowded and busy, everyone was trying to rush to work at the same time we are trying to rush to the airport. As the train arrives Ron and I notice two things, 1) The train is already packed full of people in every single cart, 2) no one is getting off and there are probably close to another 50-70 people trying to get on. Ron managed to squeeze his way on to the train, I didn't have the same luck, while trying to force myself on, some huge Italian with a PaulyD haircut freak, with braces shoved me off the train as the doors were shutting. Great this day is really starting off bad, now I had to wait around five minuets for the other train, and Ron had no idea I was shoved off. There is no reception to call Ron underground, so the hell with it time to roll with the punches. Once I arrived at Termini, Ron was waiting for me at the exit, I didn't even try and explain how PaulyD shoved me off the train, and we sprinted up stairs to the trains, but on our way up there we thought it would be a good idea just to pay to take a taxi. In Rome, most cabs will have a fixed rate when you are going to the two airports in Rome. We pay the cab driver 30 euro to take us to the first airport, Ciampino.
We get to the airport with no bordering passes printed out, and about… 45 minuets to spare before we have to board our plane. We stand in line for about 10 minuets before I walked around the corner and saw a bright orange sign that read “Easy Jet help desk”. I walk over and ask the lady a few questions. She spits Italian at me so fast I just gave her a blank stare like I just might have crapped my pants. I run back to line and grab Ron to talk to her. After they start conversing I catch a phrase from her saying “you’re the wrong airport” and my heart drops, along with all the color in Ron’s face. This day is really starting off well. We spring outside to the taxi corner and tell the driver we need to make it to the other airport within 30 minuets and we will tip him extra if he does (in Italy you don’t tip cab drivers, waiters, etc. I love it) he says he will try and off we go.
About two miles into the trip I see him turn off the meter, I mention it to Ron, without a minuet hesitation Ron snaps on the guy asking him why he turned it off. Long story short the driver said “Because you asked me to hurry you have to pay 70 Euros” At that point I told him to pull the damn cab over and I’ll pay him 5 Euros for the trouble. But we stayed in the cab, we didn't really have a back up plan if we really got out of the cab. While I was threatening the cab driver if we didn’t make it there in time I wasn’t paying him a cent, he casually laughed at me and never looked back at me... Oh not to mention that Ron has zero cash on him and he was planning on paying me back when we got to London… Thank god I had enough on me because when we go to the airport we had 10 minuets before the plane left, the driver did his job. In two cab rides I’ve dropped 100 euro and we haven’t even made it to London yet!
We sprint towards the check in desk and notice that there is no line to check in, but the security line is huge, right away I gave up, I knew there was no way we were going to get in. Ron insisted we try so I let him have a go out at it. The lady behind the desk laughed at us and told us we missed the flight and there was nothing else we could do besides by another ticket. Ron and I with our heads held low and tails between our legs make our way to the customer help desk and asked how much a one way to London was and when the next flight was. The lady was a total sweet heart, and thank god for Ron’s sake, I’ve never missed a flight before, I just spent a ton of money, and I was grumpy from this morning… Not a good start to the day. Everything though worked it’s way out, the one way ticket was 70 euro, Ron paid for mine while taking all the responsibility of going to the wrong airport so this too helped me calm down quite a bit.
Finally at 3:00 PM we are on our flight heading to London. We arrived in the Gatwick airport in London around 5:40 PM and headed straight to the “London Eye”.
I didn’t know a lot about the history of London, I only really knew about Shakespeare, a little bit about the Parliament, and the London Bridge off of the top of my head. Speaking of that the famous “London Bridge” it is no longer in London… Dang thing is in Arizona, so that song growing up now makes so much more sense… that was dumb, but anyways….
The London Eye was amazing, you walk up to this ferry wheel type of machine and when it’s your turn, you walk from this plat form into this huge… bubble? And surrounding you is a pexy glass shield, there are little note cards stands placed throughout the bubble that explain different buildings as you go higher and higher.
My favorite thing I saw when we were at the peak was Parliament. The Big Ben and Parliament stood out more than anything else did in London without a doubt, I placed myself in the corner where the Parliament was wasn't ready to move any time soon.
After the London eye Ron and I made our way to his friends apartment where we jumped on the “tube”, going off track here for a second, I only wish that all metro or trains were called the tube! It was really funny saying I’m riding the tube, or meet you at the tube…. Just a little fun fact.
That night we were told we were going to one of the nicer clubs in London, so Ron and I threw on our party pants and hit the town, not going to lie we were looking good! The club was similar to most clubs in Europe, but you weren’t aloud to take pictures inside which I found kind of stange? That very night they had a few special guests hanging out in the back…. American Porn stars, it was really funny actually watching them pose for pictures and do little lame photo shoots (none of them were naked) but!! The club was fun we were all dancing for awhile and getting a good laugh out of the photo shoot going on behind us. After a few hours of that though Ron and I were spent from a long stress full day so we made our way back to the apartment with everyone around 3:30 AM and crashed square on the floor.
The next morning we woke up around 9:00 AM and were out the door with Kelsey, Alex, Ron and I around 10:30 AM. First that day we went to the Victoria and Albert museum (Albert is the main character in the Kings Speech) we spent around 2 1/2 hours there, We skipped more than half of it and explored in the modern art more than anything. There we saw Raphael’s art work. I was shocked at these paintings and art work, I've only seen pictures of this place and here it was the real deal right in front of me. I wasn’t suppose to take this picture but guess what… I did it!
