Rule #1: Always have "London A-Z map"

Two 50+lb suitcases, one overweight carry-on, and a sleepless seven hour plane ride later I arrived safely in London on Thursday morning. After arriving at our hotel, the Arran House which is located in Bloomsbury right by the University of London, and pumping with excitement our professor sent us out into the city each with a partner and a tube stop location. Our mission: find the stop, walk around, and make it back to the hotel by 6pm (not using the same form of transportation we used to get there). Easy.

After purchasing a £5 mobile my partner and I were off to find the Tower Hill tube stop. When we arrived the first thing we saw across the street was the Tower of London. Excited to get a closer look we hurried across the street (after looking the wrong way for cars) and were immediately absorbed into a crowd of tourists. Fitting right in we pulled out our cameras and began taking photos of everything in sight. As we made our way around the Tower we saw the Tower Bridge coming into view. We crossed the bridge and whipped out our bus maps and began plotting our route back to the hotel.



No direct buses + rush hour traffic + two sleep deprived girls + lack of knowledge of London= a very difficult journey home (with 3 min to spare)


The next morning we took a boat ride down the Thames to Greenwich and got a very brief tour of many of the major London landmarks, it was kind of a reality check that we are in London. In Greenwich we walked up to the Royal Observatory and the History of Astronomy museum and of course took pictures straddling the prime meridian! We spent the remainder of the day on a group walking tour of our professor learning the history of Greenwich.

Although we had been walking all day I still had a lot of pent up energy and decided to go for a brief run. Long story short, the streets of London are a lot more difficult to navigate than those in Canton and my quick run took me on a 2 hour tour of the city. But I made it back safely with a map from the very nice concierge in hand.

I've had three very exhausting (but exciting) days, with plenty more to come and I can't wait! I absolutely love this city so far and am looking forward to really experiencing some of the things I love (music and dance especially). Most of our syllabus looks like it will history and culture based, so I'm sure I'll have a lot more to say as the days come. Until then..

xo.