Back to School...

Day 3: University of Oxford!! 

In front of the main door to the University of Oxford!! 

The University of Oxford is THE oldest surviving university of the English-Speaking world! How amazing is that?!? When discussing with Heather our trip, I begged her to let me visit Oxford, because my love of education and colleges has never left me. We entered Oxford and went straight to our hostel. 


Staying in hostels was interesting. For the majority, the hostels were reasonably clean and very well priced. The only negative to staying in hostels is that it is almost a guarantee that you will be woken up in the night by your roommates. Some people would stay out till the bars closed, then barge in at 2am, waking everyone up. But, for only about 8 pounds a night, you can't complain. Here was our hostel in Oxford, which was very nice. 

I dropped my stuff out, and immediately headed out into the city!! I was beyond excited to see Oxford!! To explain the city a little bit, the University of Oxford is split into 17 (!) different colleges, all around Oxford. So while walking down a street, you all of a sudden find one of the departments! 

This was the entrance to the Oxford Castle, which was amazing! 

To the right was my hostel, to the left was the city. In the middle, was adorable-ness.

Look closely. The name was a little familiar :)

My first department I found was the history department! Lucky!

This is one of the main entrances into the University of Oxford! 

How beautiful! Can you imagine going to school here?!

Just to give you an idea of some of the brains and talents that have attended the University of Oxford: 

Authors: C.S. Lewis, J. R. Tolkein, Percy Shelley (!), Lewis Carroll, and Oscar Wilde

Economists & Philosophers: John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Adam Smith

Scientists: Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins, Tim Berners-Lee

Actors: Hugh Grant, Kate Beckinsale

This was the English Department. Of course I would find the two departments that I would be involved in if I went to Oxford.

A beautiful church in the middle of town

This was the Queen's College. By far the nicest building in Town, as it should be ;)

One of my favorite buildings: The Museum of Oxford. Very interesting, and made me want to apply for a janitor job just so I could stay in the building. 

My favorite building of the town: of course, the library

There were so many books!!!

From here, I decided to trespass into some dorms so I could visualize my dream life attending Oxford. 

This is the entrance to one of the dorms. Note that tiny white sign in front: it says, Do not enter unless student with ID. oops...

"I am in the dorms of the University of Oxford!"

Students live HERE!! 

Can you believe it? 

Their cute little courtyard. 

VERY happy to pretend I was a student for the day!

I felt smarter the minute I left Oxford. :)

Not just rocks...

If you click on ANY of the photos, you can enlarge them :)

Stonehenge!!

Although I received quite a few comments that Stonehenge was uneventful or under-stimulating, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see Stonehenge myself. There is a cute travel bus that picks you up directly from Bath, and takes you to Stonehenge. The drive is about an hour, then they give you an hour at Stonehenge, then an hour back. 

Stonehenge is one of the most famous sites in the world, and literally in the middle of nowhere. All surrounding the rocks are sheep and beautiful pastures of local farmers. I am sure most of you have seen pictures of Stonehenge, but there is nothing like seeing it in person. As a future history teacher, words can't describe how fascinating seeing the rocks were in real life. 

Who wouldn't want to hold history in their hands? :)

Archaeologists believe that the stones were erected around 2500 BC!! Along with the rocks, there are burial mounds all around the stones, where the Celtics were buried centuries back. Also, the mystery behind some of the crop circles are formed close to Stonehenge. The crop circles apparently formed in under 30 minutes, and are still (although heavily debated) unknown about their origin. 

It was very cold at the location, mainly because it is in the middle of nowhere with flat plains surrounding it. But definitely worth a couple frozen fingers. 

Another awesome part of the trip, which unfortunately I wasn't able to get a picture of, was the Westbury White Horse. Here is a picture I found online of it: 

See the horse off in the distance? That horse is a hill figure said to have been there for centuries. A white horse was a standard image for the Saxons during the Dark Ages, as well as a heraldic symbol associated with the British Royal Family. The eye of the horse alone can fit 20 people into it. There are 4 other chalk hill carvings surrounded England. The view of the horse is seen on the freeway on the way to Stonehenge!

How pure and majestic is this view? Amazing....

Needless to say, my journey to Stonehenge was wonderful. Believe me when I say, they are just not rocks....

This week in slow motion...

Well folks, I am back! (clarification: back to London, England)  Instead of wrapping my whole trip into one post, I thought I would take you through city by city, and experience it fully with tons of pictures :)

On Saturday morning I took off for Bath, England. Bath is about 2 hours west of central London, and is one of the most ancient cities in England. At the heart of Bath lay the remains of the oldest Roman Baths in the world. The bath was used by Roman nearly 2000 years ago, and was the temple of Minerva. The city itself is very English, with beautiful buildings everywhere. The day consisted of seeing the whole city, and we stayed in a hostel for the night. Technically, we saw Stonehenge on the same day, as it is about an hour drive away from Bath. But for posts sake, I will save that for the next one. Bath is too pretty to simplify it for you. 

This is Bath Abbey, a church founded in the 7th century! 

Another view of Bath Abbey. The church is massive, and has great gothic features. 

This is the Pulteney Bridge and the Weir. The view here was breathtaking. 

Bath is full of tiny alleys and walkways for people to walk down. Being a major tourist attraction, there are tons of little shops and sites down every walkway. 

