House of Lords

I'm a very lucky lady. I had the most wonderful opportunity to actually get a tour and eat in the house of lords! As part of my internship, we were invited to dine at the house of lords with the very gracious Lord Fraser who just so happens to also be a president for the charity I have been interning at. Working at Attend.org.uk has been a wonderful experience and by far one of the best parts of my abroad experience. I have learned so much about the culture. BUT ANYWAY back to the fantastic trip to the house of Lords. We weren't allowed to take pictures but of course that didn't stop yours truly.

The hall was beautiful it reminded me of the ceiling from harry potter

The ceiling beams are just so gorgeous

Here is in fact the house of lords 

Fun fact I learned is that the house of lords is red so wherever you go the seats and details are red, but once you go to the house of commons everything is green. So remember house of lords red, house of commons green.

After the visit we took a photo outside with Lord Fraser from left, Ryan, Cam, Lord Fraser, Ewart and I

The Attend Gang From left Me, Cam, Ewart, and Ryan

Of course an embarrassing cold selfie with Big Ben

Taking the Bus

After our lunch we decided to go enjoy the bumper cars across the thames river since were weren't needed back at the office there was a great arcade and bumper cars next to the London Eye.

Madrid

We arrived in Madrid in late afternoon. I slept most of the rainy train ride, though I did enjoy watching the Iron Lady in Spanish for a bit, and writing out postcard to some loved ones. Once in Madrid we found our way to some paella, because honestly Sarah and I became addicted because it is the most amazing meal. It is salty and a little spicy and delicious. We met a lovely canadian and spanish couple. The spaniard he met his wife when he was studying in canada. She still hasn't learned spanish but they still come to spain every now and then. I really would love to have that life, marry a spaniard and get to come to spain every year or couple of years. I really have fallen in love with Spain, the food, the dancing and music, and the naps! There really is so much to love. After lunch we checked in at our hostel which really wasn't the best but had a nice location right next to the palace. Katie Adrian then came to meet up with us and we got churros and hot chocolate to dip it in. Then we went to look at the market and Katie showed us around a bit of Madrid she likes. We then met up with some friends in her program, and had some drinks. The next day Sarah and I went walking around Madrid we got breakfast and I had the torrtia which is basically a spanish omelette which was very delicious. Sarah got the fried potato which came in this really delicious sauce that tasted like the sauce paella comes in. We tired to go to a couple of museum but found them to be rather expensive. We went through the park. It was unfortunately raining but it was still lovely to walk around and see the arch! For lunch around 2pm we met up with my friend Diana. We walked around Madrid with her as well and got Churros at this famous place. It was VERYYY delicious best churros diped in chocolate I've had in my entire life. Then we went to the museum saw Picasso's famous painting called the Guernica. It was magnificent. I really have a new appreciation for Picasso and for Dali. I enjoy their artwork. After the museum we got more paella and sangria for dinner. We took a nap then took our plane back home to very cold not so sunny London.

Alicante

Alicante was wonderful. Sarah and I arrived by train the first day. We were a little disheartened when was saw that it was raining, but we soldiered on. The bed and breakfast said that we would be able to a bus easily from the train station, but we couldn't even find a bus stop. So we decided to walk there because Alicante isn't too big of a city it is very easy to walk through it. We got a great deal on meal which was three courses and a glass of wine for only 9 euros. I got a kind of fish soup, which reminded me a little of noodle and manhattan clam chowder. It was really delicious. I then had steak and chips. I had a delicious red wine. We had flan for desert which was very good. After lunch we made our way to the bed and breakfast which was right next to a beautiful church and across from a museum. Even in the rain, Alicante was a gorgeous city. The buildings are brightly colored. They are yellow, pink, orange, many colors of the sunset. Our B&B was lovely and was very cheap per night, it had heating and air conditioning a tv and gave us towels as well as a lovely rooftop breakfast, but we'll get to that later. After checking into the B&B Sarah and I got lost wondering the city streets. We went into a gallery and admired the street art. A lot of the places were closed because it was raining, and they decided not to reopen after siesta. That night per Jackson's recommendation we went to a restaurant called Miami. It was near the beach. I got a pasta dish which oddly enough had an egg over easy on top. Jackson Chauncey, and Chauncey's sister Audrey met us after dinner for drinks at around 9:30. We went to this cute cafe place and got delicious sangria. It was so great to see them. They looked amazing glowing, and Jackson looked so natural in Spain, their spanish was so good. I was very impressed. They had class the next day so, Sarah and I woke up to a beautiful sunny Alicante. We had breakfast (which was toast with cheese and ham) on the roof of our bed and breakfast. We had a great view of the castle and church. It was so sunny and beautiful out I wore just leggings and a tank top with my cardigan (IN MARCH!). After we went to walk on the beach and enjoyed the sun. We met up with Chauncey and her sister and got some gelato, she showed us around alicante and the market place told us some of the history of spain and alicante, about the dictator there during WWII and how there were bombings in the market killing lots of civilians (not a happy story really). I got some delicious Valencian oranges there though, Sarah got some fresh strawberries which were delicious as well. After leaving Chauncey so she could go to lunch we got some delicious chicken paella and wine. We then took a nap, then sat on the beach to get our toes in the sand. Later we met up with Chauncey, Audrey and Jackson for drinks with some of their friends from there program. We were able to get buckets of beers which was rather lovely. We then said our goodbyes and then in the morning after having our rooftop breakfast set on a train to Madrid.

