Fall Break: The British Isles

Fall Break was a very interesting process to plan for. Lots of kids are going with their parents either all over Europe or having a nice quiet vacation in the surrounding Tuscan and Umbrian countrysides. Being rather on the late side of planning for most things, I was very late in planning what I was going to do for my fall break. One roommate Julie was going to Germany, Austria, and the Netherlands and invited me to go with her. Unfortunately ticket prices were through the roof to travel with them so I had to opt out. Another roommate of mine, Jeanette, is backpacking across Sicily which sounded like fun, but my third roommate, Erica, had no plans either. So about four days before fall break started, we decided on a tentative itinerary of Ireland, Scotland and another country. At first it was going to be Spain, then the Netherlands, and finally Greece. They were all hard to get to from where we were going to stay in Edinburgh, Scotland, so we decided on going to London. Erica has never been there and we’re already going to be on the same island. So we bought plane tickets to Dublin and then to Edinburgh, but we hadn’t booked a flight back to Rome. We now do have a flight back home – out of London. Our plan was to rent a car and drive from Edinburgh to Salisbury to see Stonehenge before we have to go back to school. Unfortunately all the affordable car rentals are for ages 23 and up while the most expensive ones allow 21 yr olds to drive. Train tickets and plane tickets in the UK are god-awful expensive. In Italy to go from one end to the other is about 40 euro. From Edinburgh, Scotland, to London, England is about 150 POUNDS! So we’re now looking for bus tickets down to London. But that’s all background. Now to the real adventure!

Our plane from Rome to Dublin left this morning at 9:55am, but the only way to make it was to leave yesterday so we’d be able to get to the airport with enough time to check-in and go through security and passport control. We had two options: get a hostel in Rome for the night or take a late train out of Perugia, sleep for about 5 hours in a train station, get to the airport and save hostel money. Being two thrifty college kids, we decided to take the later train out of Perugia. So around 10pm last night we finished packing our stuff and started walking down to the train station (apparently walking takes about the same amount of time as taking the bus and we saved a euro). The walk down was a bit shady since it was 10:45pm on a Friday and we were given very crude directions to the station (just keep walking down and you’ll see it). We finally made it without any problem to find out that the ticket machines weren’t working, but somehow we got a ticket to the layover station, Terni. So onto the train we got. It was so cold outside. I’m wearing a tank top, long john shirt, sweatshirt and a coat with 2 layers of pants on as well as gloves and a hat. We get to Terni and look for a nice place to spend the night. A man gets up from one the long benches in the main waiting room (it’s about 1am by now and our next train leaves at 5:39am). Right as we sit down Erica notices a girl she knows from class who is also doing the same thing we’re doing (sleeping at train station to catch her plane). It’s freezing cold. We are all shivering. Someone between consciousness and sleep I notice she’s gotten up and when she returns she mentions that the sottopassiggio is a lot warmer, and that there is also a chapel down there. So we grab all our things and head down to the little chapel. We each grabbed a pew (about 2 feet too short for me) and tried to sleep. But it was still frigid down there. I tried to use my towel as a blanket, but it was too thin and basically did nothing. At 5:20am we all woke up and grabbed some HOT cappuccino cioccolato from one of the vending machines. It was so nice to hold something warm in my hands. Still shivering we wait for the train to arrive, get to Roma Termini (the big train station), transfer to Ciampino and then get a bus to the airport. The airport takes hardly any time to get through at all. We’re checked in and waiting at the gate within fifteen minutes. Throughout these transfers we’re still trying to get warm as well as catch some sleep. So the plane ride is highly uninteresting besides RyanAir gives you no leg room and the stewardesses come around at least six times trying to get you to buy a soda or chip bag on the plane since they are not complementary. But we arrived in Dublin!!! It was so green outside and not as cold as Perugia. The Dublin airport was under construction so it took some time to walk through it all especially since they put all the cheap airlines out in the boonies of the airport. None of that mattered though when we got to baggage claim and our bags were there!!! We grabbed out bags, I got a smoothie to eat/drink, and then we headed to information to find out which bus to take to the hostel downtown for the night. The plan was to get to the hostel, drop our stuff, take a nap, eat something, look around a little bit, get on the internet to finalize our plans for the trip, and then go to bed very early. So we get to the hostel with little trouble (we had help from a nice lady sitting next to us on the bus) only to find out that we’re staying in that hostel tomorrow night. Erica had forgotten that we were staying at a different place near the airport tonight. We need to find the bus to get back to the airport which takes forever because it’s not on the main street with the rest of the bus stops; it’s on a side street and down quite a ways. We are wicked tired due to not sleeping for 36 hours by now as well as schlepping our bags across Dublin and back again. Back to the airport we go to get directions to the hotel Erica knows she made reservations for. On the way to the airport four boys dropped a stink bomb in the bus and ran off. Luckily for me, I couldn’t smell it but everyone around me had their sweaters and coats over their mouths and noses. The hotel has Wi-Fi which is all we care about now to figure out our days in Ireland and the bus from Edinburgh to London. But when we get to the hotel they don’t have our reservations, we paid an exorbitant fee (we were too tired to try and even find another hotel especially since we’re near nothing), and the Wi-Fi is not free whatsoever. At this point we’re hating life and just want to sleep. Unfortunately our heat is not working so well in the room, the people above us are having a trampoline party, and there’s this little Asian boy running up and down the hallway. Oh, earlier we also got ripped off on power adapters. We just got back from having decent cheeseburgers (the first in months…we also had fish and chips today! We’re not eating pasta while we’re away and we’ve vowed to eat lots of meat) and watching the semi-final world cup rugby match between South Africa and England. South Africa won. We are tired and delirious and still have no idea what time we can get to the hostel tomorrow because it’s not written anywhere and the hostel people were mean to us today. This trip will get better when we drink some real Guinness and buy some Ireland shirts. Maybe those giant Leprechaun hats too.

