I started writing a blog about Italy, but then forgot that I had gone to London again between the Lake District and Italy! Maybe I didn't remember it because I still haven't put my pictures from it on Facebook. Oops- I knew I was forgetting something. Maybe I'll do that tonight.
Anyway, we went to London because of a field trip for British Studies- we went to go see the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, and St. Paul's Cathedral, all of which were really cool. In the National Gallery, we saw all the originals of the paintings we've seen on PowerPoints in class: like Charles I, Mr. and Mrs. Andrews (which was on our last exam), Experiment on a Bird in an Air Pump (which I wanted to be on our last exam). It was really neat to be seeing the originals. In the National Portrait Gallery, we saw portraits of the Queens and Kings that we saw in class, mostly of Elizabeth I, Henry VIII, and Victoria I would say... they seem to have a lot of portraits. Also in the National Portrait Gallery is the only sketch of Jane Austen done while she was alive. Sooooo cool! In St. Paul's (aside from being absolutely beautiful) all kinds of famous war heroes that we have been learning about in class are buried in it, so that was fun. AND to make things better I had Dr. Bujak for the tour, and he is hilarious and really knows what he is talking about.
After the field trip, Amber, Melody, Megan, and I (and a bunch of other people) all stayed in London for the weekend. We grabbed our luggage off the bus and started the trek towards our hostel. Ooh, Hyde Park Hostel, how you sucked. It was seriously a dump- very shady. Our roof leaked, I was pretty sure a pigeon was about to fly through our window one night, it smelled bad, the toilet was missing parts, etc. It was so disgusting that I refused to take a shower (naturally by the time I got back to the manor I was nasty, so that was the first thing I did). We even discovered (thankfully on the day we were leaving) a can of bug killer in our room. So, if you're ever in London, DO NOT EVER stay in Hyde Park Hostel. It's not even in a good area of town- NOTHING is anywhere NEAR Hyde Park... except Hyde Park. If you want to go to the park, then you should probably stay near it- just not in Hyde Park Hostel. NEVER.
Aside from the crappy hostel (which we were conveniently NEVER in), London was as fantastic as ever (though also as rainy as ever). Friday night Melody, Amber, and I went to see the Lion King, and it was AMAZING. We waited outside the stage door and met the guy that played Simba, the girl that played Nala, they guys that played Timon and Zazu. Simba was super nice- he was asking us where we were from, what we were doing in London, where we were sitting during the show, how we liked it, etc. He was actually taking the time to talk to us, which we all really appreciated. So I would definitely recommend seeing the Lion King.
Saturday we mostly wandered around and went shopping. Melody went back to school on the bus that night (thus escaping the nasty hostel) and so Megan, Amber, and I walked around London (ok... so we took the tube around London. Hey- it was raining). We did lots of tacky souvenir shopping, and a lot of Primark shopping as well. London Primark is a must. Primark is the BEST STORE EVER. Seriously, I have restocked my entire spring wardrobe for about $30- it is dirt cheap and really cute stuff. Then we went down to Millenium Bridge (the bridge used in the filming of the 6th Harry Potter movie) and took pictures there, walked over to Shakespeare's Globe Theater, and then had dinner. On the way to the bridge we ran across some men selling roasted peanuts, so naturally we bought some of those (and they were delicious).While we were eating dinner we watched the England vs. France rugby match on tv with lots of Londoners, and I eavesdropped on a Spanish conversation happening behind me. It was magical.
Sunday Amber, Melody, Audrey, and I went to Hillsong United's church, and it was awesome. The worship was great (as expected) and the message was as well. The speaker was actually from America (Texas) so that was an interesting experience. It seriously was great though- I would go back anytime.
That's basically all we did. Amber and I definitely showered as soon as we got back.