Barcelona

Sarah and I arrived in Barcelona in the evening. We walked along La rambla street. We got a little lost but eventually found our way to our amazing hostel, called "the Hipstel" (which is a play on hostel and hipsters) It was a beautiful old spanish architecture building, and our room had old spanish tiles for the stairs to our private room which was nice. After we got our room settled we went to meet up with Megan and Christina. We all went to a bar called Mojito rocks, which had the best mojito I have ever had. The next day Sarah and I did some walking around. We tried to meet Megan and Chrisitna at the market off la rambla but it was unfortunately closed on sunday. We walked in the gothic bari district saw some beautiful architecture. We walked over towards the ocean. We got some tapas and sangria which was delicious our waiter spoke english and flirted with Christina, who had the same name has his wife. We tried Manchego cheese which was delicious. I ordered muscles which were very good. After lunch we walked along the pier and got some chocolate covered churros. They were also very good. We spent the rest of the afternoon looking for the Picasso museum because its free after 3pm on Sundays. We went to the park and saw a beautiful fountain, and a wolly mamouth statue. Finally we got to the picasso museum which had an amazingly long line. It was great to see Picasso's early work though. He was a very talented 15 year old. Sarah and I then went on a pub crawl that night and made two new friends from the hostel. Roy who was from Israel and booked this trip last minute, and Saul who was from Mexico, but wast studying in France. We went to a club called Opium they had chocolate fondue. There was a saxophonist who played some big hits and was very talented. The next day Sarah and I went to Park Guell, which is easily now my new favorite place in the world. It was absolutely gorgeous you could see all of Barcelona from up there, and it was gorgeous, it reminded me of doctor Seuss. It was so colorful. Then we went to the Sagrada familia, which they were unfortunately doing construction on. I loved it though from what I saw, because it looked like the sand drippy castles I used to make with my dad when I was a kid. By that point Sarah and I were starving so we got lunch at Barcelona's famous sandwhich place, called Bo de B. The sandwhiches were amazing. Once we had the sandwhiches we walked over towards la rambla and the plaza there. We went to the bocadillo market and got freshly squeezed mango and orange juice. It was delicious. I went to a book store to look for a book for my mother but had no luck finding it. After that we went back to the hostel and joined the spanish culture in taking a siesta(nap). After that we met up with Roy and Saul for dinner, and then went to Chupitos which had different types of crazy shots. They would light them on fire and everything. It was exciting. The next morning Sarah and I took a train to Alicante.

Are you a true scotsman?

I took a 8 hour bus ride thursday night arriving Friday morning. I arrived in Edinbrough at 6:30 am I waited an hour until the sunrised, then started walking around. I saw the ocean it was beautiful. Edinburgh is really gorgeous. I then walked to Edinburgh Unviersity. It was really beautiful I would have loved to have gone to school there. I then got breakfast. English breakfast tea and bacon on a roll. It was delicious and fresh. They even gave me a piece of chocolate on the side of my tea. After that I went on a tour of Edinburgh castle which was really beautiful. I loved seeing the views from the top. I even saw "Arthur's seat" which was cool since I just finished watching the series Merlin. After that I ran to the national gallery. They had some beautiful paintings. It was really nice. I then hopped on a three hour bus to Aberdeen to see Sally. Sally and I caught up got some lunch and then went to her place. She had a lovely cottage, she lives with all scottish girls. It was really nice to see what it was like to live there. She took me out and let me just say, Scotland has a pretty great night life! Drinks and food was way cheaper there than in London. Scottish accents are really lovely too. Aberdeen's campus is absolutely gorgeous and reminded me of Hogwarts. I was very jealous of Sally's life. I would love to go to school there. The second night Sally took me to a ceilidh. It was amazing. It is a new favorite activity of mine. Its like folk dancing but with traditional gaelic music. There is a lot of getting swung around by men in kilts. It was amazing.