London, England

Arrived in London on Wednesday, the 20th of April. Met up with my friend in King's Cross and dropped my things off at his apartment. Went to catch the Arsenal vs. Tottenham game. The bars get pretty packed for any English league game. Watched the end of the Barcelona vs. Real game as well and then grabbed some food and hung out at his apartment. Next day we walked around LSE (London School of Economics) and went to the Courtauld House. I went to Uncle Paddy's place that night and caught up; we had a great time. My sisters flew in the next day. After a long hassle of phones not working and mixed terminals, we made it to our hotel (which was another fiasco due to the lack of sign on the building). Relaxed a bit and then headed out to see Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, and the Parliament Building. We checked out the Tate Modern Museum. It's mostly modern art (which can get a little weird), but many of the artists I learned about in my 3-D design class last semester. So I found it really interesting being able to see the artist's work right in front of my eyes. We went back and grabbed some food. The next day we met Uncle Paddy, Damien, and Sean Reidy at Harrod's Dept. Store. Noreen bought some chocolate and then we headed out to check out more of London. We went the British Museum (that holds all the items stolen by the British from around the world), walked through Camden (very similar to the atmosphere in Venice, California) and stopped for some Pimms, St. Paul's Cathedral, walked the Millennium bridge, took a ferry ride down the Thames River, and all in 33 degress Celcius/91 Fahrenheit. After the ferry, it began to pour. We looked into taking the London Eye ride (gigantic ferris wheel that takes 30 minutes to go 360 degrees so you get a slow paced view of the city), but it was too long of a wait. We grabbed some dinner and had a few pints to call it a day. Back to Ireland!