No Tomorrow in Nottingham

While I've been trying my best to catch up on my Europe travels, I have also been busy celebrating the end of exams and the semester. One of the biggest events of the post-exam celebrations was the No Tomorrow Festival, which I got to go to yesterday, so I thought I'd better fill you in. This was basically a music festival at Wollaton Park, AKA Wayne Manor AKA home to everyone's favourite caped crusader. With dire weather forecasts and a miserable morning, I approached the afternoon of the festival with some trepidation. As it happens, Nottingham suprised us all with an absolutely stunning afternoon. We had sun the entire time, and no mud so we could lay on the grass and relax. The festival itself was great, with stalls, fairground rides, Pimms and of course a bunch of awesome musical acts. We spent the afternoon and evening dancing along to Jess Glynne, Clean Bandit, Sam Smith and London Grammar (none of whom I'd heard of until arriving in Nottingham). It was especially cool to see London Grammar who actually met at the University of Nottingham. Actually, being excited to see them BECAUSE they came from Nottingham made me realise how much the University feels like a place I would consider a second home. Also, I would thoroughly recommend seeing London Grammar live if you get the chance, as their lead singer sounds even more amazing in real life than she does recorded. All in all it was an amazing day and an epic way to celebrate the start of the break.

(PS cred to Emily White for the last couple of photos, I was a bit slack with taking my own)
 

Vienna is a handsome, lively city, and pleases me exceedingly.

 Finally! As of Wednesday I am a happily free woman, having finished all of my exams. Of course this is just one step closer to leaving Nottingham, but in the meantime I have two weeks to enjoy free of studying, so I can't complain. In an ideal world I'd now be spending all of my time outside in the sunshine, frolicking in meadows and what have you, but unfortunately this is England, and the weather is not that kind, so I guess there's no excuse not to spend my down time stuck inside catching up on my Europe travels.


We had timed our arrival in Vienna to coincide with Easter Sunday, so that we could enjoy markets outside Schonbrunn Palace. Our first morning we headed into the city centre to explore before heading out to the palace. We visited St Stephen's, the main catholic cathedral in Vienna, during their Easter service. The church was huge, and really beautiful on the inside, and it was interesting to see a little bit of a European catholic service. Of course, it was all in German so we couldn't understand anything. We then walked towards the Museumsquarter via the Spanish Riding School. This area was just surrounded with amazing buildings and statues, so it was great to explore.

The rest of the day was spent out at Schonnbrunn Palace, a former summer residence. When we arrived it was teeming with tourists, so we had a few hours to wait around before our tour. Luckily the weather was great, so we got to enjoy the easter markets and have a picnic in the sun.

 
It really was a beautiful setting, and we also had a chance to explore the gardens behind the palace. The gardens were huge, and filled with greenery and flower gardens, not to mention a zoo and a hedge maze, which we certainly made the most of. We had an audio guide for a tour of the palace, which was quite a nice way to go at your own pace but still take in a lot of information. There was so much history behind the palace, and its various residents, but probably the most entertaining point in the tour came when everyone realised they were in the room where a 6-year old Mozart played, and simultaneously flipped out. After the tour we returned to the gardens and walked up the hill behind Schonbrunn, past the beautiful Neptune Fountain to the Gloriette. From here we had an amazing view of both the palace and the city of Vienna.

Having completely exhausted ourselves, we finished the day with the all-important Wiener Schnitzel.

Our second day in Vienna we took a walk along the Danube river, where we encountered some amazing street art. The walls on both sides of the river were covered in a huge variety of art, some of it very cool and plenty of very weird stuff. 

From the river we walked towards the Museumsquarter, with a detour to the old home of Sigmund Freud, which has now become a Freud museum. Once at the Museumsquarter we spent some time at the Natural History Museum. The place was huge, with so much to see, so we didn't get a chance to get around all of the exhibitions, but we certainly saw a lot. Probably amongst the most popular displays would be the dinosaur fossils, which were very impressive. One of the other most famous displays has to be the Venus of Willendorf statuette, which I found surprisingly tiny. The whole museum was great, and it was only a shame that we were short of time, not to mention exhausted, and couldn't see everything there. Having exhausted ourselves out from days of walking around, we had a very laid back afternoon, which mostly involved deciding where we should stop to eat next. Austria is particularly well-known for its cakes, so we took it upon ourselves to try some of the most famous ones, particularly the Mozart Cake and Sacher Torte. These were 10/10 would recommend.

