ENGLAND {part 2: york and whitby}

well. it's almost been like...1 month since we went to England. and boy have I been slacking. I've been so busy with homework, school, work, piano, and friends. Dad finally let me start driving his car to school and I have been taking my friends everywhere. it is soooo fun, and I have been waiting my whole life to be able to do that, and we have had a blast everytime! once a week, my reallllly good friend Kate (who I saw at the airport in the last post ) and I have our special lunch dates, and they are really my favorite part of the week. Today, my saint of a mother left Einstein Bagels and some cookies at my house, and pretty much everything was gone after we went back to school! anywayssssss.... back to England.

Day 3, we woke up at 5:30 in London to get ready for our next stage of the trip: York and Whitby. Most people haven't heard of either of those places, but let me tell you, they are the prettiest places I have ever gone. you know in the movie Pride and Prejudice, the beautiful green English countryside? it almost looks unreal, doesn't it? well, that's actually what England looks like. It is gorgeous. We were to meet our Castle cousins in York, and then go to their house in Whitby and spend 2 days there. Uncle Chris is in the Air Force, and what a lovely (windy) little (cold) place to be assigned!
We boarded our train at Kings Cross Station early that morning so we could board the train to Hogwarts!

(we wish.)

we somehow ended up in York instead. and it was super cold and rainy. but we were excited to see our cousins who we hadn't seen for about 3 years. and boy, have they grown up! Alyssa is 2 years younger than me, Alec is in between Wesley and Justin, and Hayden is a year younger than J. We went to the York Castle Museum (hahahahahahahahahahahaha get it, the Castles went to the Castle museum. I'm going to use that stupid little joke a lot in these posts, so be prepared). afterwards, we went to some viking museum and Wes chose a silly little Viking flute as his souvenir. he entertained and annoyed everyone around him by playing the same 7 notes every chance he could. Me, J, our cousins, their parents, and our parents were probably really close to breaking that thing!

 Alyssa and I. I'm 2 years older and much shorter.

 Hayden, Wes, J, and Alec

 We climbed a lot of stairs at this tower.

 we tried. we really tried.

 the Castle "women": me, Mom, Alyssa, and Rochelle

sometime in the middle of the day, the sun came out. then, we went to the York Minister and BAM it started pouring again. afterward, we got tortured and went to the York Dungeon and watched some really scary shows about the Plague, King Henry VIII, and Mom got put on trial for "dancing naked" (the actual dancing didn't occur, but the trial did. it's hard to explain.) finally, we were on our way to Whitby and stay with our cousins. the boys immediately ran to the backyard to play some soccer, and Alyssa let me take her comfy bed while she slept on the beanbag. what a saint.

next morning I woke up with some pretty nasty allergies. my lips were chapped and swollen, I was coughing up a storm, and my eyes dried up so bad I could barely see. this day was the boys favorite, and one of my hardest. we went to the Captain Cook museum in Whitby and walked by the harbor. we ran into some missionaries there, too! it was so exciting to see our missionaries in the teeny town of Whitby, England!

next, we went to Castle Howard. This was everyone's favorite thing because it had a super cool playground. and I had a really cool experience there. (too bad Rochelle took all the pictures and we don't have them.) so, there was a beautiful grand piano in one of the rooms there, and the lady who works there saw me eyeing it, and asked if I knew how to play. I said "yes" and she gave me permission to play! so, I played a grand piano in Castle Howard in England, and a lot of tourists that I didn't even know were watching. one old man asked me if it was the First Arabesque by Debussy, and indeed it was. I was so proud that I played it well enough for someone to recognize it! for the rest of the trip, I was not feeling very well at all and I had to just live through it. on our way back to Chris and Rochelle's, we stopped at one of the train stations that was featured in Harry Potter!

day 5 in England (day 3 of this post), we just chilled in Whitby again. Mom's camera died, so we didn't get a lot of pictures, and I really wasn't feeling good that day. but I was determined to have a good time on the last day with my cousins. we went to Whitby Abbey (where the boys played Fugitive together) and took a walk around town. we went to the beach and all the boys jumped into the North Sea with their clothes on. I didn't even get close. then, we had Fish and Chips for dinner. It was not exactly what I expected. They gave me a whole fish that I couldn't even finish. It wasn't my favorite thing, but we were in England, and what's a trip to England without fish n' chips?
we went to bed way early that night to prepare ourselves for getting up at 4:40 to drive to york, and catch the train to Edinburgh, Scotland! which, deserves a separate post. so, stay tuned for part 3. could come tomorrow, next week, next month, or next year. we'll see.