I'll be honest, I had to look at my pictures on facebook to find out what came after Coventry and Stratford. It has been so long since then! But it was the Lake District, and it was SO FUN! It was probably my favorite in-country trip that I have taken.
We left the school on Thursday night and drove to a tiny little village called Hawkshead (which if you say it really fast sounds like Hogs Head, like the pub in Harry Potter!). We got there at like, 11:30 (our bus took a while to get to the hostel because the roads are so narrow, it had to go past the hostel and turn around!), so when we got there we pretty much just went to bed. Friday morning we got up and explored Hawkshead, got some outdoorsy equipment (wool socks, waterproof pants and jackets, etc) and then took a bus into Ambleside to go on a boat tour of Lake Wyndemere. It was cool I guess, but it was cold, and we were so looking forward to Saturday's activities we didn't really care about what we did there. When we went back into the village, we ate dinner at a nice little pub and I had probably the best lasagna and garlic bread I've had since being here- it was delicious! :) Yum-O!
Saturday was the day we were all waiting for. We got on the bus and went somewhere (I'm not really sure where... haha) and we were pumped up by Miss Molly Schmeidler giving us a wonderful motivational speech (Sparta-style) on the bus. It was hilarious. Something about scrambling those ghylls like we've never ghyll scrambled before... I don't even know- Molly does strange things. ;) When we got there, we split into groups based on what activities we had signed up for. Most people had decided to do either Rock climbing or mountain hiking in the morning, and then go Ghyll scrambling in the afternoon. I chose the mountain hike, so I started up the giant mountain. The walk up wasn't too bad, and the views were amazing. From about half-way up the mountain we could see the coast and the ocean in the distance... we could see for miles! And what was really cool is that there were snow-capped mountains surrounding us, and even some snow on the mountain we were climbing. It was beautiful. I might put some pictures on here... if not, just get on facebook. They're all there.
After we climbed the mountain and refueled with some food, we all got into our waterproof clothes, boots, etc, and got strapped into our harnesses and prepared to climb those waterfalls (because that's what ghyll scrambling is- climbing mountain stream waterfalls.) It was AMAZING. It was SOOOOO cold, but I didn't even care, because it was just so fun. We were all laughing the whole time. It was by far the most adventurous thing I've done ever. In my whole life. I felt like I conquered the world. Some of the walk up was just like, hopping from rock to rock trying not to step in the water, but some of it was literally climbing the face of a waterfall... a straight down, 20+ feet high waterfall. I don't even know what else to say- it was just great! When we were all on our way back down the mountain, we passed a place where the water under the waterfall was about 7-8 feet deep, and we all decided to jump in. Baaaad plan. It was freezing, and your muscles kind of decide to stop working. But it was sooo worth it.
I think one of the best things about the lake district weekend was that I got to hang out with a bunch of new people. None of the people (except the lovely Chelsea Burch) I hang out with on a regular basis went (Anna, Shaylin, Eileen, Amber, Sam, Audrey, Melody, Megan, etc) so I was basically forced to meet new people or spend the weekend alone. It was great. And I got to make new friends because I was one of two people with a waterproof camera, so everyone wanted me to take pictures of them. So it was good. I would LOVE to go back to the lake district in the summer. I think it would be even MORE fun.