 

Once it got dark we also got the opportunity to see Vienna at night. Walking past the Opera House they had an outdoor screen to get to watch and listen to the opera for free, which give the area a great atmosphere. The buildings in the Museumsquarter and surrounding looked even more impressive all lit up, especially the Rathaus (town hall), and the parliament building.

Our final morning in Vienna I thought I should take the chance to visit the Hundertwasserhaus, especially to enjoy a little link with home. It did not disappoint, with a whole set of apartments designed in classic Hundertwasser style. There was also a gallery with some of his artworks and images of other buildings designed all around the world. There was also an underground bathroom with fountain, but of course not as great as the toilets in Kawakawa.

It was great to see something that was both a part of the country I was visiting, and of New Zealand, and also to see a part of Vienna a little out of the central tourist area.

I felt like we saw such a range of things in Vienna, from the historical palace to brand new street art, and everything in between. The city had such a lively feel, bustling with tourists and locals. It was a great place to explore, not to mention Vienna's great cafe culture (to rival Wellington even). Having very much enjoyed what Vienna had to offer we hopped on a train to our next destination, Budapest.

Byyyyeeee!

Prague never lets you go… this dear little mother has sharp claws

Well! I'm now halfway through exams, and not nearly halfway done with my blog posts about Europe, but I will soldier on, and hopefully get some more written in the next week or so! From Berlin a small group of us took the train to Prague (where we would meet the others taking the bus). While the bus might have been more economical, using the train to get between cities was definitely a great decision, as we got to enjoy some amazing views taking a scenic route. This was a great introduction into the Czech Republic, which was absolutely picturesque. Prague itself really seemed to epitomise the fairytale idea of Europe, and we were staying in the centre of the old town so we especially got to enjoy it. The only reminder that we were well in truly in the 21st century were the fast food chains which, for some reason, were unbelievably well signposted, with directions from hundreds of metres away. We also had a good laugh when we realised our hostel was directly opposite a Tesco. Suddenly the Czech Republic didn't seem quite so foreign after all.

Our first morning in Prague we took a walking tour offered through the our hostel. Our guide was actually a Brazillian now living in Prague. Although our tour wasn't as informative or well organised as the one in Berlin, we certainly got a unique perspective on the city. We started our tour in front of the great disappointment which is the astronomical clock. Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure that the actual functioning of the clock is impressive, but when you wait in a fully packed square for the clock to strike 11 with other tourists eagerly holding up phone cameras you expect a little more than a glorified cuckoo clock. It was fine. A much better sight, in my opinion, was the Charles Bridge.

 We crossed the river via the bridge and it was a great walk. First of all, we were blessed with some beautiful weather, and there were performers and artists all along the bridge. Although I do have to say I have never understood caricature artists, of which there were plenty in every city, including this one. Why would you travel to a foreign city only to pay someone to draw a picture of you with a larger nose than usual. Why, I ask?! From there we wandered around the city on the other side of the river, and then alongside the river. We didn't actually see many of the sights of Prague on the tour, but it was nice just to get a feel for the city, and we did see a few some interesting buildings and sculptures along the way, including this famous depiction of Freud.

After our tour we headed to what would soon become my favourite place in Prague, the Easter markets. Unsurprisingly, the markets were chocka full of delicious and, more importantly, affordable food as well as some local musical entertainment, and lots of craftwork. It was a really great way to get to know the local customs and cuisine. We all quickly formed an obsession with Trdelink (your pronunciation guess is as good as mine), this kind of sweet bread which I was actually first introduced to at farmer's markets in New Zealand as a Hungarian speciality. Travelling around Europe we did find that a lot of cuisines we might associate with one particular country were in fact quite ubiquitous throughout the continent. In any case, the Prague version was delicious.

 
In the afternoon we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather to walk up the Petrin hill, which has a lookout at the top.The hill itself is a park, so lots of greenery, which luckily made the walk more enjoyable, as we did find climbing the slop a little brutal. Honestly it probably wasn't that steep, but we were all very weary and perhaps a little out of shape. But reaching the top of the hill was definitely worth out, and we had some great views of Prague.