10/21: First ‘real day’ in Ireland. Since we were super angry with our hotel we took very long baths AND showers to run out their hot water and kept all our lights on this morning. I don’t think it did much since we slept in late this morning. It was glorious - Sleeping in a bed, with sheets and 2 comforters in a room that was not exposed to outside air unless we chose for it to be. While getting ready for the day we watched this made-for-tv-movie called The Secret of Moon Castle. If you ever happen to see it on television it is definitely not worth anyone’s time, but everyone was speaking with Irish accents and it was early in the morning and I was easily amused. We also ate a very expensive breakfast at the hotel. 7 euro for cereal, a banana and juice? I thought that was a bit ridiculous myself. So we bit the bullet and paid and ate and packed our stuff to move to the hostel which we had tried to get into the day before. No problems with that since we already knew where we were headed. We checked in and got to our room. It was filled with bugs. Lots and lots of fly-like things. Erica and I tried to shoo them out; we’re praying that they were in the room because the window was open. But after dumping our stuff in steel lockers with large brass locks we started to really explore the city. First stop was Trinity College and the Book of Kells. Honestly, I don’t ever remember hearing about it except when my mom told me I had to see it while we were in Dublin. So we went and it was quite amazing. James, if you are reading this, I think I won the oldest book competition. And Parents, do we have a picture of St. John somewhere in our house? After the Book of Kells we started walking to the Guinness Storehouse. We took a loopy way around the city to get to Guinness in order to see Christ Church Cathedral, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and I’m sure something else that I have a picture of but can’t remember right now. After loads of walking we finally made it to the Guinness StoreHouse. The tour was quite interesting – learning about Arthur Guinness and his hops and pure water from the Wicklow Mountains. The tour ends on top of the StoreHouse in a circular glass panoramic bar that gives out complimentary Guinness pints. We hadn’t eaten since breakfast around 11ish, so after our pints, we quickly tried to find some food for the tipsy and hungry Erica. Rick’s Burgers in the Temple Bar area did the trick, plus we are on a red meat frenzy since its expensive and not the same in Italy. So we’ve eaten many hamburgers since in the Isles. Rick’s was the end of the night for us, so we headed back to the hostel. A little after we got into bed (we stayed in a 5 person co-ed hostel room) we acquired a roommate – a late 40s year old man. I did not witness any of these events since I was cranky and pretended to be asleep. Erica on the other hand woke up when he was getting ready for bed and noticed he was no longer wearing pants. Early in the morning she woke up again and now the man was also not wearing a shirt. But he left very soon after that, and we saw no more of this man.