Sorry guys. I've kinda forgotten to blog for about 2 months I feel like. So much has been happening since I last blogged. So, I'm going to write a separate blog for each event. First, we have my trip with the school to Coventry and Stratford.
Coventry is a really neat town with two cathedrals that we stopped in on the way to see Shakespeare's birthplace in Stratford. During WWII, the original cathedral in Coventry was bombed (Coventry was a huge arms supplier for the war). The very next day, plans were started to rebuild the cathedral. Rather than tearing down the remains of the old one and building on the same site, however, they decided to build a modern cathedral next to the old one. So right next to each other are these two amazing cathedrals, and each is amazing for its own reasons. The first is amazing because even after being bombed, this building that was probably built about 7-800 years ago is still partially standing. The steeple is still there, there are still stairs to where the pulpit probably was, and the outer walls (complete with spaces for windows) are still there as well. It was eerie, but very cool. The new cathedral is just... powerful. It's not really all that "pretty" per say- it doesn't have the typical cathedral (here is the church, here is the steeple) kind of look to it. But that I think is what makes it so amazing. We have been all over the country, looking at different cathedrals and analyzing them for their architectural or historical value- we forgot they were still churches- still places built to worship God, the same God we still worship today. This cathedral however, complete with a tapestry of Jesus that was probably 45-50 feet high and covered the entire back wall of the church, brought me to my knees. Usually people here are pretty rowdy on field trips, but not that day. Not in that cathedral. People were respectful and reverent. At one point, we all separated from eachother and went and sat down. I pulled out my iPod and just put on worship music. All I wanted to do was praise the Lord. I just wanted to sit at His feet and worship Him. I could literally feel the presence of the Holy Spirit there. When I rejoined my friends, even those who are not believers said, "Whitney, why is this place so powerful? All I want to do is sit in a corner and cry." So that gave me an excellent opportunity to be like, "Well, here, let me tell you about Jesus and how amazing He is. He is why this place is so powerful. He is moving in your heart." Praise God for moving in hearts here!
After visiting the cathedral, we got back on our bus (which was a double decker tour bus... strange) and went the rest of the way to Stratford. When we got there we wandered around and went and saw Shakespeare's birthplace, where he is buried, and ended the night at the Royal Shakespeare Company Theatre for a production of King Lear. Seeing where Shakespeare was born and buried was weird. Like... William Shakespeare walked there- he went to the church he was buried in. He played with his sibblings in the house. It was just bizzarre. But cool
King Lear was pretty good too- or at least as good as a tragedy can be. I much prefer As You Like It, or Midsummer Night's Dream to Lear or Hamlet, but whatever. It was still a good show.

Ok. Onto the next entry... the Lake Distrcit!

So much to blog about since the last time! I meant to do this sooner, but got busy writing papers for school and such… so sorry. I've decided that this blog will revolve entirely around my recent escapades into Harry's world, rather than writing separate blogs for both trips to Oxford and Ascot. We'll start in Oxford.
My friend Megan and I decided to go to Oxford with the sole purpose of visiting the Great Hall used in Harry Potter 1 and 2 (they recreated it in the studio for the rest of the films). So we hopped on the train in Grantham at 6:17, got to King's Cross, took the tube to London Paddington (which is actually the train station that Harry uses to go back to the Dursley's after shopping with Hagrid in the first book- it's not included in the movies, but I just finished re-reading the book, and it's there) and then hopped on another train to Oxford. When we got to Oxford, it was raining (what a surprise!) and we headed straight to the Great Hall at Christ Church College. When we got there, we found out the hall wasn't opened until 2:30 pm that day, so we had the whole morning to kill in Oxford. There is a TON of shopping in Oxford (like Primark- my new favorite store). After a long morning of shopping and walking (in and out of the rain, of course) we went back to the college.

The magic began when we entered the building. Leading up to the right was a great stone staircase. Yes, the stone staircase that the first years venture up to the sorting ceremony, and the stone staircase that Ron and Harry walk up after their encounter with the whomping willow in their 2nd year. Then, the doors at the top of the stairs led where? THE GREAT HALL! It was so fantastic to be in the Great Hall. I couldn't believe it! It was smaller than the movies make it look, but it was still pretty great. There were a lot of other tourists there (how dare they enter my Harry Potter site!!) but it was still a GREAT day of Harry Potter.

