Welll again it's been a while since I've updated! I've really only taken one big trip since my last update. During our spring break I traveled to Newcastle, England where I stayed the parents of a girl who plays golf for K-State! Small world right? Anyways, I left the Thursday before our break and ended up getting there late because my train was delayed because someone had been hit and killed at one of the stations my train was going through. Yeah and on the train they apologized at every stop for the inconvenience....really? They also said sorry for the inconvenience, there was a casualty...as if we had a right to be mad about that. Oh well, anyways, my train from Edinburgh to Newcastle was really great! The view was spectacular! The train rode right along the coast the whole time, I mean I literally could look out my window and we were on the edge of a cliff looking over the ocean. When I was on the train it was around sunset, so the views were spectacular! I made it to Newcastle eventually where Malcomb and Helen were waiting to pick me up. I stayed with them until the following Wednesday and it was a blast! They took me all sorts of places in and around Newcastle. I went to this little island called Holy Island, to some other small towns around the coast, and to Alnwick castle where they filmed the first flying lesson in Harry Potter.
In front of the Castle on Holy Island
Helen gave me all sorts of fun sweets to try. I am now obsessed with scones and crumpets. She also gave me some cookbooks to start cooking...I've been getting better! I also drank more tea that week than I have in my entire life. I will be purchasing a tea pot to bring home...I am now a big fan of tea and scones :) I ate at this Italian restaurant which was amazing. I've never had any Italian quite like it. Olive Garden doesn't even hold a flame to this stuff. They also took me to a big mall in Newcastle called the Metro Center. It was huge and SO CROWDED! I've been to Chicago around Christmas time and this mall was crazier than that. Though everything in general seemed very crowded to me. Then Helen and Malcomb pointed out to me that England is in fact smaller than Kansas. Kansas has somewhere around 2.5 million people...England has around 60 million people. I now understand. I was there over Easter and went to church with a family friend of Helen and Malcomb's. After church we had a traditional easter dinner with roast, tons and tons of vegetables and yorkshire pudding. It was DELICIOUS. And they said they have that meal just about every Sunday. I wish we had Easter meals every Sunday! I also received two huge chocolate Easter Eggs...they don't do Easter baskets here but instead give each other these huge Cadburry Chocolate easter eggs. They're also pretty much amazing as well. It was definitely a great Easter! The next few days we did some more traveling around. We went to Hexham where we went to this amazing abbey called Hexham Abbey. I also got to go see Hadrian's wall which was really neat to see! It was really great just being able to get some homecooking for a week and sleep in a real bed in a real house :) I was sad to leave!
Standing on part of Hadrian's Wall
Sooooo since then nothing too exciting has gone on other than I've been working on some essays I have to turn in. I know. I'm mad I actually have to do schoolwork...what gives?? Oh yeah I guess the whole ICLEAND VOLCANIC ERUPTION has been quite the buzz kill here. I mean this thing just starts erupting out of nowhere in ICELAND and shuts down all traffic in EUROPE. Of course. Of course, right as my planned flight trips are starting to get all situated. And the worst part is, you can't see any of this ash cloud they claim is disrupting the atmosphere! I mean if it's gonna cause so much chaos, I at least want a sweet picture of me standing outside with volcanic ash surrounding me. But no, the skies are clear and blue. They said the last time this happened was in 1862 and it erupted for 2 years or something. Wellll that's no good now is it?! I'm supposed to be on a plane this Friday morning to Ireland. As of now the flights aren't cancelled...but they are up until Wednesday. Looks like I better find a decent swimsuit cause we might be swimming on over to the land of the Irish.
Here's a picture of the lovely eruption...
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