London long weekend!

You guys will all be so proud of me haha.

Not boasting or anything, but i'm just really surprised at myself, even though i've only been here a few weeks i can already feel myself growing more independent :P haha.

Over the long weekend Nick, Natasha, Elle and me headed down to London. Before we left I booked our train tickets down to London, found really cheap tickets (£7.90 x 2 for two single tickets), normally if you buy it on the spot it's like £30+ single!! So i was really proud about that :) Called up the taxi company to get us to the station nice and early at 6:15am! (okay i know this doesn't sound all that big and independent right now..but I promise you it sure was stressful and daunting when you have no idea what to do!). I also booked our accommodation, 2 nights at YHA Central London, so i found that online and it was cheap for london (£25 a night)..could have got it cheaper..but we left it a bit too late..so the only room left was a private 4 bedroom ensuite!!! but that's still cheap for London! the youth hostel was actually really really really nice! better than the motel's I've stayed at back home!!!

So on top of booking transport and accommodation all by myself (with the help of Natasha and NIck's credit card..and we're just going to ignore the slight mishap of me double booking the accommodation and paying an extra £200...........which we did get back 100% when we arrived!! so all is good) i also am pretty pro at catching the underground now :D!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (funny how i figure out the England transport system faster than i do the Australian one :P )

Saturday:

When we arrived at Liverpool St station we all got oyster cards, and we really had no idea what we were going to do, no planned itinery or anything..whcih admittedly was a bit stressful. But it was all good, we caught the tube down to westminster, and as we walked straight out of the station there in front of us was the Big Ben! Which was pretty cool. (haha funny story, when i was younger and I visited London with Rachel and Dad, we were on a bus and Dad was like 'oohh coming up is the Big Ben!'..now i heard him say 'big BEND' and so i was full getting ready on the bus to play like dead people (ya know when you let your body go limp...otherwise known as 'corners') by which time i actually missed the 'Big BEN'..) but ANYWAY got to see the Big Ben a lot easier this time. Headed down to Westminster abbey, Parliament House, took heaps of pictures in Parliament Square which was really pretty. We then headed down to Parliament House to take more pictures, saw the Queens Gallery (Nick and me didn't actually go in..we couldn't bb to pay the fee! and i had a funny feeling I had already been there 2 years ago when i visited London....it's quite funny, it was only as we were seeing the sites that i remembered i had already seen all of this with my family!! but it was good to see them again, esp since the sites WERE free, and it has refreshed my memory :) ). We then headed down to Trafalgar Square and saw the National Art Gallery where we bumped into one of the achers and her son from back at school! Then went to the YHA....

Sunday:

anyway the next day we saw Tower of London, London Bridge (which is a really crummy old bridge..the really big pretty bridge isn't in fact the lonodn bridge! but we all think itis..but i'm ont quite sure waht that pretty bridge is called..), london eye..and we saw all those sights in the snow!!!!!!!!!! it started snowing on us which was really exciting! haha i love the snow. first time snow has actually FALLEN down on me..if that makes sense. haha but yes..it WAS FREEZING.

and in the evening Nick and me when to Holy Trinity Brompton, which i'm pretty sure is the chruch that Mum and Rachel were talkinga bout two y ears ago when we were here!!! when we met up with Mel Hsu....................but anyway the chruch was really goood! they have a full on book store underneath and stuff...worship was great, haha lotsa brooke fraser..woot. haha. or more accurately, hillsong but brooke fraser's stuff. I was pretty worried about how on earth we were going to get there, and again my independent boost kinda flicked on when nick and me had to find our way to south kensington, and then walk to the church before it got dark, in the freezing cold and snow! but we got there fine, and so there was another good feeling of accomplishment. we went to the 5pm service, and Nick loved it so much (i think he really missed his worship) he wanted to stay till 7pm..but i was feeling relaly bad, i had a really bad headache (yes mum - it's been my first headache in AGES ie, since I got to England..and i think it was just tension headache..cause off carrying around my backpack everywhere).

Monday:

last day in London, woke up to SNOW SNOW SNOW SNOW SNOW. it was soo cool!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3-5inch snow EVERYWHERE! haha. so we decided to go shopping at oxford st? but alas ALL THE SOHPS WERE CLOSED!!! okay, a tad bit of an exaggeration, but most were because apparnetly none of the buses were working cause of teh snow, and some underground railines were closed, and on liverpool st station all the trains were delayred! but some were still open, and i managed to buy ONE thing..which is a surprise. haha iw ill upload a photo of it for you guys later.

It was quite stressful trying to get the train back to Ipswich. The train was supposed to leave at 3pm, an we arrived at Liverpool St station with like 8 minutes to go. I was the only one who hadn't caught a trainf rom Liverpool St station back to Ipswich, but even so the others still had no idea what was going on. So I was kinda freaking out (as I do) and so I tried to ask the ticket lady why our platform number wasn't displayed on the big screen? She wasn't much of a help, didn't bother explaining to me the system (casue we had NO idea what to do). Anyway I FINALLY figured out that pretty much all the trains were delayed, hence it didn't matter which train we caught, we just had to catch the next Norwich train, which explained why the station was at a stand still. I should have took a picture, everyone was just standing int he middle of the station, standing frozen staring at the big screens that displayed the train times and stuff. It took us a while to figure out why they wre staring there, and why suddenly, all of a sudden at the same time, big masses of pepole would start moving in the same direction. Tuirns out you have to stand there, wait for them to display what platform number your train is on, and everyone has to no joke run to catch the train to make sure they get a seat (becuase since all the trains are delayed....everyones just trying to grab wahtever train they can to get to their stop). It was soo chaotic, all because of the snow. So whilst us gaps were frolicking around in the snow and taking pictures with all the snow, the rest of London was inwardly groaning because they knew the transport difficulties that would arise.

Anyway we ifnally arrived back home, by which time i immediately threw off my wet socks and jeans and jumped into a nice hot shower!!

Interesting facts that made me realise how much of a tight ass/dag/like my dad i am:

- I was no joke so SKIMP with my money, i bought £1 walkers crisps (6 packets) £1 bag of 6 apples, and £2 box of cheerios that lasted me the whole weekend!!!! so I was soo looking forward to lunch today, which was my first proper cooked meal since Friday! and it was roast too..yumm..with yorkshire pudding :P

- haha i also bought a small bottle of milk to have with my cheerios, i felt like the biggest bogan, i would take handfuls of cheerios and a gulps of milk, slush it all around - and that would be my breakfast haha. But aynway, to keep my milk nice and cold (cause it was so warm, central heating, in ou room) i kept the milk outside on the window ledge. haha. it's funny, before i would laugh at my dad for doing things like that...shows how much you're like your parents ay?

- Friday night before we left I stole a loaf of bread from the staffroom and made a whole heap of peanut butter and cheese (Separate..not together) sandwiches for the train trip down. haha.

- (this is just for my parents) - Yes, i did wear my sexy money belt ALL the time (containing my passport and cash), despite the fact that we were staying in a PRIVATE room!

- i've officially been dubbed as the 'organised' one by Nick and Elle..which makes me laugh. haha. Nick was like "I need your help booking my flight to SA." and i'm like "WHAT?! i've never booked a flight ticket in my life!!!" haha. and he's like "but you're smart at this stuff" so hear that guys? guess i'm supposed to be full travel smart and independent now :P