Ciao tutti!
Welcome to Katie's Corner. A sidestep away from SPQR: All Roads Lead to Rome, this is the running commentary on Jennifer's blog that existed only in my mind as well as a vocalized nagging to Ms. Vosters. Until now. 'Cause we all need a lover of the craft, yet non-English major to balance out this hardcore literary fanatic. I joined up with Jennifer in Rome last spring after spending the fall semester back on campus. You may recognize me from my 8 photo appearances and the endlessly clever titling of "Gelato jubilee". I know! Who says a Communicative Sciences and Disorders major can't write? That's worth a Pulitzer at least.
Well friends, this blog has been abandoned for too long. Jennifer
went to Berlin after Prague, but hasn't even told you the inner workings of
that trip! Meanwhile, our friend Maddie and I were visiting Smicks in Ireland, and
then scurrying around Glasgow and Edinburgh in Scotland. We were all reunited
on April 27th, and that's where our London story begins.
Side note: Now, dear readers. Don't become terribly confused. Since
she's left this blog by the side of the road to do so-called important
activities like classes, work, and watching Doctor Who, she has been to London
yet again. This focuses on her April/May 2014 trip to England's capital. Not
her December 2013/2014 trips. The girl drank the London juice and couldn't get
enough. If you've been there, you can understand why.
Sunday, April 27th
It was my third time to London, Jennifer’s second and Maddie’s
first, but we were all equally enthusiastic to be in an “easy” city after our
previous months of traveling.
Speaking/reading English entirely was almost nerve-wracking. I was waiting for our SMC Rome Program
director to jump out behind the Houses of Parliament and slap my hand for not
speaking Italian. London was our
playground and guilty pleasure. Maddie
and I spent the first morning watching the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham
Palace, sometime residence of the Queen, fulltime tourist mob. The palace isn’t necessarily jaw dropping,
but the parks in London are spectacular; St. James’s and Green Park surround
the site and bloom with carefully coordinated tulips. The three of us whiled
away the afternoon at Kensington Palace, where William and Kate have an apartment,
and a museum is housed showcasing the Royal Family’s past as well as my
favorite exhibit, Princess Diana’s gowns.
A walk along the River Thames and a late night jaunt to Piccadilly
Circus (the London equivalent of Times Square) rounded out the first full day.
View of the London Eye from St. James's Park
Monday, April 28th
We kicked off day two with one of my favorite London sites, Covent
Garden. Many may recognize it from My
Fair Lady, as the location from which Eliza Doolittle sold her flowers. The marketplace is a mix of higher-end stores
and antique flea market. You can visit
the Apple store and buy an old hand mirror within the span of 15 minutes. It also is home to one location of Ben’s
Cookies, my first love in life. If you
haven’t tried their orange peel variety, you need to board a plane to London
ASAP. We lunched from the brilliantly
named The Pie Shop, where all enjoyed mushroom pies and meat paste. I can’t create any alibi for Jennifer that
afternoon; Maddie and I journeyed to Leavesden Studies in Hertfordshire, part
active film hanger, and part Warner Bros. Studio Tour London-The Making of
Harry Potter. We delightfully squealed
and took so many photos both of our full charged camera batteries died. The trio, not Harry, Ron and Hermione, but
Maddie, Jennifer and Katie, spent that night awkwardly ordering only food at a
wine bar.
Local Ravenclaw Maddie Corsaro flies through the barrier at Platform 9 3/4
Baker Street! If you listen
very closely, one of us is thinking or talking about Sherlock Holmes at any
given moment. Tuesday belonged to the
man in the deerstalker, as we ventured over to Baker Street, the location of
Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson’s flat in the Arthur Conan Doyle stories. At their 221b address, there’s a museum set
up like their lodgings and a buzz-worthy gift shop. Following our Victorian era Holmes adventure;
we headed over to North Gower Street, the exterior filming location for BBC’s
modern day adaptation Sherlock. We ate
lunch outside at Speedy’s Café, which is adjacent to the Consulting Detective
and trusty friend’s door in the show.
