Wednesday, December 8, 2010

In true Spanish style I had a 6 day weekend to travel!

This weekend I was in London and Madrid, and travelled quite successfully regardless of blizzards in London and air traffic controller strikes in Madrid.  
I went to London to visit a good friend of mine (Nicole) who I haven't actually seen in person in a long time, funny how that works out when you're studying abroad.  We did gymnastics together at Gymnastics Plus, once upon a time.  
Friday: I arrived in London before her classes were finished for the day so I met up with some friends who had also been on the program in Poland with me, Jeannette and Jessica.  They took me to the Christmas markets along the Southbank of the Thames and we just hung out for a couple hours.  Then I met up with Nicole and we walked around Leicester Square and Picadilly Circus and had amazing Thai food for dinner (yay for spicy food, finally!)  It turns out that Nicole is at Le Cordon Bleu in London for baking and desserts and just happened to have a bunch of yummies that she had made in class in her apartment so we snacked on those A LOT.  There was chocolate fudge with pistachios, French maccroons in 2 flavors, cookies of various types, some sort of sweet granola bar thing, and some sort of muffin thing.  Basically it was lots of deliciousness.    
Saturday: We woke up and wandered over to the IMAX theatre to see....Harry Potter 7.1.  Yea that's right, I saw Harry Potter in London on IMAX.  Definitely beats Becky seeing it at midnight...Then we spent the day wandering around Harrod's.  Had lunch in a diner on the 4th floor and just looked at stuff.  Then we went to King's Cross station and went to Hogwarts (unfortunately the trip didn't turn out quite e as planned because apparently platform 9 3/4 is actually between platforms 8 & 9 not 9 & 10 as one would assume).  We went to the winter wonderland at Hyde Park and walked around looking at everything.  We had mulled cider and nutella crepes while watching people on the rides and ice skating.  We then had pizza at Nicole's apartment.
Sunday: We met up with one of Nicole's friends from Switzerland, named Celine, and we went to Brick Lane (which is simultaneously the Indian and Jewish section of London) where we went vintage shopping, ate Indian food for lunch and bagels for dessert (neither of which you can get in Spain).  Then Nicole and I went on the London Eye followed by a really nice dinner at Jamie Oliver's Italian restaurant in Covent Gardens.


Monday: I got on a plane to Madrid.  I met up with my friend Gloria, who had also been on the trip to Poland.  We just kind of walked around.  Went to a Chinese restaurant Gloria wanted to try, and then I met up with my friend Amanda, who is studying at the University of Salamanca but was also in Madrid for the weekend, from the ballroom team in Claremont.  She, along her friends, and I went ice-skating and then we hung out for a while.  I headed back to the hostel early and went to sleep.
Tuesday: Gloria and I hopped on a bus to Segovia.  It was raining when we got there and although it stopped within about 15 minutes it was still pretty cold.  We saw the Roman Aqueducts, the Alcázar (which is rumored to have inspired the Disney castle), and the Jewish quarter.  When we got back to Madrid we went to the Plaza de España and a lookout hear there and saw the whole city.  Then we both headed back to our abodes for a little rest.  We met up later, along with one of her friends, to go ice-skating (again).  I then got Starbucks, I missed it (sad but true) and then I headed back because  I had to get up super early to get on the first train to the airport to get back here.
Now I am at home and preparing for a Channukah party because its the 8th night and most of my friends haven't the slightest clue what Channukah is!


¡Hasta la semana que viene!
xoxo

Sarah

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