Our first student blogger is Mindi!
Hello there! My name is Mindi and I am a junior at The College of St. Scholastica. I am studying Business Management with a Theatre Minor. I grew up in Tower, MN but I was the last class to graduate from Babbitt-Embarrass. I chose to go on this J-term for a couple of reasons. I love traveling with a passion and I never want to miss an opportunity to experience something new! I also wanted to go on this trip because there is so much history here: plagues, fires, royalty and fashion.
For our first day we had a full day of adventures! My room (The QUAD) missed breakfast because our trusty alarm was not so trusty. We got ready in 15 minutes and I must say we were quite good looking for our rushed morning. We had a bus tour lined up to see the city of London. Our guide's name, who we will see again, was Eleanor Jackson and our bus driver's name was Darren. On the tour Darren was a bit naughty and did an illegal maneuver to turn our bus around. We have not been here very long and we already were breaking the law! We saw many things on our tour. We saw Westminster Abbey, St. Paul's Cathedral, Hyde Park, Green Park, Buckingham Palace, West End, London Bridge (it didn't fall down), Parliament, and Big Ben.
We didn't tour inside these monuments but we were outside of them and now we know where they are so we can visit them on our own time. We did go inside the Museum of London for a couple of hours. It was pretty much dealing with the entire history of the city of London from the beginning all the way up to the Olympics. I really enjoyed learning about the fire that claimed a large portion of the city because the King's bakery started on fire. It burnt for 5 whole days. I also really enjoyed learning about London during World War 2. They had movies with eyewitness accounts. You can read about all these things in a book but to be in that interactive environment made it more real for me.
After the museum we went to eat at a restaurant called "Canteen". My three course meal consisted of: Mushroom Soup and Soda Bread, Steak and chips, and Bread Pudding. I enjoyed the Mushroom Soup despite the look of it. It was brown with little chunks in it. The steak and chips were delicious!! The steak was so juicy and the chips were awesome! The bread pudding was my least favorite part of the meal. I'm not a dessert person to start with and then to add such a uniquely flavored dessert was too much for my northern Minnesotan palate. It was a crisp breading on the outside with a soft, mushy lemony (very lemony) inside with caramel ice cream on top. It was such a different blend of flavors and awkward texture. I would say try it if you get the chance because I'm sure if you are a dessert person you may like it. I just was not fond of that portion of the meal.
The night ended with a group of us walking to the Thames River and just looking around then taking the Tube ("Chewb" in London Lingo) back to our hotel by ourselves. It was a busy day but it is such an amazing experience I wouldn't change it for the world!! I will continue to try new things and take advantage of being here!!
I'm really glad you touched on the fire of 1666 (such an ironic year) in your blog post, Mindi. Although we were rather tired while walking through the museum, I'm glad that we managed to keep our experience there interesting :)
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