The staff obviously knew we were fans, so they let us walk around the
tiny restaurant to view their Sherlock cast pictures hanging on the walls. Bonus: someone walked out of the “221b” door
and nearly gave us a heart attack. Not to outdo our already fantastic day, we
joined up with our friends and fellow Rome Smicks, Katie and Megan, for dinner
in Chinatown and a showing of Les Misérables.
Can you say spoiled?
Wednesday, April 30th
High off Les Mis excitement, Maddie and I started Wednesday off with
a visit to Westminster Abbey, which coincidentally was the third anniversary of
William and Kate’s wedding at the same spot.
I know Kate would have made us bridesmaids. As if we needed to add any more fuel to the
Sherlock fire, in the afternoon we all went by the Old Bailey courthouse, which
was a filming location, before reaching our destination: St. Bart’s
Hospital. Fans will recognize it as the
spot Sherlock jumped to his apparent death.
A classic red phonebook had been turned into a Sherlock shrine, with
drawings and scribbled quotes. We ate
Hobnobs on a bench and just stared up at the building in awe. We were those
people. From there, we walked by St.
Paul’s, the Globe Theatre, and London Bridge, which Maddie discovered is not
all it’s cracked up to be. We looped
back around the Thames to the Wellington Barracks, where Jennifer and I
recreated Sherlock and John sitting on the bench from The Sign of Three. I promise
I’m done with the Sherlock talk, weary readers.
That’s it. Basta.
Katie Quick as John Watson and Jennifer Vosters as Sherlock Holmes
Thursday, May 1st
After a quick breakfast stop at Pret (otherwise known as the
establishment we ate at for 95% of our meals, which isn’t surprising
considering there’s one on every corner), Maddie and Jennifer went off in
search of ancient treasures at the British Museum, while Katie, Megan and I
trekked it out to the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, a.k.a
Wimbledon, home of the famous Championships, for a tour of the grounds. Following our separate ventures, we all met
up for afternoon tea at Harrods, a department store in the heart of the
city. Harrods has nearly any product you
can think up, though you’ll swear the price tag is fictional too. It’s safe to say we merely browsed. After hitting up Topshop, we ate dinner at
(you guessed it!) Pret, this time in the King’s Cross/St. Pancreas train
station, where I saw some 11-year-old boy named Harry trying to find Platform 9
¾. Silly kid!
Friday, May 2nd
Friday was my 20th and favorite birthday so far. We spent the day wandering slowly around the
parks of London, taking in the scenery from the ponds to exquisite
landscaping. We saw the Peter Pan
statue, Royal Albert Hall, the Princess Diana memorial, ate lunch in Regent’s
Park, and celebrated the day by eating Ben’s cookies at both breakfast and
lunch. It was amazing to just wander and
enjoy our last full day all together before parting for the summer. We went out for an Italian dinner, and while
it wasn’t the same as Rome, it still gave us the feeling of our home in the Eternal
City. I couldn’t have asked for a better
or more relaxing day to welcome my new decade.
Saturday, May 3rd
The London Underground, or simply, “The Tube” was undergoing strikes
the entire week, so Maddie and my attempts to squeeze in the Tower of London
before our flight back to Ireland were all for naught. Instead, we strolled through Covent Garden,
our temporary base in Leicester Square and bid farewell to our giant blue
rooster friend in Trafalgar Square before lunch. With that, our London trip was over. Jennifer still had another couple days before
her own flight to Dublin, so the three of us divided again, sad to see the end
of our current journey, but knowing that in no way was it our last.
Thanks for sticking it out to the end of our abridged escapade,
everyone! A big thank you to the roomie
for letting me feature in (read: hijack) her blog. Maybe if I pressure her
enough we can all finally discover what really went down in Berlin.
Katie