10/22: Erica and I decided that today we did not want to be in a city or be in a tour group out to the country so we planned our own tour to Wicklow, a small picaresque Irish village. Wicklow had a medieval castle and lots of pretty countryside. We got a train ticket that morning and trained out there. Across and facing us on the train was a couple that was very intrigued with their picture phone – for about 2 hours they look pictures of everything and giggled (the people were in their late 40s maybe). We hopped off the train at Wicklow Station. The station was deserted and we were in the middle of some suburbs. We walked and walked, hoping in the right direction, to the village center. We found the tourist information center, but it was closed for lunch so we decided to grab some lunch as well at Ernie’s Bar. It had decent food. Erica refused to look at the Guinness on tap. After lunch we walked back to the information shop and got directions to the castle and Wicklow Point, a nice place. So we followed her direct ions to the tee and found some ruins and took some pretty pictures there. We continued our hike to the castle when we realized that in the directions the tourist lady wrote for us we had already passed the castle and were on our way to Wicklow Point. At that moment it dawned on us that the ruins were actually the castle. That confused us and still confuses us because we have a brochure for Wicklow Castle, and the picture is of a medieval castle. But we continued on to the Point where we had to walk through this red gate and up and up past lots of goat and cow pastures. But it was gorgeous – being out of cities with no one else around except the goats and cows. We found this tower but were not allowed to go near it since it was private property. So we obeyed the law and stayed outside the gate surrounding the tower. We then took a long hike back to the train station only to find out that the next train left in 2 hours. Our feet were killing us but we were starving so we hiked back into town, got dinner, hiked back, waited and waited for the train, and got back to the hostel in Dublin. Luckily we did not have another roommate that night since we had to wake up at 3:30am the next morning to catch our flight.

10/23: Erica and I woke up way too early this morning. We planned on getting out of our bunk beds at 3:30am, but we didn’t until around 4:00am. Well, Erica got up earlier, but I am a much worse morning person than she is and refused to get up until I absolutely had to. We walked to the bus station that was going to take us to the airport which we are happy we got there 20 minutes early. The bus was supposed to leave at 4:30am so we got there around 4:10am. The bus arrived within 3 minutes, packed up, and drove off. At 4:22 we were miles down the road. The airport was not that exciting. We grabbed breakfast there, and I had 2 caffe lattes which were delicious (I also was not tired for the rest of the day). RyanAir was a bit sketchy with its landing since we hit the ground roughly and then stopped abruptly. But that’s why it’s so cheap. We got a bus to Edinburgh after grabbing some money from the ATM. The exchange rate is horrible in Great Britain; its quite sad. We took a bus into Edinburgh center and immediately noticed how much prettier Edinburgh was than Dublin. After much fretting and phones not working we met up with Caitlin outside this train station. She walked us to her dorm where we were crashing for the night and then had to go to class. Not having internet in our rooms, I was very excited and played around on it all morning. Erica fell asleep and took a very nice long nap. When she woke up we started to explore the city. We listened to 2 different street performers. One group was three guys: 2 playing African bongo drums and the other with the bagpipes. I really liked that one. The second group was 3 Braveheart guys playing drums and bagpipes. Around this time Caitlin was out of class so we picked her up and went to the grocery store to buy stuff to make some Mexican food since we were all craving it. It ended up being delicious – while we watched half of Hot Fuzz. Caitlin’s friend Emma came over and then we all went this pub and ended up playing their Pub Quiz. We didn’t do so well since we were battling UKers and since the quiz was many UK history and pop culture. But Caitlin did come in 2^nd place in the dance-off and win us party poppers. After the game we had to get back to Caitlin’s room to go to bed. It was a very long but very fun day.

10/24: We all woke up late when Erica’s friend Colby called her to meet up in a coffee shop. So we got dressed and went to Black Medicine Coffee Shop were we spent 2 hours just talking. Colby went back to his dorm while Caitlin showed us around Edinburg University. A couple hours later Erica and I dropped Caitlin off at her dorm and then went to meet up with Colby and hike this hill called Arthur’s Seat. I’m not complaining but I’ve noticed that every trip I go on involved some sort of hike. It wasn’t as cold as we thought it was going to be though and we were overdressed for the weather. The way down was much easier. For my knees since they’re a tad off right now, I found it was easier to sort of gallop down the mountain. Erica joined me, but right as we were stopping she turned and fell right on her rear. We finished the hike, Erica said bye to Colby, and headed back to Caitlin to pick her up and go out to dinner. I was planning on trying the haggis, but by the time I was ready to order I just wanted a burger or something; I was not in the mood to try something new and intestine-like. But before we could order or even sit down, we had to produce IDs for some reason. Of course I had forgotten mine so we all had to go to Caitlin’s so I could get my ID. The food was worth it though. And they never even looked at our IDs which I thought was a little strange since it was such a big deal that we have them. After dinner Erica and I packed our stuff, Caitlin walked us to the bus station and we caught a night bus to London.

