London!! 

Once again I found myself in such a surreal situation, hanging out in one of the most famous cities in the entire world! Filled with delicious foods, great accents, and a high exchange rate, all of my favorite things! So, my first spring break has come and gone, we had 10 days off so Keliana, Belinda, Marielle, and I planned a trip to London, Wales and Ireland. We arrived in London late on Thursday night, exhausted from traveling we passed out as soon as we could.  In the morning we were determined to start our London adventures right with a proper English breakfast, pictured below.  The waitress also gave us fresh croissants and some delicious coffee, it was probably the best breakfast I've ever had.  

Then we were off to the Tower of London, we had decided that day that we were going to go to all of the big tourist sites that we figured were must sees.  And while all of the places we went were pretty cool, it was by no means cheap...  The Tower of London is a historic castle and has served many different purposes throughout history.  It was where royalty lived, a prison, an armory, all kinds of stuff.  We toured through the different sections of the castle but I think my favorite part was when we saw the crowned jewels.  We weren't allowed to take pictures and the crown below is a crown with all of its jewels removed, I grabbed this picture secretly hah.  There was a whole section with a moving walkway that showed the crowned jewels, it was mind blowing, seriously.  I can't believe how many jewels these people wore on their freaking heads!! Also another impressive piece was a massive punch bowl made completely of gold with some insane carvings.

One of the most interesting things I learned about the castle was that kings used to keep wild animals in their castles to prove how powerful they were.  They had bears, monkeys, snakes, tigers, lions, everything.  Having exotic animals not only proved to other royalty that they were powerful but also to the common people these animals were so foreign that it made the Kings seem almost godly.  It also said that there were often mishaps with the animals getting out and people getting killed. Below is a picture of Belinda and Marielle in an animal cage hah.

London, London Bridge

Next we headed over to the London Eye, another serious expense but being the largest ferris wheel in the world we figured it was a must.  I actually really enjoyed it, we had a leisurely ride and gradually got to see the whole city, obviously it is enormous.  A lot of times when I see cities in the aerial view you can see where the city stops... that wasn't really the case with London.  Also this bagpiper was randomly playing on the bridge, it was a nice shot haha. 

Me on the London Eye 

 We then passed by Big Ben, another amazing thing to actually see in person, just because it is such a recognizable monument. We chilled in a park with a view of Big Ben for a little while and just took it all in.  Then we found a London telephone booth so we could get stereotypical London pictures :)  We had planned to go to Westminster Abbey which is where a lot of famous peoples tombs are located but it closed early that day, so we missed out.  

Instead we went and did the next best thing, got Fish and Chips!! We went to SoHo because Keliana found a place that was supposed to have the best fish and chips, and dear god was it delicious!! I don't really eat fish, but I'm trying to break that habit and I loved the fish and chips! After that we wandered around SoHo but it was getting late so we went back to the hostile to chill and then headed out to a pub for a couple beers and some cider.  In both London and Ireland cider is a popular drink a lot of the pubs, it was pretty tasty! 

The next day we decided that we should do some less expensive activities because we felt so robbed from the day before.  So, we ended up going to several different spots all over the city and wandering around the streets.  First we headed to Portobello Markets which was a couple streets filled with tons of booths and tents, people were selling all kinds of random things.  Even though it was a market a lot of the stuff was still really expensive, I didn't end up buying anything but it was cool looking at what people had to offer. 

I took the picture above for my father, and the picture below for my mother :)

Then we decided to head over to Abbey Road, where the famous Beatles picture was taken that's on the cover of their album Abbey Road.  It was just a regular crosswalk and further down the road was Abbey Road studios.  The wall outside of the studio was covered lyrics and words from fans who had visited the Beatles site.  

We then decided that we wanted to get tea and scones, so we found an awesome little cafe with some great stuff.  Check out the size of those English Muffins!! I was freaking out, I should have gotten one of those but I wanted a scone instead. 

Cool London architecture!  