After the museum we went to a well-known pub that serves the best fish n’ chips in London. It was the first time I’ve ever had fish n’ chips, and I won’t lie… I really liked it! It’s been a long time coming but I’m really coming around to liking fish, so this summer I’m busting my butt to start liking fish so I can work off this pasta gut that is slowly developing day by day. After we finished our Guinness and fish n’ chips we walked through a park and made our way to my girlfriend’s house. Buckingham Palace!
As we walked up to the golden gates we noticed that the flag was raised as high as it could go up the pole, meaning that the queen was inside, waiting for me to come pay her a visit! We took a few pictures and spent about 20-30 minuets walking around the gates and looking at the huge sculpture in front of the palace. The Buckingham Palace is awesome, hands down one of the coolest thing I saw in all of London.
We headed back to apartment to shower and get ready for dinner. Kelsey and Josh took Ron I to a sketchy ally where we were suppose to find some of the best Indian food in London. Josh started bargaining with some random dude at the corner to get a deal on dinner. We walked into an Indian restaurant and for 7 pounds each we had a great filling meal and two drinks of your choice! There’s a way to do that here in Rome, but we are at a disadvantage when you can't speak the language fluently; it's not even fun to try and and attempt it. but Josh nailed this dude to a deal like no other! Instead of going out that night we all decided to take it easy and head to one of the local pubs that was close by their apartment. Ron and I each had two beers and were about to fall head first onto the table we were so tired.
Next day around the same time from the morning before we head for Parliament, there we met up with Josh again for a grand tour. Josh works next door to the Parliament, and from their Josh took us on a “FREE” tour of the Parliament. Josh you did one hell of a job, not only did he take us on a tour of it all for free, he told us what really goes on in the court rooms, for his job he prepares speeches, writes arguments, etc for his boss. When it all comes down, his boss all argue in the Parliament office and do all their work in there. It’s to bad that they don’t let you take pictures inside the Parliament because the place was amazing!! It made me want to watch V for Vendetta one more time because of that!
After the Parliament we made our way to St. Paul's church. Again you weren't aloud to take pictures inside the building. It really is to bad because as you walk into the church you are blown away from all aspect in the room. You are surrounded by gold, sculptures, tombs, and thousands of people. We pay for a audio guide of the church and begin our journey. There are 5 main things you have to do when you go to St. Paul's 1) you walk around the main lobby area, here you see amazing paintings on the walls, paintings of all the saints that protect the church are painted in order to surround you, it makes you feel like you're always being watched. 2) You climb a flight of stairs and go to the "whispering hall" where you sit against a wall and you whisper anything you want into this tiny hole, and from more than 100 yards away if the other person is leaning against the wall they can hear what you are saying. 3) you climb more stairs and come outside, here you see a great deal of London and the buildings surrounding it. 4) you climb more stairs, and remember you have to come down still too, it was one hell of a work out. But you go to the top of St. Pauls' and from here you see double from what you just saw moments ago. 5) you return to the main lobby and head to the basement where Prince Albert himself is buried and his tomb rests high on a solid marble base. Before we left, I was able to catch the tail end of mass. I was the only catholic out of the group of friends I was with and asked them if we could just stay for a few more moments... Made me feel like a good Catholic!
After St. Pauls we head to a little sushi joint across the street to relax and get our legs back before we headed to the Globe Theater. At the Globe Theater you get to see the stage where Shakespeare himself once acted and directed his plays. We were lucky enough to watch the rehearsals of Hamlet; we were only able to watch I think five minutes of it. As we stood up to leave the Globe, I really didn’t want to leave, we were all ready to tell everyone to “piss off” so we could watch the rest of rehearsals but there was no way around it. Shortly after we left the theater, the guided showed us the way out. Sadly we were rushed out of the Globe.
After the Globe we jumped onto the TUBE (hehe) and make our way into the heart of the city once again. We walked down the street and through a few alleys before we came across a sign that read
That's right we went on a tour through Benjamin Franklin's house! We were so stoked thinking that this house was going to be massive or have all sorts of gadgets laying about... We were very mistaken. As you walk into the house they seat you in a tiny room to watch a 5 minuet video about Ben. From there you are escorted by a lady that is dressed up like they did in the days of Ben. This lady played a roll of Ben's best friend growing up and possibly his mistress, she took us room to room explain what happened in each room. But after I think it was third room, we all noticed how bad she hated her job and how miserable she was. Showing people empty rooms and watching short little clips a day had to get old after awhile. This tour took around 45 minuets and we were all starving once again! Ron and I asked Kelsey what the plans were for dinner and with a big smile she yelled "China Town". Finally! Food that isn't pasta or pizza, not to mention I miss Chinese food a lot!
After the show we once again went back to the apartment, being tired as hell, I bought Kelsey and their roommates a few bottles of wine for being amazing hosts to us and taking such care of us. That night we cracked a bottle open and before I even took a sip of the 8 pound bottle of wine, I was head nodding in a small awkward half circle red chair. After my chin smacked my chest I shot straight up, after realizing what I had done still half asleep, I realized how awkward the situation I just caused came about, I looked at everyone and then thanked everyone once again for everything and headed to bed.
The next morning Kelsey walked Ron and I to the Easy Bus stop, from there we said our final good-byes and sat on a tiny bus that took us for an hour bus ride to the airport. Ron and I made it on time, went through security like a glove and made it to our gate about 15 minuets early. This worked out perfect because on easy jet you get to pick your seats as you walk on to the plane. Ron and I placed ourselves on the back of the plane; I dove into my new book (run away jury by John Grisham, this being my 3rd book I’ve read by him since this fall).
As we landed in Rome there was a massive thunderstorm brewing and rain was slowly starting to trickle down. There was part of me that wanted to go back to London right away, I definitely could settle with a good job and live there for the rest of my life.
Next trip… Not sure yet!
Awesome story Chase!
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