Athens to London to utter exhaustion

Hello!

I finally have a chance to sit down and write a blog! I must say, I had the best fall break ever. I am happy to be back in Cologne though, I'm whooped. I got home with every intention of making it to class, but I fell asleep, and slept until 5. I Guess if you sleep for 5 hours in the middle of the day without budging it's a good indication that you needed that sleep. I still feel like I could sleep the whole night. I can't because I have homework to do, but you get the idea.

So I left off in Athens. Wednesday we got kind of a late start, because we were waiting for the other girls to wake up to see if they wanted to go with us. At 1 we finally decided to just go on our own. We left the apartment and walked up to the top of the hill in the neighborhood. The view was amazing, the city just sprawled out in every direction. Athens is gigantic. We were able to see Acropolis and the Parthenon from there and we got a lot of cool pictures. After leaving there, we went over to Acropolis and started at the museum there. It was pretty cool with a bunch of statues and stuff from the Greek times, and you could walk over a glass floor and see the ancient ruins. After the museum we headed up to the Acropolis which was a long and steep walk, but still really cool. The Parthenon was giant and really sweet looking, even if half of it was covered in scaffolding. We stayed up there for a while, then headed back to the apartment. When we got back we had dinner and we were going to go out, but we all just fell asleep instead!

The next morning we got up early and went out touring. First we went to the temple of Zeus at Olympus. This used to be the largest temple in Europe when it was still standing. All the museums and temples were free for us also, since we have EU student IDs. After that we went over to the original Olympic stadium from the first modern Olympics. From there we walked back to the subway and went to the National Archaeological Museum. That had a ton of reallly really old stuff in it, along with some stuff that we had learned about in our art class. After that museum we went and found a Gyro to eat, which was super yummy, and we went and checked out the Parthenon at night. And got some delicious Gelato. I had tiramasu and cheesecake flavored. We went back to Antonios and he took us to a meeting of other Couchsurfers. We tried some honey liquor that was rather interesting, and then went and ate another Gyro. We met a lot of really nice people, and I also met my first neo-conservative European, which was interesting. After that we walked around the city and saw a bunch of historical ruins all lit up, then we were exhausted so we went back home and went to bed. I had to get up early in the morning to get my flight to London.

I left Athens around 8:30 in the morning and got out to the airport around 10 or so. I had to wait around for a while because my flight was delayed. We finally got moving, and I got to London around 230 or so, Gatwick airport. The lady in customs proceeded to drill me like I was a terrorist, and couldn't understand why I was living in Germany, why I flew in to Prague first, what I was doing in Athens, why did I fly to Mykonos first, why didn't they stamp my passport there, blah blah blah. Obvioulsy I radiate international criminal. When she finally determined that I wasn't a threat to national security, I went and waited for my bags for around a half hour. Then I hopped the Gatwick express to Victoria Station, and took a cab to the Intercontinental Hotel in London. When I got there, they wouldn't let me check in, claiming that no one had informed them of my arrival. I know that's not true but whatever. They let me call the contacts that Uncle David had given me for a couple hours, but I couldn't get a hold of anyone. The lady was nice and let me store my luggage and gave me a key to the lounge where I could take a shower and chill for a little bit. After I got cleaned up and relaxed I walked over to Buckingham Palace. The Queen was in, as noted by the flag on top of the building, and there were lines of cars waiting to get in. I guess there must have been some kind of state dinner or something. After that I took the underground to Kensington on a quest for fish and chips. I found some and they were pretty good. I went back to the hotel to try and call the people again, and a new lady was there who wouldn't let me. I was frustrated because she was nasty about it, like I was some creepy football stalker. I understood though, it was just for the security of the team. They got to the hotel around 11 and I met up with Uncle David and got the situation worked out. Once she realized I wasn't trying to sneak into their hotel rooms she was very pleasant. Once that was all worked out we went out with some of the people that work for the team. We were able to bypass a line and get into this pretty cool club. It was a nice change from getting denied entrance at the one in Berlin. We stayed there for a while and then moved on to a club in the Hilton. Someone saw Harry Connick Jr. there. We ended up going to a different one after that wayyyy up in some building. We had a sweet view of London from there. It was a pretty late night, and the original plan to get up at 6 and sightsee was postponed til 8.

At 8 we did get up and get ready, then we went and toured most of London in 4 hours. We went from Buckingham Palace to Big Ben, to Westminster Abbey, to the river to check out the London Eye. Then we hopped the tube to the Tower of London, and the Tower Bridge. We took the Queens walk on the Thames to the nearest tube stop and went back to the hotel. We were cutting it close time-wise because Uncle David had to be back to the busses by 12:30 to go to the stadium. We ran back, and the stadium trip had been cancelled! I decided to relax for a while before we did sightseeing again. Around 5 I decided to head over to Harrod's, and I stopped in H&M and wound up with free boots which is a whole other story. Harrod's was AMAZING, even though I didn't go through all of it. Someday I'll go back and give Harrod's the attention it deserves. I got back to the hotel, and we decided to go over to the Patriot's hotel to visit Uncle David's friend Jimmy. After that we walked to Shepherd's Market and grabbed some dinner. I had really good fish and chips there, and also a Koelsch beer which made me happy. We met some other guys from the bucs and walked over to Buckingham Palace again. After that it was a question of whether or not to go out again. I was too tired so I decided not to.

The next morning we got up and found some tourist trap stores so I could get spoons for mom and me. Then I walked over to Picadilly circus which is like the Times Square of London. When I got back it was almost time to head over to the stadium. I got an all access pass and got to ride the busses over with the team! When we got there I got to hang out outside the locker room, go on the field, go in the coaches boxes, and I got to sit at the camera box for the whole game! It was sweet! I also got to meet Mike Alstott who was very nice, and I got some pictures of Tom Brady. All in all it was the coolest thing ever. By the end of the game I was really tired. We got back on the bus and went to the hotel, and I went and called Bobby for a little bit. Then I went down to the room with all the computers where they were and had a beer. I was too tired to go out, even though there was a party and other stuff going on. I had to get up at 4:30 in the morning to get my flight. That sucked. I ended up getting there in time, even though I was a total zombie. I got home around 11 AM and decided to take a quick nap. At 5 I woke back up. And I'm still tired. Really tired. I'm gonna be taking it easy the next couple weeks until I got to Vienna.

Talk to you soon!
Jess