This is called the Royal Crescent, which has over 30 residential houses. The crescent was built in 1764, and is said to be the best depiction of Georgian architecture in England. 

 I was very excited to find a Charles Dickens statue. :)

From here, we went into the location of the Roman Baths. The Bath are a Heritage Site of England, and were amazing. Never before have I been able to picture so vividly the life of the Romans during this time. They considered the Baths to be spiritual, and had certain baths designed simply for their gods. Other baths were used to cleanse themselves, and be rejuvenated in their faith. 

This is the Sacred Spring, in the very heart of the Roman Bath site. The spring is the only hot spring in England. It holds more than a million litres of naturally hot water that have been bubbling up from underground for several centuries. 

Here I am trying the mineral water from the actual spring itself! It was gross water, but I certainly felt rejuvenated afterwards :)

The Pump Room, which is a resturant that overlooks the Roman Baths were quite pretty as well. After drinking the mineral water, I felt... well.. pumped! 

Bath was amazing, and not to underplay any of the other cities, I believe it was my favorite city that I visited this week. The sites and history involved with Bath is incredible, and the Roman Baths were splendid. 

Tomorrow's Post: Stonehenge!!

On the lookout...

Well folks, half-term break is here!! Although I really do like being in the school, I am SO ready for a break! Private schools run 8-5 here, so about everyday I get home at 5:30 and have just enough time to finish the lesson  plans, eat dinner, and crash before the next day comes around.

This week is going to be amazing! Here is my schedule:

Saturday-
*Early train to Bath, England
*Tour bus to Stonehenge and back to Bath
*Sightseeing Bath and staying overnight

Sunday-
*Train to Oxford
*Trip to Windsor Castle
*Stay overnight at Oxford University

Monday-
*Head to Liverpool
*Liverpool Sightseeing for the day

Tuesday-
*Flight to Dublin, Ireland
*Dublin sightseeing for the day

Wednesday-
*Dublin, Ireland all day!

Thursday-
*Sightseeing
*Flight to London
*The Lion King play

Friday, Saturday, Sunday-
*Relaxing, preparing for the next 5 weeks, and planning my trip with my Dad

I will have limited internet access while traveling, but I will post TONS of pictures when I get back of all the lovely cities, I promise. Stay safe, and I will talk to you soon~

Jamie- 0, Food Poisoning- 1

Another great day in London this saturday! We went to the Tower of London, which was amazing! The Tower of London was built in 1097, and serves as a royal residence, armoury, treasury, and as a prison. 

This nice bloke (man) was our travel guide. They are officially called Yeoman Warders. Their official job is to look after any prisoners of the tower, as well as protect the Crown Jewels. Today they are more likely to be tour guides through the Tower. 

Their nickname is "Beefeaters." This nickname originated because up to the 1880's, their salary was paid in chunks of beef.

This is the traitor's gate, which was used for the entrance for all prisoners here at the Tower of London. The moat surrounding the Tower would meet up with the Thames River, where the boats would bring in the prisoners here to this gate. Sir Thomas More was brought through this gate!

In one of my history classes at school, we are learning about the two Princes who disappeared at the Tower. They were brought here by their uncle, as the eldest would soon become king. However, they were last seen playing in the garden, and were never seen alive again. Hundreds of years later, workers found the remains of 2 young boys, and it is said that their uncle had them killed so that he could become (and did) King of England... Creepy!

Here is one of the 9 ravens held at the Tower of London. It is said that if the ravens ever leave the Tower of London, the kingdom will fall. They are supposed to have 6 at all times, and there are 3 extra right now. They just wander the area, but in the above pictures you can see their houses. 

Here were the Crown Jewels! Among all the beautiful jewels, this building holds the world's biggest diamond, the Sceptre with the Cross from 1660. 

They have a guard watching the Crown Jewels at all times!

You can walk the walls of the Tower, which give a great view of the Tower Bridge!

From here we went on to St. Paul's Cathedral, and walked up the 500 steps to the Golden Gallery at the very top of the Cathedral. Unfortunately for me, I had just eaten some food that was not settling well. As soon as we arrived to the church, I was feeling sick. I managed my way up to to the top, but on the way down starting to fell really bad. We took a break at a coffee shop. 

We then walked to Shakespeare Globe (!) which was amazing. Shakespeare's Globe is dedicated to his type of theatre. It is an open arena, just like the theatres during the Elizabethan Period. The poor would get standing tickets, and the rich would get their own boxes for the play. It was common for the actors to get things thrown at them if they weren't doing well, especially tomatoes or apples. Shakespeare's Globe was beautiful! Since I wasn't feeling well, Heather took most of the pictures for me. I will try to steal some from her (yet again) to show you all. :)

However, at this point I was quite sick. I had manged about 2 hours of walking around, but just couldn't take it anymore. We slowly made our way back to the train station. However, with the bumpy train ride, I only made it about 3 minutes before getting sick on the train. I had managed to get sick 3 more times before making it to my room, where I collapsed. My host family thinks I got food poisoning from the Tuna I had for lunch. They said seafood is really easy to spoil quickly, and they think I had food poisoning from it. 

I made it through the night, but woke up a lot in pain. I slept for quite some time. Today, I feel like I ran a marathon, and I have been really sore and achy. But, the stomach pains are gone, and I think I will be fine by tomorrow.  I think I will be staying away from Seafood for awhile now though!