Week 2: York, England

This past weekend, a couple of friends and I decide to go travel to the city of York for our first

York Castle

independently planned travel weekend. This was definitely a learning experience for us and now we know a lot more about how to travel independently. We started the weekend with a class day on Friday to make up for a Thursday class that we won't have on February 7th. The day seemed to drag on because I was just ready to start my weekend travels. After we all got out of class, we took the 5:10pm shuttle from Harlaxton manor to the train station where we had to wait for our 7:30 train to York that only one out of the three of us would board. Surprisingly, that one was me. When we were trying to board the train, we realized we were on the wrong coach so we tried to get off so that we could walk down to coach C and get on there. Molly and Shelby made it off but the girl behind me wouldn't move so I was unable to get off and before I knew it, the doors shut and the train started moving. A guy standing behind me then told me that there were doors connecting the coaches and that I could just walk through to Coach C. Molly and Shelby ended up having to catch a later train to York, so I had to sit in the waiting room at the train station in York for almost an hour before they arrived. When they got there we decided we were absolutely not walking the 15 minutes to the hostel. With the way our trip had gone so far, we would've gotten lost. Luckily, there was a continuous line of taxis outside of the station picking people up and taking them to their hostel. In a hostel, you get one room to share with other people who book that room. In this case, it was a room with 6 beds and our group reserved 3 of them. Reserving spaces by beds instead of rooms cuts the price down a lot and in many cases you will only end up spending around 12 pounds a night. When we walked into our room that night we met two of the three of our roommates, one of which was changing out in plain sight..

Fancy afternoon tea food

The next day we made reservations for afternoon tea at a place called Betty's for later that night. To burn time before our reservation, we decided to go to the viking museum, which we learned later is intentionally made to smell funky to mimic what the vikings would have smelled like. It mostly just gave us a headache. We then went and took a tour of the York Castle which had a museum of the prisons that debtor's were kept in during WWI. Many of the people who went to prison there ended up being executed for their offenses. After that tour, and a brief walk through the town centre and local shops, we arrived at Betty's for afternoon tea. I wasn't sure how I was going to like it because it was really expensive and really fancy. They started by giving us a choice of 15 teas, all of which were endlessly refillable. I had a hard time choosing because they didn't have an option for "plain iced sweet tea" so I was a little skeptical. I ended up getting a Ceylon Blue Sapphire tea which, after adding a lump of sugar, was really good. I was surprised by how much I liked the tea. After tea, we got a spread of finger sandwiches, scones, and cakes. I was skeptical of that too because we didn't get to choose what they brought out, we just had to go with it. I told myself I was going to at least try everything since the meal was so expensive. The sandwiches were overall not too terrible. There was

Fancy Blue Sapphire tea

only one that I really did not like, but the others were pretty good. The scones were amazing, and most of the cakes were too. The whole experience just felt over the top fancy but it was a good way to experience a traditional British tea time. I liked it alright, but I don't feel like I got my money's worth. To end the first night in York we went on a Ghost Tour through the city of York on a double decker bus. It was a bit cheesy but overall a good time. The host was hilarious and told us a lot about the history of York and the people who died there.

The next day we got up a little later and checked out of our hostel at 10 am. This was poorly planned

Debtor's Prison Museum

on my part because we didn't leave on the train until around 8, so we had to carry our backpacks around with us all day. It wasn't too bad overall but a little inconvenient. We left our hostel and decided to go see a movie at the closest theatre. We ended up seeing the new Pixar movie, Coco, about the Day of the Dead and a boy who loves music. It was so cute, but definitely sad too. I was in a movie theatre crying over a Pixar movie. Unbelievable. After the movie, we walked outside through the snow to the closest restaurant for lunch before we went on a tour of York's Chocolate Factory which was my favorite part of the whole trip. During the tour they told us all about the history of chocolate and how it's made. Throughout the tour, they gave us many samples, and even made us a batch of passion fruit filled chocolates which were delicious. After the chocolate tour, we went to hang out at the Cosy Lounge for a few hours since it was the only thing open. We had a few drinks and played some board games while we waited for our bus back to Grantham which we all got on thankfully. We had a really good time in York and I loved exploring more of England!

After we all made it to York

This weekend I will be going to Cardiff, Wales with a group of friends, so hopefully that trip is just as fun and goes a little smoother.

Cheers!

Travel weekend 1: London

Colin the Caterpillar

Since I posted last, not much has been going on at the manor. We started classes and the events have slowed down a little. We did have a trivia house competition in the Bistro on Tuesday and that was a lot of fun. Especially since my house won! On Wednesday we took a local culture trip after class to a cute little town called Stamford. There were lots of shops to visit and we even bought a chocolate cake that looks like a caterpillar. Around 6:30 pm on Thursday, we loaded up the buses and headed out to London for the weekend for our first weekend trip. It took about two and a half hours to get there, so we didn't arrive until around 9:00 which didn't give us time to do much that night. However, on Friday we got up bright and early and went to experience the very mediocre, but free hotel breakfast before we headed off to the Tower of London for a few hours. After leaving the hotel, we walked in a big group to the tube station, making it even more obvious to the people of London that we were definitely tourists. The Tube ended up being not all that hard to navigate, and it was a lot like the MetroLink in St. Louis except bigger and underground. Surprisingly, my friends and I were able to navigate it correctly all weekend. The Tower of London was a really cool historical landmark. It was an old castle that now has displays of the armor and weaponry that the knights and kings may have used during this period. My favorite