In the evening we took a pub crawl, as Prague is apparently well known for its nightlife. Up until that point in the trip we had encountered a lot of American and Australian tourists, and I was disappointed at the lack of kiwis, so I was amused to discover that all of our guides on the pub crawl were from New Zealand which, really, sounds about right. In general the nightlife wasn't that different from anywhere else I've been, and they still played mostly American and British music, although I suppose that could have just been the places we were taken. It was also really more of a club crawl, with the final venue being a "five story extravaganza". Basically every floor was dedicated to a different music style, although the "hip-hop" floor was playing Ke$ha and Katy Perry, so I'm not sure if they quite had the genres mastered. Our tour guide from the morning had assured us that Prague, especially the old town, was a really safe city, so we decided to walk back to the hostel to save money, and it did actually feel very safe. There was hardly anyone about, no drunken hooligans, and we got to enjoy an empty Charles Bridge which was very cool. I think that there are three ways one must experience a city in order to really get to know it, from the city centre, from above, and at night. Luckily I got to experience all three in Prague.

Our second day in Prague we visited the beautiful Prague Castle. This looked exactly like something out of a Disney movie, and is also the largest ancient castle in the world, so we were certainly impressed. Getting to the castle involved another steep climb, up a hill opposite the Petrin hill, but we got some more great views of the city. The castle had a lot to see, including the Basilica of St Vitus, reproductions of the Bohemian Crown Jewels and a mock-up of a historic street. Unfortunately the weather again took a turn for the worse, so we didn't spend much time exploring the castle grounds, but the buildings we did see were beautiful and detailed a lot of Prague's history.

The next day we had to get a train to Vienna, but not until the afternoon, so we had some more time to explore. The Jewish Quarter had been recommended to us. Unfortunately, upon arriving at the first synagogue we realised that it was in fact Saturday, which is the Jewish sabbath, so everything in the area was shut. We decided to still wander through the Quarter, as we could see some of the buildings from the outside. The place was funnily enough still packed with non-English walking tours. We did get to see this very strange Franz Kafka statue.

Unfortunately this mostly served to remind me that I didn't manage to read any Kafka while in Prague, despite the best of intentions. Having worn ourselves out, we ended our exploration of Prague with one last visit to the Easter markets, before heading to a new destination. Prague was very much the traditional European city I had been dreaming of before I started travelling, and it did not disappoint.

Berlin is a city condemned forever to becoming and never to being.

Well, well, well, look who's back! Having finally returned from a month of adventuring through Europe, it's time to start writing about it. Unfortunately I'm also heading into the exam period which means I may be a little busy studying to keep blogging, but fortunately I'm willing to do pretty much anything to avoid studying in the first place (just kidding, mum!). Basically my trip in Europe involved travelling with a group of other exchange students from the USA, Australia and one lone New Zealander, getting the train from city to city, seeing some of the major sights that Europe has to offer.

The first place we arrived was Berlin, which is a pretty great introduction to Europe I think. I do have to say that I think my experience in Berlin suffered a little from timing. Being right at the start of the trip I hadn't quite settled in to the rhythm of travelling, we only had two full days there, and the weather was less than ideal. I did like Berlin, but I think I would need to visit again to really fall in love with the city. Our first day was largely spent walking around, first a little exploring on our own, disrupted by repeated sudden downpours, and in the afternoon a walking tour. In my head I thought that I would prefer wandering around a city at my own pace and picking out my own sights, but I went along with the rest of the group and realised that this was by far the best way to be introduced to a city. We took a Sandemans free tour which uses tipping instead of a set price (ideal for us poor students!) and had a great English guide for the 2.5 hours of walking. We started at the Brandenburg Tor and were then taken around the central city, seeing sites mostly associated with World War II and the Cold War. A lot of this was quite sad, because the effects of the past 100 years are still very visible, and it really lacked the classic old architecture in most other European cities. On the other hand I guess this is what sets Berlin apart from everywhere else, it gives it some of its unique character and culture. In any case, our guide did a great job of balancing both the good and the bad within Berlin's history.