So then yesterday, I went to Ascot to visit Michelle, a girl who works for the same company as my cousin, Thatch. Michelle is very sweet and told me about how she stumbled upon a current Harry Potter filming site! I nearly died when she told me that! I mean, imagine the possibilities for a second… They were endless! Michelle was kind enough to invite me to come investigate with her, and drove me around and let me stay the night with them even! It was really nice to a) be away from the manor for a little while and b) to go LEGITIMATELY stalk the Harry Potter cast. So when I got there on Wednesday night we went to Number 4, Privet Drive, which is in a neighborhood close to where Michelle lives, and that was AWESOME. I stood in front of Harry's house! It was great! Then we went back to her house for a little while, and then went into Windsor for dinner. We saw Windsor castle (the home of the queen), ate dinner, and then went to the forest. We chose a path and walked up it for a little while, then realized that it wasn't getting us anywhere, and we had no idea where we were going, so we turned around and headed back to the car. When we got back to the car, a man was like, "You all haven't broken down, have you?" and we said, "No, but actually we're huge Harry Potter fans- do you know anything about what's going on here?" He proceeded to tell us about what they were doing, where they were doing it, and that they had also finished doing it (which was sad news for me). But he said that they had about 150 extras, and 2 minor characters, and that they were either running at each other, or the 2 minor characters were running away from the extras, through an archway surrounded by green screen. I'm thinking this has something to do with the battle at the end of the book. So, we went back to the forest on Thursday morning to see if we could find anything else, and took a path the man pointed us towards (which was in the complete opposite direction from the path we were on the night before). Judging from the map, we didn't think the site was very deep into the woods, and I felt like we could get there and back to the train station for my train out at 9:10. Well, we got to the forest at 8, and judging from the fact that we only reached the filming site at 9:00, I was going to miss my train. But anyway, I came over the top of a hill, and down the road from me were all kinds of trucks, bulldozers, and official looking people. So, I walked that way- I knew I had found it. When I got closer I kind of cut through the woods to see around this obnoxious green netting that was in the way, and when I got to a place where I could see, this man started walking towards me. I was like, "great. I'm going to get kicked out." Sure enough, he said, "Sorry, you can't come back here. There's bulldozers and it's dangerous." so I said, "Ok, well can I just hop up there for a second and take a picture?" And he said, "No, I'm afraid not." So I said, "ok, well then I'll just take one from here," and he said, "Sorry, I'm afraid I can't let you take any photographs" (All this time he's still walking towards me like he's going to do something to me if I don't leave- trying to be intimidating. What I thought in my mind was, "Dude, I don't think so. You clearly do not understand who you're talking to. I did not just walk through the woods for an hour to finally find this place just for you to tell me I can't take any pictures." What I said was, "Ok, thanks," then I turned around and walked away. I walked back up the path a little bit until he had stopped watching me, and then I darted off into the woods. Under the cover of how thick those trees were, NO ONE could see me. So, I followed along in the trees until I got to basically right above where I wanted to be. I had to stay hidden in the trees, for fear that guy would see me and then actually like, call the police or something ridiculous like that, but I did get some pictures. Then, I left. I missed my train, but it was worth it.

As many of you probably already know from my incessant facebook status updates about It, on Thursday evening some friends and I ventured to London to go to the red carpet (dyed green for the occasion) premiere of the new Tim Burton movie, Alice in Wonderland. Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Helena Bonham Carter (Bellatrix Lestrange), Alan Rickman (Severus Snape) and Timothy Spall (Peter Pettigrew) were all there. I didn't see them, but I know that Alan Rickman and Timothy Spall drove past me, because all of the stars drove past us- they had to. I saw Anne Hathaway and Helena Bonham Carter from a distance, and I got up close and personal with Mr. Johnny Depp.

Suddenly, screams started to our left, and grew louder and louder. We knew that the moment had come: Johnny Depp was here. A slow moving black car got closer and closer to us, and through the open window, Johnny waved at us. My camera only saw his hands on his lap, but I saw his face.


We then proceeded to wait some more, as the heavens proceeded to rain even harder. We watched more famous people arrive from far away, judging how important the person was on how loud the screams were. Then, another mountain of screams came- this time starting on our right. Johnny Depp was walking back down towards us! He walked past, and started signing autographs and was moving our way. He was getting closer and closer to us! I stuck my arm out over everyone else, notebook opened to a blank page, and then… YES! I felt a pressure on the notebook! I had a Johnny Depp autograph! I was snapping pictures like crazy, not knowing if I actually had a picture of him or not, but when I pulled my camera back and looked at them, I realized I had several.


After Johnny passed us, we realized that no one else was probably going to walk down (it was getting close to the time of the screening), so we headed out. It was an amazing night. I still can't believe that I was a foot away from Johnny Depp, and that Anne Hathaway, Snape, Bellatrix, and Pettigrew all drove past me in a car. It's crazy.



I love my life.

