Scavenger Hunt in the City

 have so much to tell about, I think I'm going to just do it by explaining each picture for now (seriously, I could practically write a novel about everything we just did today!). So, the first picture is our classroom/common room where we had orientation today. This basically consisted of meeting Sylvia, our cook, going over logistics, and learning all the house rules. We were given our Oyster Cards (Tube passes), signed up for meal duties, and Prof. Pitcher assigned us a scavenger hunt to do around the city.

The two pictures below are of our house from the back garden. I still can't believe I LIVE here!

The next 3 photos are of the views outside my window.

The first step on our scavenger hunt was to take the Tube to St. Paul's Cathedral. Riding the Tube was easy -- finding the Cathedral, however? Not so much. First we turned the wrong direction and headed towards this old building, which we thought was something important, but oddly enough the sign on the window said "The Dentist." I still don't quite understand...

Eventually we turned around and someone said, "Oh, duh, it's right over there!" Lo and behold, there it was, a gigantic building impossible to miss. We walked to it the back way and finally found the front to take our picture at, as assigned.

Next we walked to Millenium Bridge (as seen in Harry Potter!) and admired the River Thames for a little bit.

From there we promptly go ourselves lost on the way to Trafalgar Square. Or rather, we took the long way to get there and learned the hard way that "Subway" does not actually mean a subway -- it's an underground walkway, which I knew before, but got confused by the signs.

Regardless, we got a good walking tour of the city along the Thames.

This was an interesting curved building along a side street.

This was also an interesting building with a little friar dude on the front and a train running behind it.

Finally made it to Trafalgar Square. It was pretty, but there wasn't much to it. Mostly a couple big fountains and a big statue thing and a lot of tourists.

Our next stop was Big Ben and Westminster Abbey (which are right next to each other. On the way there, we fon this interesting Women of WWII memorial in the middle of the street.

...And the London Eye, which I probably won't ride since I hear it's about 20 pounds to go on. It's pretty to look at though, and admire from afar.

And the infamous Big Ben tower. I'm going back sometime later this week to look at it some more. We didn't spend too much time here, but it was absolutely beautiful.

Across the street was Westminster Abbey. This place, too, was crowded with tourists, but right beside it in the courtyard was St. Margaret's Cathedral, a smaller (relatively speaking!) church that very few people seemed to notice.

I didn't take any pictures inside it, as that seemed highly inappropriate in such an obviously sacred place. There were a few tourists inside, but it was incredibly quiet, and aglow with candles and stained glass windows. There were tombs inside with people buried all the way back from the 1600s.

After a little while, we continued on to Buckingham Palace. By now it was getting late and we were all getting pretty tired. I didn't really get any good pictures of the palace, but again, I plan on returning there to see it again now that I know generally where everything is.

We rode the Tube to Piccadilly Circus (London's version of Times Square) just as the sun was beginning to set around 4:30. We decided we'd have to forego our last stop, all the way up on Oxford Street in order to make it back to dinner in time by 5pm. Back on the Tube, we rode home and then had an amazing dinner of lamb, roast potatoes, veggies, and Yorkshire Pudding (which is nothing like it sounds -- it's kind of like a light flaky biscuit!).

So that was my day in a nutshell! It's getting late here so I'm going to peace out for now.

Cheers!