Having tired ourselves out from basically an entire day on our feet, and put off by the miserable weather we spent the evening at the hostel. I have to say I was pretty nervous about hostel living, having had the privilege of only ever travelling with my parents in relative comfort, but it ended up being great. Everything was clean, the showers were surprisingly great and I even survived the top bunk. The hostel in Berlin had its own bar which was a nice place to hang out, and meet people. In our case this was an entire Norwegian girls choir. While eating our dinner suddenly the table next to us burst into beautiful song in a foreign language, causing every boy in the bar to turn towards this table of blonde norwegian girls in an entirely comical way. As one of my friends pointed out, it was basically like the Veela in Harry Potter.

The next day a few of us walked out to the East Side Gallery, the longest remaining stretch of the Berlin Wall which was commissioned to be covered with street art.

This was a very cool sight, with a huge range of art from the beautiful to the creepy to the just plain weird. We only walked a short section of the wall because it really did seem to stretch on forever. I think the only disappointing thing was the amount of graffiti covering the art, despite the many signs requesting otherwise. I mean is it neccessary to write "John and Jane 4eva 2k14" on a historic wall, I don't really think so. We walking back into the city with the intention of visitng the Holocaust Memorial and underground display. We got to the memorial, but the queue for the display went on for days, so we just walking through the memorial itself.

That evening we took a train out to Edelweis, a bar recommended to us by our tour guide for its Tuesday Jazz Nights. In explaining how to find the bar he said "you'll walk through an abandoned railway at which point you might think you're going to die but if you just keep going you'll get there and it won't be at all dodgy". Heeding his words we did eventually find the place, without dying, and it was much nicer than the surroundings might suggest. We headed upstairs to a small room where the jazz band was setting up. At first it seemed very quiet but in just a few minutes the whole place really filled up. The first hour or so was a jam session from the house band, a group of americans, and then an open session. The whole thing had a very cool vibe, and it was a nice relazing evening, although it got a little suffocating with a crammed room full of people smoking (an experience to be repeated many a time in Europe). In any case, it felt like a really authentic experience and a great way to end our time in Berlin.

Having satisfied my need to eat a Berliner in Berlin we hopped on a train to our next destination: Prague.

In which I learn to be a tourist in Nottingham

Phew, let me tell you study abroad is nothing if not time consuming. Not only do I have to do actual study for actual exams, but I also have to make the most of my time with new friends and plan extensive travel for vacation. I mean, it has it's perks, but getting time to write a blog is apparently not one of them. Still, I'm making an attempt, and I'm here to tell you about finally getting to explore Nottingham properly.

I think it's a typical cliche that you never really get the chance to be a tourist in the place where you live. That's certainly been true for me back in New Zealand. Having lived in Auckland for 3 years I would surely have at least made it to Waiheke Island once, but when you live somewhere you always have an excuse to put things off. I've found the same being in Nottingham. While I've made plenty of daytrips to explore other towns I've barely seen any of the attractions in Nottingham, at least in the city centre, so when my brother Max visited for a weekend it was the perfect excuse to become a tourist.

We started off our Saturday morning the only way we could, breakfast in a bar/converted church, the Pitcher and Piano. This is incredibly popular in Nottingham, unsurprising given the setting. The inside is amazing, with surrounding stained glass and various arches and alcoves, so this was a very cool place to enjoy a big breakfast. We then headed to Nottingham Castle. This included the obligatory photo in front of the Robin Hood statue, and then an exploration of the grounds. The site offered great surrounding views of the city, which I guess explains why they chose it for a castle. There was also one remaining building which housed a whole variety of exhibitions. We checked out a few, including the story of Robin Hood, before finishing our circle of the grounds. Following this it was only appropriate to grab a pint at Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem, dubiously titled the oldest inn in England. It certainly was old, and the inside was something of a maze, with rooms and stairways every which way. The food menu also looked delicious so I would love to return again to be able to spend an evening there.

