Motherland

Dear Internet,

WHAT A WEEK. After finishing our finals, we could all finally breath a sigh of relief. All that was left was a 6 day long coach trip to Western England. I’ll admit, at first, I wasn’t too keen to go. I would’ve rather stayed in London and enjoyed my last few days that sit in a coach and stay at hostels. I don’t know if you remember, but my last experience with a hostel did not turn out well. I wasn’t looking forward to it at all. But, mark this moment because I don’t say this often…I was wrong. Let’s be organized and break this into days.

Monday:

-       - Tinturn Abbey, one of the many old monasteries in ruin in England. History lesson! The reason they’re all in ruin is because King Henry the 8^th separated from the Catholic church in order to divorce his first wife, Catharine of Aragon. Known as the Reformation, this spurred the destruction of many churches and monasteries.

Tinturn Abbey

-       - Bath. I remember visiting this place as a little girl when I lived in England. The Roman Bath House is the main attraction here. It’s a naturally heated bathtub where the ancient Romans used to come to bathe and worship. Too bad the water was horribly dirty. After we went to the Fashion Museum, where Meredith and I might’ve had a little TOO much fun.

-       - Hostel #1. The worst of all the hostels in my opinion. Mainly because it was closing down after we left because it was NOT UP TO STANDARDS. This also marks the first of many jacket potatoes on the trip.

Tuesday:

-       - Exeter Cathedral. Beautiful, but what made this one of my favorites was what we did after our tour. Our whole group walked to the back chapel of the cathedral and sang a few hymns. It was incredibly special and spiritual.

-       - Tintagel and Merlin’s Cove. This is where King Arthur’s castle was. You can still see the ruins built into the side of the cliffs. This was also the first time seeing the ocean in a VERY long time. Being a fish out of water, I was thrilled! The sun was shining and the waves were crashing in this lovely place that I wish I could call home. After a bit of exploring, we went on a “short” and “flat” walk along the coast to the next town. What was meant to be 2 miles turned into 5 along the rocky up and down path that lead to Boscastle. While it was one of the most beautiful things, I wish I was a little more prepared!

Merlin's Cove

The view from our hike

Merlin's Cove

-       - Hostel #2. This was my favorite hostel! It was right on the beach and my room faced the ocean. We kept our window open that night so we could hear the ocean as we drifted off to sleep. Before we went to bed, a few of us went on a walk on the beach since the tide had gone out. In the dark we sang silly songs and ran around barefoot like idiots.

The view from our hostel

Wednesday:

-       - Eden Project. A self-sustainable “garden”, it holds one of the world’s largest rainforests in captivity. Who knew?! With huge biome’s, you can visit the tropics and the Mediterranean all in one day. Plus the food court is awesome!

-       - Land’s End. This is where people thought that the world literally ended.

-       - Hostel #3. The nicest of all the hostels. I was pleased with this.

Thursday:

-       - Saint Michael’s Mount. One of the most gorgeous places I’ve been to. It’s a castle on an island that you can walk to when the tide is out. SO COOL. Plus people still live in the castle. EVEN COOLER.

-       - Stourhead Gardens. This is where certain scenes from the newer version of Pride and Prejudice were filmed. Cue swoons. It was beautiful!

-       - Hostel #4. Did not like this hostel. Aside from the fact that my bed felt more like a crib, a stray cat decided to sleep in my friend’s bed while she was out.

Friday:

-       - Salisbury Cathedral. Really beautiful with a cute little old man as our tour guide. Plus I got to see the Magna Carta!

-       - Stonehenge! Self explanatory. Pretty much awesome.

Our whole group!

Saturday:

-       - Winchester Cathedral. This was a very unique cathedral because its crypt was flooded! Apparently it floods majority of the year. You can still go down and view part of it, which was amazing. Just check out the picture.

-       - Royal Pavillion. Where the Prince Regent, also known as George the 4^th, spent a lot of his younger days. It is over the top to the highest degree. There were no pictures allowed sadly. I could spout off random information I learned from my audio guide, but that’s no fun.

-       - Otto’s. Not part of our tour but part of London. Since it was my last night in England (WAAAAH), some friends and I hit up our favorite pizza place. It’s definitely a favorite. Cornmeal crust pizzas topped with crazy things like BBQ wings and brussel sprouts. Sounds weird, but is absolutely delicious.

BEST. PIZZA. EVER.

It didn’t hit me until Saturday that I would be leaving London so soon. It was a bit scary to think about! I’ll write more on that later, but this trip was a great way to spend time with some of my favorite people in the world. It also showed me how much I love not just London but England too! It might be rainy and cold, but nothing beats my England. GOD SAVE THE QUEEN.

Love,

Courtney