10/25: We got into London 30 minutes ahead of schedule (at 6:30am). Luckily, the bus wasn’t that full so we weren’t packed in. People didn’t talk on it and there were no babies. When we got to London we were both really disgusting so we took showers in the train station. Surprisingly it looked much cleaner and nicer than the shower in the hostel in Dublin. We found a place to store our bags for the day, put the essentials in our backpacks, and started walking around. We were close to Buckingham Palace so we took a look at it. There were lots of people dressed up in fancy velvet dresses all around us and when we got to the Palace there was a line of cars waiting to get in. I asked a police officer about it, and he told me the Queen was presenting awards to people who had done community service. I thought that was sort of cool. From there we walked around the park directly across the street as well as Hyde Park. There were lots of swans and dogs and squirrels running around; we had fun playing with the geese. After playing with the animals we started on our way to the British Museum which holds the Rosetta Stone and lots of other stolen things from all over the world. The British pillaged from everywhere! One of my friends Robbie met us at the British Museum so we had a nice catch-up on our lives while looking at huge chunks taken off the Parthenon in Athens. I think he asked four different people if what we were looking at was fake since it just seemed unrealistic that people would be able to chisel out these massive blocks of stone and transport them back to Britain unharmed. And that they’re still in Britain and haven’t been returned to their native land. Robbie showed us around a little bit more of London – like Leicester Square and Trafalgar Square which was hosting a protest to the 2008 Olympics being held in Beijing with all the atrocities that are happening/have happened there. It was time for Robbie to get back to his college for dinner, and Erica and I had to get to Oxford where we found free housing with 2 of my very good friends, Vanessa and James. We got a train and arrived in Oxford around 10pm. I was starving so we went to this kabob place and I downed a half pounder burger. It was delicious. Probably not even close to the best hamburger I have had, but at that point I was famished. After ‘dinner’ James and Vanessa took us to this very famous/hard to find tavern in downtown Oxford, Turf Tavern. We’re sitting down inside and I see this guy I worked with a couple summers ago. He’s from Israeli and I knew he was going to be traveling around Europe, but I had no idea we were going to be at the same place at the same time. So I got up and went outside and sort of yelled at him as he was walking by. He didn’t hear me so I was resigned to just send him an email about it the next day. I went back inside and explained the story to my friends. Vanessa is sitting right next to the window. All of a sudden the guy comes back. Vanessa sees him and starts banging on the window. She gets his attention, and then both she and James are pointing frantically to me. That’s when I noticed that his face was just a little bit different, and it wasn’t my friend Alon at all but some random person. He’s stopped so I go back outside and apologize and explain myself. He also apologized because he thought he was supposed to know who I was and had forgotten. We parted ways, and I went back inside where the rest of the conversation circulated around Alon’s name and how strange it must have seemed to other people for this girl to come running out of a tavern and yell, “ALONE!” Or if I had asked the guy if he was alone or said that his appearance implied he was alone.