 Feeling refreshed we then took a tour of the "City of Caves", an exploration of the sandstone caves below Nottingham. These tours are very popular with families so we had a few children with us. One girl was very nervous about the prospect of bugs inside the caves (I recommended she not visit the weta caves in NZ). She asked Max whether he thought there would be any spiders down in the caves. Not satisfied with his answer she asked our tour guide who reassured her that there would not be any spiders causing the girl to stare daggers in Max's direction. If looks could kill, I tell ya. The cave tour involved wandering through several sections set up for different uses, such as a tannery, bomb shelter and hideout for criminals. Our ticket also gave us a tour of the Galleries of Justice, which was well worth it, and offered a lot more than the caves. We had different characters from different eras taking us on a tour of first the court and then the prison below. This included various cell designs from pits in the ground to the most modern cells of today, which was all kinds of unpleasant. I was especially enterteined when we were assigned different crimes and the punishments which would befit them. I ended up being deported to Australia, which I quipped was probably a punishment worse than death. After a long day we needed a drink and dinner so we headed to Spanky Van Dykes. Don't let the ridiculous name put you off, this is actually a very cool bar (or eatery and funhouse as it describes itself) with delicious food and funky decor. We ended the night back at the P&P which was absolutely packed, but we got a table upstairs which offered great views of the whole church.

On Sunday I showed Max around my university hall and campus. Luckily it was very nice weather so we took a stroll by the lake. It was very picteresque, especially as the cherry blossoms were just blooming. We headed across the road to Wollaton Park, as Max was very excited to see the home of Batman. It was great to wander through the grounds, but unfortunately we had chosen the wrong day to see inside the Hall as it was hosting a Vintage Wedding Expo. We braved the garish pink and lace to check out a bit of the inside, but it was very crowded.

With a few hours before Max's train we decided to have a relaxing afternoon with tea at Thea Caffea, a local tearoom, and then took a wander through the city square and along the canal. It was great to take a whole weekend away from the university, to explore the city and to hang out with my big brother.

For the next week or so I will be knuckling down to study and finish my last assignments for the semester. After that I'm heading to mainland Europe for almost a whole month of travel. I'd love to say I'll be updating you on my adventures, but given that I will probably be very busy and without my laptop it might be a struggle. I'll try to add photos to facebook and instagram if you want updates though.

Byeeeeee!!!!!

A tale of two lanes

If there was one city which was at the top of my list to visit while in England, it was probably Liverpool. Liverpool has a special place in my heart, as it was once home to some of the coolest people you will ever meet. I'm referring, of course, to the Myles/Donelan clan (I bet you thought I was gonna say the Beatles, who are alright as well I guess). Having spent a year or so of my formative years in Liverpool I was keen to take a trip down memory lane. To be fair most of my memories come from photographs, but I still like to think my stay had some lasting effects on my childhood. In any case, Liverpool also has a reputation as a pretty cool city, with some quality museums, its famous docks, and the inescapable legacy of the Beatles. I'm sure every other international student was as grateful as I was when a travel organisation for students announced a daytrip to Liverpool, and they would never again have to hear me say "okay I'm definitely going to book a trip to Liverpool soon", for the hundredth time. And so it was that I found myself surprisingly eager to be getting on a coach at 7am on a Saturday morning.

The past two daytrips that I took were with societies run through the University of Nottingham, but this one was run by an external organisation, and it was unbelievably better organised than either of my previous trips. Instead of just dropping us off in the middle of a new city with a map and a thumbs up they actually had a planned itinerary, which you could follow or not as you pleased. Our bus dropped us off first outside the Cavern Club, a nightclub fashioned after the original club where the Beatles once played. This was definitely the biggest tourist area of Liverpool, and no one was turning up the chance to advertise their link with the Beatles, with hotels such as the Hard Days Night or Eleanor Rigby. We went to a cafe on Mathew Street for breakfast which ostensibly had nothing to do with the Beatles, and yet the walls were covered with photos of the Fab 4, in case we were in any doubt about where we were. I chose to stay with the group for the morning, before heading off on my own, which turned out to be a great plan as I got to visit the Anglican Cathedral. I hadn't heard anything about the Cathedral before the trip, so I probably wouldn't have gone there if it weren't for the recommendation, and it was well worth it. 

The cathedral is the fifth-largest in the world, and the longest, so in other words it was huge. I certainly have never been in a cathedral anywhere near as big. We were there was at least a good half hour just wandering through the whole building. At the west doors was a large floor space with surrounding very impressive stained glass windows and a Tracey Emin art installation, which seemed somewhat out of place in a cathedral. We walked more or less the length of the cathedral, up to the main altar and into side galleries which included various other art pieces, and details on the construction of the building which took a good 74 years. It would have been great to also explore the bell tower, arguably one of the largest in the world, but unfortunately we didn't have time. I was definitely glad to have seen the cathedral though, I doubt I will get a chance to see another cathedral which is comparable.

