Adventure is out there, and it starts in London
If you know me, you know that I have always wanted to travel, to go and see everything I possibly could, and on June 23rd, 2022, that dream of mine started to come true.
The street that we stayed on in London, Ladbroke Walk.
Ben, Brody, and I all graduated from high school or college this June. Our amazing parents orchestrated this adventure for us. Ben, Brody, and My Mom/Karen set out to go to London, Scotland, Paris, Rome, and Pompeii. Around Rome, Ben's Mom/Shawna, and Chris will be joining us for the second stent after Brody and Karen leave. With them we will go to Milan, Venice, Zurich, Stuggart, Heidelberg, and back to Paris. After that(can you believe there's more?), just Ben and I will be heading to Barcelona. I am beyond blessed, thankful, and excited to go on this adventure with these fantastic people.
Ben, Brody, and I left Portland, OR, very early on June 23rd. We stayed in Atlanta, Georgia, where Karen had been on a work trip. We had dinner at the South City Grill with my Aunt, who we hadn't seen in a while. The food was delicious, but my tummy had been upset from the traveling and just everything else.
On June 24th, we left Georgia and had an 8-hour overnight flight to London. We arrived around 2pm and had dinner at PizzaExpress, which is all over the place here in the UK. It was pretty good; we've mostly just had the pepperoni and cheese because there's a lot of pizza with mushrooms here, which my mom and I are allergic to.
On our first full day in London, we took the hop-on-hop-off bus around town. We got off by the London Eye, then walked across The Westminster Bridge towards St Stephen's Tavern for fish and chips. After this, we headed to one of the London Hard rock cafes. This is the point where things get interesting. Brody wanted to go to Harrods to shop, but Mom had a cramp in her back and wanted to rest. We had done a lot already. We went shopping for a while and talked to a friendly security guard in front of a McLaren dealership. He had said he played football with a guy who had a Bugatti. I really wish we had found out who his friend was! At this point, we started a 35-minute walk back to the house we were staying at, but everything changed 15 minutes later. I get a call from mom. She is headed to the hospital. Not good. Brody and I take off running the rest of the way, and when I say run, I mean sprint. Brody says I didn't run as fast as him, and he left me in the dust, but I remember that happening only after we had run half a mile. Saving too many of the details about that mom came home eventually. It turns out that she had a 7mm kidney stone. The doctors put in a stent to keep the stone in place to let her continue the trip. Although it was a scary and stressful way to start our journey, 7 days later, I can say that she's almost back to normal and is happy to continue this trip with us, relatively pain-free.
Ben, Brody, and I saw many things while she was resting. This is probably why you are reading my blog post.
The first day after, we walked down Portobello Road Market, one of my favorite parts of London. Brody found delicious ice cream pops at one of the stores that we haven't been able to stop buying since. We also got a delicious pizza from Arancina with a fiat in its window that held the pizza.
The next day, day 6 of travel, was one of my favorite days in London. We got up and went to The Natural History Museum, which was freaking awesome! We even caught dinosaur pokemon on Pokemon Go at the museum. On our way there, we walked by the Imperial College, where we saw their FSAE trophies and work areas. That team is doing a similar thing to Ben's GFR team at OSU, it was pretty neat that we got to see it. It made Ben happy. This is also the day Mom returned from the hospital, which we were all pretty happy about.
On Day 7, Ben, Brody, and I went to the British Museum and saw a lot of old art, some of which were other things I learned about in school. Everything I learned about is locked up in the museum's private or special collections. After walking around the museum, we went to Piccadilly Circus. There were a lot of stores, mainly American candy stores. Brody got some pretty cool Nike stuff from this area, tech fleece if you know what that is. The Nike store had a Nike By You area, which I had thought only existed online. Watching people customize the stuff right there and then leave with it was very neat. We had Shake Shack in Piccadilly Circus, one of my favorites of those big burger brands. While we were walking to the Nike, we stopped at the tailor shop that the Kingsman storefront was based on, Huntsman and Sons. That was really neat. Ben and I both really like those movies.
Day 8, the last full day in London. We got up early to go to ride the London Eye. The view was something else, but it made your tummy turn on the way back down. Mom was getting a bit tired, so we took a cab back to the house to drop her off. At this point, Ben, Brody, and I took the tube to London Tower. We did not go in as it was close to closing and expensive. Still, we walked around it and saw the beautiful Superbloom, which is flowers flooding the moat. Then the London Bridge. When we got back, Ben and I walked down Portobello Road Market again, where I bought a nose ring because the one I had in kept catching on things. We then went to Patty & Bun, my favorite place to eat in London. I had a cheeseburger, we shared fries, and I had pink lemonade, which turned out to be a cocktail but was very, very good.
Despite a hospital trip, we had a fantastic time in London. Honestly, it wasn't quite my speed, but it was a bucket list item crossed off the list. Although it had a few quirks, the house we stayed in was really awesome and in a great location. My favorite things were the Natural Science Museum and Patty & Bun. We leave our first Scotland location next Friday, so check back here in a week for the next blog post. Cheers.