Strange title, you may think to yourself. Isn't the Hoedown Throwdown from the Hannah Montana movie? Why, yes… yes it is. You may be wondering how this dance became part of my excursions in England; this is a completely natural reaction. Let me regale you with the story.
I suppose I should start by telling you that this weekend I went on "The Big Adventure" which is a retreat that the student group at New Life Church in Lincoln takes every year. Jonas (the pastor of New Life Grantham) came to Mosaic (our Bible study at Harlaxton) and invited us to come along. So Amber, Audrey, Melody, Erika, and I packed our bags and headed to Norwich (pronounced Nor-rich… the English like to make letters silent. For example, Leicester is pronounced "Lester". But I digress…) Anyway, so we went to Norwich and met up with the group there. We were warned on the way that a big talent show is traditionally part of the weekend. The girls and I began discussing our options and I threw out "Well, I mean, I can teach them how to line dance…" and the girls decided that would be great. Then I thought, "How can we possibly make this any more Americanized?" Answer: add Miley Cyrus. So I said, "Actually… I know the dance to the Hoedown Throwdown song," which excited everyone (except Audrey, who chooses to associate more with lil Wayne rather than Miley) and so I started teaching it to our group as soon as we got there. Saturday night rolled around, and the closer to time to do the dance, the more we thought, "I hope they think it's as funny as we do… otherwise, this could be ugly." Thankfully, they did think it was as funny as we did.

After we performed, they wanted me to teach them more dances, so I broke out the Tush Push and the Hitchhiker. Surprisingly, English people catch on a lot faster than do Americans. We ended Saturday night with a spontaneous dance party that lasted until 2:30 am, the playlist for which included Down, Bye Bye Bye, I Want it That Way, A Whole New World, Low, Don't Cha, The Hoedown Throwdown, and Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. It was pretty great. Sunday morning, I skipped out on breakfast in favor of sleeping and when I woke up, the following conversation ensued:

Erika: "Have you seen Audrey and Melody?"
Me: "Um… no."
Erika: "Oh, well everyone's looking for you."
Me: "Um… ok. Why?"
Erika: "They all want you to teach another line dance."

It made my heart happy for the British to be adopting my so beloved line dances. :) So that morning, as part of the morning wake-up routine, (Whitney's Workout as Antonia put it) I taught Slappin' Leather and busted out "She Thinks My Tractor's Sexy" just for the occasion.

When we weren't having dance parties, we were learning about the Lord. :) It was so refreshing to be in such a great, Christian environment for even just a few days. We talked about Elijah and the faith that he had. It was really cool to be reminded about how one day he was calling down God's fire from heaven and completely beasting it for Jesus, then the next day he was on the run from Jezebel, in a complete spiritual depression. Even holy men like Elijah had seasons where they felt far from God, you know? It was just an encouragement to think that even if I feel far from God, He is still RIGHT beside me, and also that the feeling of distance is in a way normal. We're all going to experience times of drought, but that's when we really need to dig in.

So, that was my weekend. It was great and I have lots of new friends now! :)

London this weekend was AMAZING. I had so much fun! I can't even begin to tell you about how great it was, but I'm going to try.
We left Harlaxton on Friday morning at 8 and drove into London. It was raining all the way there, so I was kind of sad about that, but by the time we actually got to the city it had stopped, so that was great. We then went on a 2 hour bus tour around London and got to get off the bus and take pictures in front of Tower Bridge. It's so weird to finally see landmarks like that in person; we see that bridge all the time on tv, in movies, in the news, etc- so it was so unreal for me to be standing right in front of it. We then went back to the hotel and checked in and everything, then we had all of Friday and Saturday totally free!
Eileen, Anna, and I decided to go for a walk around London. We started out with a bigger group of people, but that slowly disintegrated as people found their own stuff they wanted to go see, and also just because it's hard to navigate a huge group of people through a big city like London. After taking pictures in Trafalgar Square, we headed on down towards the river to Big Ben and Parliament, where we took more pictures and stopped in a little souvenir shop for some postcards and such (we acted like tourists for just a little while... most of the time we tried to blend in.) When we got down to Big Ben, we realized that we actually had no idea how far we had gone, and also that we had to get back to the hotel to meet people for dinner. We had kind of just been wandering through the streets, stopping in stores as we passed, etc, so we didn't know how long it was going to take us to get back to the hotel. 45 minutes later we FINALLY got back. It was so cold outside and it was dark and I really think we walked like 3 miles each way. Then came the fun dinner at the crazy Chinese place. The only reason we went was because it was close and the London Pub was so jam packed not even two people could get inside, let alone our group of 8. The Chinese place was so weird, and it was expensive, and our waitress hated us, even though we didn't do anything. She was just a meanie. But it's ok I guess, because now we have a good story about it. You probably don't think that was a good story, but trust me... they were crazy.