From there I separated from the tour group with a couple of international students, to head to my old house via some Beatles landmarks. It took us at least an hour to walk there, but it was actually a good chance to explore the suburbs. Living on a University Campus, most of our time outside of the campus is spent in major city centres, so it was nice to see an English city outside of the tourist hotspots. There were a few of these amazing old red brick houses on our route, with overgrown hedges and black steel bar fences looking like something out of American Horror Story. Also luckily our route took us pretty much in a straight direction, meaning it was difficult for me to lead us astray (as is usually wont to happen). I still nearly managed it, when I got confused between the misleading similar Greenbank Drive, Gorsebank Rd and Greenbank Rd. I mean, who is naming these streets, honestly. Eventually we made it to Penny Lane, made obvious by the massive crowd and hard-to-miss Magical Mystery Tour Bus. It must be a pain for local drivers to have these tours coming past, as the road is inevitably blocked up with people taking advantage of the photo opportunity. Once the tour had moved on we took our chance, and then walked along Penny Lane, which turned out to be a very long road.

Eventually we made it to the real destination, No 7 Centreville Rd, AKA my old home. The street did look familiar from the old family photos, although to be fair, English streets are all very similar. It was pretty cool to see the house at an age when I am likely to remember this visit properly, and to visit the area where little me spent a whole year, so I was quite excited.

Having exhausted ourselves from the long walk we opted to take a bus back into the centre city. We wandered around Albert Dock, and then decided to visit the two best-known museums, the Maritime and International Slavery Museums. We had under two hours before being picked up so it was very convenient that the two were located in the same building. The most prominent exhibition in the Maritime Museum was probably that on maritime disasters involving the Liverpool docks, in particular the Titanic. There was also a lot about both world wars, and the navy in general, and a exhibiton on immigration and customs. On the top level was the Slavery museum, which detailed both the introduction and abolition of slavery in Europe, and the after-affects on black culture particularly in America and Britain. It was unfortunate that we had so little time, as both museums were really interesting and well set up. I could have stayed and seen much more in the museums with a couple more hours. This goes for the city as a whole as well. After the Slavery Museum we had to head straight to the busstop and back to Nottingham. I could easily have stayed another day and had much more to see. Even though I try to avoid looking too much like a tourist I would have loved a whole day just to explore the Beatles side of Liverpool, and then another day to see all the museums. I never get tired of a good museum, and Liverpool seems to have an abundance of them. The city centre also had a very cool vibe, with lots of little cafes and niche shops which would be worth exploring. I can only hope that I get another chance to go back in a few years time.

 
Byyyeeeee!

In which I visit a university town and a seaside port.

One of the best parts of being in Nottingham has to be the location. Nottingham is in the Midlands, so more or less in the middle of England which means that most towns are pretty easy to visit just for a daytrip. And also conveniently there are lots and lots of University-run groups organising said daytrips meaning low costs and an enjoyable lack of self-responsibility. Instead of having to decide which towns to visit, and when, I just wait until an event pops up on Facebook, and off I go. This means in the past couple of weekends I got to visit a couple of towns which hadn't really been on my radar of must-see places, but which were definitely worth the trip. 

First up, Oxford. Oxford is probably most well known for the university, but given that New Zealand universities aren't exactly major tourist attractions it hadn't really struck me as a visiting destination. Once I heard that Oxford was the home of Alice and Wonderland, and that parts of Harry Potter were filmed at one of the colleges I was sold. It was also interesting to see given that I had recently visited Cambridge, home to the UK's other most famous university, offering a good comparison. Oxford felt very much like a tourist destination, which an abundance of shops selling Oxford sweaters and Union Jack tshirts, and no shortage of (very pricey) attractions to visit. Personally I feel like I wouldn't enjoy studying a town which was always packed with visitors and tourist busses, but I guess that's the price you pay to attend a presitigous and famous university. 