After wandering more we stumbled upon the Sherlock Holmes Museum and shop, we just went in the shop but it was a cool little place!  After that we headed over to Oxford street which just ended up being this massive high end shopping area which reminded me of Time Square in New York.  Not really the place we wanted to be, being so money conscious and all.  That night we got Indian for dinner (it was delicious) and then went to Camden Street which is a street with a lot of cool clubs and bars.  We went to the club/bar mix called the Monarch where we danced to old soundtrack music the entire night, which was a refreshing change from the same 10 party songs they play in Sevilla.  It was a fun night!!

In the morning before we left, we stopped by Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guards ceremony.  Turned out the ceremony wasn't going on that day, lovely.  So we walked around enjoyed a last little bit of London and then got on the train to go to Wales! 

Wales :)
So, the whole reason we found ourselves in Wales was because Keliana's step grandparents live there.  She had told them when she studied abroad that she would visit them and decided to bring us along as well!  Wales was absolutely amazing, probably one of my favorite places we've been so far.  I think a big reason was because it wasn't a city!  I am by no means a city girl and I've only been traveling to cities, so it was nice to be in a calm place with a little nature!

Her grandparents live in a tiny town called Fairbourne, the town only has 4 stores in it and after we arrived we walked around the whole thing in about 15 minutes.  It was gorgeous though, one side you had mountains covered with sheep and the other side you had the ocean.  

Another huge plus to staying with her grandparents were HOMECOOKED MEALS! Oh my god, they were so amazing!  One night we had a roast chicken and the other night we had salmon.  Above is a picture of us at the dinner table getting ready to eat our dessert, a delicious creamy raspberry roll thing.  We called her grandparents Nain and Taid which is Welsh for grandma and grandpa, they are both originally from England and were so sweet!  

Sooooo gooood!!

Since Fairbourne is so tiny we took a train 10 minutes to the town over called Barmouth. It was a little port town filled with cool shops and restaurants, the weather was kind of overcast but we still had a good time wandering around because the town was so cute!

These things were awesome

Port town church

Seagull posing for me

Bridge for the train over to Barmouth

There were a copule of massive jelly fish that had washed up on the shore, they were pretty cool.

This little circle hut thing was once the town's jail, but it said that since there wasn't too much crime they often used it as a place to put people who were too drunk until they sobered up, haha!

Nain and Taid had told us about a quarry that was up the mountain a little bit and after our trip to Barmouth we decided we would hike up there.  Since the weather wasn't great Keliana and Belinda decided to stay at the house and relax but Marielle and I were so hungry for some nature that we went. We walked up to the quarry, freaking out the entire way because it was so beautiful! Once we got there we saw that the mountain continued to go up but was sectioned off by barbed wire.  I really wanted to get near some sheep and when we conveniently found a bench that allowed you to easily step over the wire, there was no holding us back.  

Here is Marielle on a bed of moss, it was more comfortable than any hostel we've stayed in. We almost slept there for the night. 

We pretty much walked up as high as we could, it was so amazing that we couldn't stop! Marielle and I were so giddy, we were running around and laughing and freaking out.  Above is a picture of Marielle taking in the view on the verge of tears, yeah it was that intense. 

Since it was spring there were tons of baby lambs!! So cute.  Here are two with there mom on the mountain, the town of Fairbourne in the background. 

Here we are on a broken town stone house thing. 

The view!! In the picture below you can see Fairbourne, and in the distance where the water dips in is Barmouth. As we were going up I took probably 7 videos.  Whenever I see a super impressive sight I take a video, and obviously I was loving every second of our hike and thought it was video worthy the higher up we got.

We walked as high as we could get but as we were walking we started to hear a strange whistle from time to time.  We got nervous that it was a farmer that had spotted us and was telling us to leave or something.  Then we got the idea that he might shoot us, so after taking the view in one more time we headed back down. 

Before we walked back for dinner we decided to climb a tree, might as well since we never get to anywhere else. 

Cool houses on the walk back to the house.

That night we decided to bake chocolate chip cookies.  We don't get to bake anything in Spain because our oven doesn't work.  Also Nain and Taid had never had chocolate chip cookies, they were delicious!! Here's a picture of Belinda being domestic. 

At 7 am the next morning we left to go to Dublin! More soon to come!