After dinner we all went out to a pub that was just a couple of blocks away from our hotel, called the Rocket. It was SO MUCH FUN. I loved getting to talk to people that were there, because it seeemed to be that its customers were mostly locals. Granted, they were mostly drunk locals, but they were still really fun to talk to. Anna, Shaylin, and I met these two guys named Jack and Dominic, and I had a lovely hour-long conversation with Dominic about Harry Potter. During this conversation, it was ruled that I was indeed the bigger fan. :) (Not even people in London can touch my mad Harry Potter skills... haha) But anyway, it was like my dream come true. I was in London, having a conversation about Harry Potter, with a British guy. Really- what more could I have asked for? It was great! Also, I had the boys do their own impersonations of American accents, which was hilarious! Jack's needed some work, but Dominic's was pretty good. They then made me do my British accent. They laughed at me. Apparently it's not as good as I thought it was...
Saturday morning I went with my roommate (Amber) a new friend (Megan), and a friend from Western (Audrey) on another walk around London, but since it was POURING DOWN RAIN we took the tube (hence the title of my blog- I don't know how many times I heard "Mind the gap!" ) We went back down to Big Ben, Parliament, Trafalgar Square, etc. We also stopped in at Leicester square to pick up tickets for a show (our main purpose in heading that direction). We wanted to see Wicked, but it was going to be 59 pounds per ticket (that's about $90 for you Americans) and we decided that it was too expensive, so we went for Hairspray instead. It was so great! I loved it so much. The music was great, and the actors were phoenomenal. It takes a certain amount of skill to both talk and sing in a perfect American accent, which most of them did. After the play I went back to the Rocket with Anna and Shaylin again, where I got to meet some other guys that I also had nice conversations with (not about Harry Potter this time, but hey, life can't be absolutely perfect every day...) One of the guys I was talking to had actually been to Kentucky before, so that was a fun conversation. As we were leaving to go back to the hotel that night we met a guy from California who was studying abroad at UCL (University College of London), whose friends had left him alone in London on his first night there! (Poor guy!) So we (with the help of some of our new London friends) helped him make his way back to his school.

Sunday we went to Hampton Court Palace (the home of King Henry VIII). It was very cool to think that Henry once walked on the same ground I was walking on, slept in the bed I was looking at, sat in the chair right in front of me, etc. However, it was cold, and we were all exhausted. So, I really didn't enjoy it quite as much as I might have had we done it a different day. It was still very cool though. I may go back sometime when I'm not quite so tired.


So, the basics of what I did in London are as follows:

1. Meet lots of cool people. This is me and my new British friend Jack.

2. Walk about a million miles. Me and Anna halfway through our epic journey down to Big Ben.

3. Learn that the stereotype of "rainy London" is pretty true. This is Anna, Shaylin, and Eileen putting their umbrellas and rainboots to good use.

4. Navigate the tube. I'm a pro, trust me. This is Mark, Me, Anna, and Shaylin on our way to Knightsbridge.

5. Take in a show. This is Megan, Amber, and me at Hairspray.

6. See all the monuments I've seen on TV since I was a kid. This is (obviously) me in front of Big Ben!

7. Visit a palace. This is me walking around in Hampton Court Palace.

In all seriousness, I could see myself living in a suburb of London, should I ever find myself needing to move to Europe. (Don't worry Mom, I'm still coming home in May. hahaha ) Everything here is beautiful, and accessible, and the people are all really friendly (with the exception of our waitress at the Chinese place...). London was great. Hands down, no arguments, no complaints. I loved everything about it, and I'm definitely going back LOTS this semester.