Tower of London

part of the Tower was seeing the Crown Jewels. They were absolutely gorgeous and so intricate. I have never seen so much gold and so many diamonds in one place! It was magnificent. I wasn't able to get a picture because they didn't allow any photography of the jewels for security reasons. After the Tower of London, my friends and I separated from the group and went on a tour with another group to the Houses of Parliament. In Britain, they have the House of Commons and the House of Lords and we were able to take a tour of both. We were able to learn a lot of the history of Britain, and we learned that the Queen cannot go past the House of Lords whenever she visits parliament because of a century old feud between the house of commons and the monarchs. Both houses are extremely intricate and beautiful on the inside but again, we were not allowed to take pictures. On Saturday morning we got up and stopped for coffee at a nearby cafe before heading to Piccadilly Circus. Piccadilly Circus is not actually a circus, but instead it is similar to Times Square in New York. While in Piccadilly we bought tickets to see Kinky Boots at the Adelphi Theatre and then went to LegoLand, M&M's World, China Town, and a few tourist shops while we waited for the show to start. LegoLand in London is definitely not as big as the one in Chi-town, but they built Big Ben, Shakespeare, the

Piccadilly Circus

Loch Ness Monster, the Tube and a red Telephone booth out of Legos. If you've never been to LegoLand, it's awesome. Even better is M&M's World which is 4 stories of M&M's, and M&M's memorabilia. You can even see what color or flavor of M&M you are. I got white which apparently means I was having a moment of clarity. It was in fact clear to me that I wanted some M&M's so

maybe that's what they meant. In China Town we got bubble tea and saw all the chinese restaurants and marketplaces. They also had some good street performers. After China Town it was time to head to the show! I had never seen or really even heard about Kinky Boots before we went, but it was a FANTASTIC show about transgender individuals, and treating everyone with respect. It was funny, energetic, and interesting enough to keep me glued. Definitely worth seeing, and seeing it in London made it that much better. After we left the show and finally got dinner we headed to a "Jack the Ripper" tour on the East side of London where we walked around and saw all the places that his

Hampton Court Gardens

victims bodies were found and the gruesome details about their deaths. In all honesty, that was one of my favorite things that we did on this trip. It was creepy, but also absolutely fascinating. After all the events on Saturday, it was time to pack up our bags on Sunday and leave the hotel. After leaving the hotel, we went to Hampton Court Palace which is where Henry VIII and his many wives and later heirs lived. The gardens at the Palace were gorgeous and we got to see Henry VIII's apartment and his kitchens! We learned a lot about the life of Henry VIII and his marriage to Katherine of Aragon. It was quite a busy weekend, but I loved seeing everything in London and I hope to go back when they are done working on Big Ben and the London Eye so I am able to see those too.

Sorry for such a long post, Cheers!

Week 1:

The Carriage House

Thursday morning around 8:30 I finally arrived at Harlaxton Manor! It was an eventful and very long day especially when you include the 6 hour time change. Upon arriving at the manor, we walked through the front doors for the first and only time and were greeted by faculty and staff before our first welcome meeting where we got the keys to our assigned room in either the manor or the carriage house. I ended up in the carriage house and I have two roommates. After getting settled into our rooms and waiting for the other delayed flights to arrive, we went to dinner in the refectory and then celebrated our arrival with drinks in the Bistro (a pub in the basement of the manor). Friday morning started with a "Keeping Safe" lecture led by the vice principal of Harlaxton followed by a Harlaxton history lecture led by Dr. Bujak. After lunch we were able to explore the Harlaxton boutique and buy a couple souvenirs for our family members.

The Manor

We then went on a tour of the manor which helped me find my way around a little bit better, but not much. Then on Friday night all of the students were cordially invited to a High Table Dinner where we listened to bagpipes and were sorted into houses (just like Harry Potter). On Saturday morning we took a shuttle to the town of Grantham and went shopping for a few necessities that we couldn't pack. Afterwards were more orientation sessions for traveling and safety tips and the info fair. Later that night we went to an Irish dancing event called the Ceilidh. We learned a bunch of Irish dances and it turned out to be a blast. We ended the week on Sunday with an introductory British Studies lecture and I took the time to walk around outside the manor and plan a trip to York with some friends. Today was our first day of actual classes starting with British Studies bright and early at 8:30. So far, even though it has been pretty eventful and busy, I have enjoyed every second of being here and I am still in awe of the immaculate beauty of this place. This coming weekend I will be taking a trip to London and I can't wait to finally start traveling and posting about all my experiences!!

The Garden at the back of the Manor

The Great Room

Cheers!
Lanna Harmon

Hello!

As many of you probably know, I am going to be studying abroad this semester at Harlaxton College in Grantham, England. Harlaxton College is a campus owned by the University of Evansville where I am a current sophomore triple majoring in Political Science, Sociology, and Ethics and Social Change. While I am studying abroad this semester, I will have the opportunity to have 3 day weekends to travel around the continent of Europe and since my family and friends are eager to keep up with what I'm doing and where I'm going, I decided to start this blog. While I'm at Harlaxton, I will be taking 12 credit hours. One 6-credit British Studies class, A 3-credit Gender and Women's Studies Class, and another 3-credit course on British Politics. I plan on posting to this blog at least once a week with all of the travel experiences and overall life-happenings. I'm so excited to see what this semester has in store for me, but it is definitely bittersweet as I am packing up and leaving my whole life here in the states. I know that I will miss my family a lot, but they support me in everything that I do, and I could not be more thankful to have them.

 For now, it's time to get to bed so that I can navigate the airport tomorrow!
As they say in England, Cheerio!!