17 hours of Travel

Time flies when you are sitting on a train for 4 hours on your way home from a lovely weekend in London, England.

This past Easter weekend, my friend Whitney and I traveled to London to visit our other friend Megan. We left Friday morning to catch a plane out of Perugia. The train travel wasn't horrible...no creepy Italians asking us to put eye-drops in for them (if you haven't heard of this story yet...ask me later.) However, when we arrived in the train station, we had to then find the airport...which we had heard...is in the middle of a corn-field (holler out to Indiana.) Anyways, after 20 min. of searching we caught a cab and headed to the airport.

At the airport, we got through security okay, and then awaited our take-off time. Nothing too exciting happened during this time, and soon boarded our plane....2 hours later....we landed in London, and had to wait to catch a bus to Liverpool Street. waiting.....waiting...waiting...and finally jumped on the bus and drove an hour. When we arrived Meg was waiting for us at the Tube Station and we got on to head to her flat.

When we got to her flat, we met some of her roommates and then we were told that we were living immediately because the show we were going to go see, Spamalot, was all the way across town and we were going to be late! So we departed ASAP and LITERALLY ran through London...we Whitney was in heals and I was in flats that barely stayed on my feet...and we were running through London. When we finally got to the theater, we found out that our seats were on the 3rd floor and there was no elevator...great...so when I got to my seat...I was fanning myself with my ticket stub. The show was amazing though and we had so much fun.

The next morning we did a whirl wind tour of London and all the touristy sights...they go as follows: Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, House of Parliament, the Themes River, The Globe Theater, St. Peter's Cathedral (from Mary Poppins), London Bridge, the Tower Bridge, the palace where the crown jewels are kept and finally Kings Cross Station where Platform 9 3/4 is accessible. After that tour we went back to Meg's flat and ate Chinese food and then hit the town...

Easter was a wonderfully memorable day. It snowed hard core all day long and so our trip to a small church was almost more that we could handle. But we got there and sat among 8 other people. The smallest church service I have ever been too....and this was on Easter. But it was great all the same. We left church and headed to find Abbey Road and imitate the famous walk of the Beatles. Good thing that it was so terribly cold and I froze in my capri pants. But we got the pictures and then...came back to Meg's...changed...and then went to Hyde Park to see the Peter Pan statue, Princess Di's old house and the Price Albert memorial. Soon we came home and rested because Monday....well...read below.

Our Monday began at 1 am...because we didn't go to sleep. We caught a taxi to Liverpool station, got our bus back to the London airport. Hung out there for about 2 hours...not sleeping...because it was so noisy, and then boarded our plane at 6:10 am. Now...you know you are tired when you are sitting in your seat...while people are still boarding the plane....fall asleep...and you wake up...look out the window...and you are mid-air. Slept through escape instructions, learning how to buckle my seat belt, and take-off. Anyways, we flew into Rome and then got train tickets for the 12:15 train to Macerata. Hung out in the Termini for a while...ate some McDonalds...and then had a 5 hour trip home, boarding and unboarding different trains until we finally got home at 6:30 pm Monday night.

One of my favorite weekends here in Europe and one of the most tiring...

I leave for Roma tomorrow morning at 6 am....I'm feeling another "London Weekend"...miss you all and can't wait to come home in 12 days!

Love,
Audrey