10/26: We stayed with Vanessa last night at her college, Pembroke; she put us up on her floor which was not as uncomfortable as I was expecting it to be. But she had class and crew and choir practice starting at noon so we would mainly be hanging out with James all day. The four of us (Me, Erica, James, and Vanessa) met up for a full English breakfast in a covered market downtown. It was delicious. Lots of baked beans, ham, eggs, toast, and a chocolate milkshake for my drink. Father, you should be proud! Vanessa had to get to class after breakfast so James took us on a tour of Oxford. Our first stop was this bookshop. I forget its name, but it was amazing. Its massive and all in a basement. I got caught up in this corner for about an hour. Basically, I was in love. We all tore ourselves away from the store and started hiking around the town. It was beautiful, sort of a damp and dreary day, but it was still beautiful. I love the way Oxford University is set up with all the individual colleges with one or two entrances only to get into them. After looking around the town James took us through Christ Church Meadows – just a very pretty meadow with cows and where the crew boathouses are located on this little canal. Again, we found some swans and played with them for awhile. James got hissed at by a white goose for trying to feed it. Tired and hungry we took a pit stop at a local sandwich shop for refreshments and then went to have a look at James’ college, Lady Margaret H. The gardens there are also gorgeous. We ate dinner in their dining hall which is not the dining hall pictured in the Harry Potters, but it looks very similar to it. The Harry Potter dining hall is at Christ Church College. After dinner Vanessa was finally down with her stuff so we met up with her. Erica was tired so we all walked to Vanessa’s college, and then James, Vanessa, and I headed out back to Turf’s Tavern where some of James’ friends were meeting us. I had a great time. I met such nice people: Liz, Ji, and Scott. Well, I didn’t really met Scott until later in the evening. We’ll get to that. But at Turf’s I just talking to Ji and Liz and Vanessa. Vanessa and James decide that I need to go to Chequers because that’s another very nice pub in town. So we rush over there because it closes at 11pm and it’s around 10:30pm. So we rush over there. The boys all get a drink and want their picture taken. At that same time I decide I want something to drink so I’m rummaging through my purse to get some money. James is in a better position at the bar to order for me. So right after Ji and Scott ask for a picture, I hand James some money and ask him to buy me a drink. For the 2 seconds that Scott didn’t see I had handed James some money, he thought I was a horrible person. In exchange for a picture, I wanted James to buy me a drink. So for the rest of that night he kept apologizing and replaying the story for us. But the long and short of it was that it was a very fun night, and it was sad to say goodbye to both James and Vanessa since they are at Oxford for the year.

10/27: We had to get up ridiculously early this morning. It was no fun. But somehow we woke up 10 minutes late so we missed the original train we needed to get to the airport so we started the day with having to improvise. We arrived in London Paddington Station about 40 minutes behind schedule and rushed to the Tube. But the stops we needed were under repair and we had to ask at least 3 different people for directions, and the last guy totally changed our end destination from London Victoria Station to the Liverpool Street Station where we could pick up a direct train to London Stansted. That ended up working perfectly and we arrived to the airport very early. We had time to get some food and take our time. I hadn’t had time to eat breakfast so I got a salmon sandwich and an apple cake. But I was out of pounds. So I paid with a credit card. Right as the lady was putting my card through the machine I realized I still had a 20 pound note. Knowing that I would not be back to London in quite some time I had to spend it. I’ve barely bought anything for myself this semester minus food so I went on a little splurge and got 2 books. I spend the remaining money checking my email on the airport computers. We made it to the plane fine and had a good flight. We bused from Ciampino to Roma Termini where I met my parents for dinner at the train station. Erica went ahead to Perugia to get back home. The food at the train station was not good, but we had more time to talk. I got on my train back to Perugia where I’m going to be very late getting back now since the first train was delayed by 20 minutes and I think I’ve missed my connection and somehow I have to get a bus to Perugia. I’ve never done this before, and I’m on my own so it’s time for a little Kate adventure!

Well, I had my little 'Kate adventure'. I got to the my connection train station, Foligno, 23 minutes after my connection had left. The train that I missed also happened to be the last train to the station for the night. I had decided I was just going to suck it up and call a taxi to drive me the 30 minutes home to Perugia. Fortunately, there were lots of people who needed the same train I did to get to Assisi, Spello, and Perugia. So, the train station had this guy seperating people into what cities they had to go to and put them into taxis. I was in a taxi with 4 other people: 3 going to Assisi and one to Spello. I was the last stop and got to hang out with the taxi driver for like 20 minutes by myself as he drove me home. He dropped me off at the train station from which I normally take a bus to Piazza Italia and walk the rest of the way home. However, the last bus to Piazza Italia had left about 20 minutes before I got there. Some other Umbra students had just gotten off a train and were waiting for the same bus so we started talking and this very short and drunk man came over and told us that the next (and last) bus for the night would drop us off at the Stanieri which is sort of close to where we live in the center of the city. So we thanked him and got on the bus. He followed and tried to listen to our conversation, but being drunk and not fully understanding I have no idea what he understood or not. But I got home after 12:30. It was so nice to get into my bed. No more floors or buses or bus station!!