Upon arriving in Oxford we decided to explore some of the town before seeing one of the university's famous colleges. We saw some famous buildings, including the Radcliffe Camera and Bodilean Library, which were both very impressive. I would have loved to explore the library inside, but unfortunately you had to accompany a tour which of course meant spending far too much money. Instead we headed to the Ashmolean Museum, a museum of art and archeaology. It was a somewhat strange museum because it had a lot of displays, but many of them were replicas and casts of famous archealogical finds, so one could never be quite sure without reading up close whether something was genuine or just a copy. Still, it was a good way to spend the morning as we were waiting for the chance to visit Christ Church (one of Oxford's colleges), which wasn't open until the afternoon. 

Christ Church was home to the Lewis Carroll and, more importantly, its dining hall was used for filming in the first Harry Potter film. This was apparently a very big draw card as we spent a good 5-10 minutes just walking slowly in a queue from one end of the hall to the other. Apart from the dining hall we also got to see some of the grounds (although most was closed to visitors), and the chapel, which actually functions as the cathedral for the diocese of Oxford. Needless to say I was pretty impressed by the college, which was a far cry from the accommodation back home. After our visit we headed across to the road to the "Alice Shop", apparently the actual shop upon which Lewis Carroll based the Old Sheep Shop in Through the Looking Glass. It was a tiny shop filled with so much Alice in Wonderland memorabilia. I wanted to buy the whole shop basically, especially the tea sets. By this time we were exhausted, but still had a couple of hours before our coach pick-up, so we checked out the outside of the remains of Oxford Castle, and then headed to a pub for traditional fish and chips and a drink to round off a long day.

The following weekend I took a trip to another very popular destination, the seaside town of Whitby. As anyone from Samuel Marsden would know, I found this particularly funny because our high school bought and integrated an independent school from the suburb of Whitby in Wellington, so I spent the whole trip making Marsden Whitby jokes which absolutely no one understand. Aside from that, I actually really loved the town and the seaside ambience.

We first walked up to Whitby Abbey (which can be seen up on the hill in the photo). We had a great view of the town from the top of the hill. We took a tour of the Abbey remains, which included an audio tour. I've never actually used an audio tour before, and it was actually quite cool, because you could just wander around the abbey exploring while taking in information, rather than just reading a sign. It was also quite cheesey because the tour seemed really geared towards children, so there were lots of really bad reenactments from "historical figures", but this just ended up being pretty funny. They'd also chosen a really weird focus to capture the children's attention, in the form of executions. There were all these cardboard cutout figures of cartoons being executed around the abbey remains, and we were even informed that we could meet the "executioner" on our tour. Somehow this seemed very odd against the backdrop of this historic religious building. In any case, the remains themselves were magnificent, and it was only a shame that we couldn't have seen the whole abbey when it was in its full glory.

  The only downside to being at the top of the hill was the wind which was especially blustery and cold, so we didn't stick around for too long. We did explore the Church of St Mary and neighbouring graveyard which were also at the top of the hill, before heading back down to the town. The town itself was actually a lot more bustling than I expected, with a lot of shops for everything from fancy plates to jewellry to sweaters. And there was a neverending abundance of ice cream and sweet shops. I was surprised by how many people were actually eating ice cream, given that it was very cold and very windy and not at all cold food weather, but I suppose it was appropriate for the location. We opted instead to get fish and chips from the Magpie Cafe (recommended to us by basically everyone). The advice was good, and we enjoyed some delicious fish and chips while sitting on the pier. I do have to say that the chips in England are always much soggier than NZ, which is a let down, but the fish was great, and clearly fresh. I also very much approve of the addition of vinegar. In order to work off the very filling fish and chips we walked up another hill which had a statue of Captain Cook, and looked out across the town from the opposite side to the abbey.

On our walk back towards the coach stop we thought we would check out one of the "family amusement centres". Basically a whole section of the street leading down to the pier was filled with those arcades with different games like Timezone in Wellington, all with lots of flashing lights and fun for all the family advertised. It actually turned out to be super creepy, with all these really stupid penny games where you just keep sticking pennies into slots with the eventual (but unlikely) hope that you will win a tacky prize. And it was all lone adults, who were clearly there for the gambling rather than the family fun. 0/10 would not recommend for future visitors.

In any case, I definitely enjoyed everything else about Whitby. It really felt like the kind of place that would be nice for a whole weekend getaway, especially in the summer when you could really enjoy the actual beach aspect. I still have a few day trips planned for the next couple of weeks, so I will try to keep this updated.

Byeeeeee!