ENGLAND {part 4: the Finale}

I bet you are all relieved that I finally brought myself to finish blogging about this trip. It's taken a month and a half almost, and you are probably tired of waiting for the next post. well, here it is. the final state of our exciting adventure. and dang, do I miss it.
we ended our trip back in my favorite city, London. Boy, was I happy to be back. I loved York, Whitby, and Edinburgh.... but I really loved London. and there was still so much more that we needed to see! since we got to our apartment at 1 in the morning, we slept in. it felt so good. unfortunately, one of us clogged the toilet (not saying who) and we were delayed in leaving to try to work out a solution. finally, we just decided to hop on the subway and head towards St. Paul's Cathedral.

now, you'd think after touring church after castle after royal palace after castle after church, we'd get sick of seeing them. wrong. St Paul's was different than the other ones. you see that big dome? well, we got to climb it and see an amazing view of London! after marching up at least 32094893 stairs (or so it seemed; probably around 500 at least. who knows. there were a lot of stairs), nobody died and we were at the top. it was a lot of walking, but hey, we were in London. and we probably wouldn't get the chance to go back and do this again. so, why not?

mom sporting yet another audio tour guide

we climbed back down those stairs and I thought I was going to pass out. the boys and I rested while Mom and Dad toured the rest of the cathedral. when we were done, our next stop was Westminster Abbey. most people might think "a famous church building with gravestones of famous dead people. sounds extremely boring." well, us Castles are either huge nerds, or this place was absolutely not boring. again, with the AP World History, we got to see the graves of a lot of people I learned about. it was very interesting, and Ms. Baker even gave me study credit for going to all these places. (what a saint.) we couldn't take pictures inside, but if we could have, we would have. it was so pretty.

hopefully, you're thinking "that's pretty cool, isn't it?" well, it is. and if you are thinking that, well guess what. Westminster Abbey is by other cool things. like........ possibly the most famous landmark in London.

 

we found a little convenience store right by the Houses of Parliament, and got crisps (because they call the french fries "chips"), sandwiches, bagels with smoked salmon (this became a personal favorite of mine), and Cadbury chocolate. we ate it in a nice park across from Big Ben, next to a statue of Winston Churchill. some girl who looked around Wesley's age or maybe older was making her mom take about 1000 pictures of her jumping in front of Big Ben. Of course, the boys decided that it would be a great idea. Justin's face is my favorite. I know you're thinking, that's a lot to see in a day! and you're right. but were we done? HECK NO! because next on our list was THE famous British Museum.

before our trip, Dad gave us an itinerary a few days earlier, and showed us pictures and websites of all the places we would visit. when we got to the British Museum, Justin immediately says, "that's the place with the talking dinosaurs!" we all laughed and were a bit confused, and finally, Dad said, "that's the museum of Natural History in New York. We will be going there this summer. This one is the one with the Egyptian--"
"Oh, I know this place! YES this place is so cool!" so I think Justin was more excited than the rest of us.

again, with the AP world history, I had learned a lot about most of the stuff in the museum, but it was really awesome to actually see it in real life, instead of just see pictures in the history text book! (in case you haven't been able to tell, I am a total history nerd. I got a 5 on the AP World Practice test, which means I pretty much aced it. The real AP test doesn't give my score until July, but I feel like I pretty much aced that thing too. Not to brag or anything. I just really love history and find it really interesting.) this was perhaps the best way to review for the AP test, which was a month away. but that test has every event, from every time period, from every region of the world, pretty much. so the visit to the British Museum was very effective. I was able to review  my world history on the trip, but actually see it. and have fun with it! so, be prepared for some really awkward, funny pictures. but we all had the best time at this place. so much easier to see all the Egyptian artifacts at the British museum than actually traveling to Egypt! (Justin randomly announced at scripture study one night, "Wesley is going to Egypt on his mission!" pretty sure the Second Coming is more likely to happen before missionaries are allowed in Egypt.)

 J's goals: to get muscles like that.

 bro fist bump. he was pretty disappointed that he couldn't actually touch it.

 "what is the Rosetta Stone anyways? and why are you making me take a picture with it?" 

 walk like an Egyptian

 Mom: "Miriam, pose like a Greek Statue!"

me: "Is this good?"

Mom: "Not like that! Just kidding. do whatever you want."

 Justin kept on asking every 5 seconds, "can we see the Easter Island heads?" 

 we all had really bad allergies on this trip. Mom happened to catch us all coughing (minus J)

 this wasn't much better.

if we could've taken 100 more pictures, we would have. my iPhone had limited storage, and as much as I wanted to take a picture of every statue we saw, I didn't. you guys are probably relieved that you don't have to suffer through any more pictures! or, you're sad because you wanted more. either one works.
after a few hours of exploring history, we all got really hungry. the subway station by our apartment was connected to a miniature shopping mall, and there were a lot of restaurants there. we decided to go back to Nando's, because we loved it so much the first time. It tasted even better the second time because we weren't jet lagged, we didn't have headaches, and we had just had the best day.

sadly, our adventure had to come to an end, and we needed to get back to America. everyone was either happy because they missed us, or they were upset because they wanted us to stay longer. but the time came, and we spent all of Saturday morning packing up our apartment, making sure we didn't leave any evidence of us behind. (except for Wesley's umbrella. That kid has a history of coming back with less things than he came with. He also has a history of losing umbrellas. Several are floating around all over Japan, and one is somewhere in London. We hope that people pick them up and find them to be of great use.) after we were sure that we had everything (Wes is a very good liar), we marched out of our apartment, luggage in tow, and hopped on a subway to the Heathrow Airport. now, I don't know what it is with Castles and airports, but we are either super hyper, or super grumpy and tired. This time, Justin was dancing and singing some song he made up about America. after what seemed like forever, our plane finally took off. I made the really bad choice of watching Forrest Gump on the plane. I had never seen it before, and Dad said it was good. and it was. It was one of the best movies I had ever seen. But I could not stop crying. by the end of the movie, I was shaking and trying to control myself. but I don't think I have cried that much since I saw Les Mis a year ago.
after 10 long hours, we finally landed in Seattle, went through customs, grudgingly sat through a 2 hour layover, and enjoyed free wifi and cell phone service for the first time in a week! we were all too tired to function, and I think I actually slept on the ride from Seattle to Salt Lake! this time, we did not see any of my friends at the airport, but that was a good thing. we were all so tired, and looked like we got beat up. we waited an hour to take the frontrunner train back to Orem, and drove on the right side of the road back to our house in Provo. the first thing I did was eat 3 bowls of cereal. I missed traveling all over the UK, but it felt good to be in my own bed.
well, no more England posts! It was definitely my favorite trip. this summer, be prepared for our New York trip!

PS. to anyone who is signed up for AP World History next year or is considering taking the class, DO IT. it was my favorite class I have ever taken. it's fun, you learn a lot, and you watch hilarious video clips. the test is really hard, but if you study for it, then you've got it! the best way to prepare for this test? go to England.