I am now officially in London! I've been here for almost 24 hours and it's great so far! It still hasn't really set in that I am here and doing this! Maybe it will today when we start classes and go and do more things out on the town. There's no real schedule for us these next few days except for classes, and I happen to be on the first KP duty crew, so I have to go early and stay after breakfast and dinner to help set up and clean up. I guess it's nice that my turn will be done by the end of next week. (Side note, they have an awesome automatic lift that transports dishes and food between the kitchen downstairs to the servery upstairs where we eat.)
There's a lot I could write about already, but let me do a little recap of getting here and the first half day that I was here.
First, here's the evolution of packing:
Step 1 - Lay out your suitcases 48 hours ahead of departure.
Step 2 - Have your sweet free backpack all ready to fill with heavy things and stuff that won't fit in the suitcase
Step 3 - Lay out all the potential options; start feeling overwhelmed about the task ahead.
Step 4 - Organize the piles a little
Step 5 - Whittle down the piles, but no progress will be made till a third party (Kira) steps in and has you make the hard choices about what you really want to/should take.
Step 6 - Mom steps in once all the decisions are made and works her suitcase packing magic. 48.5 lbs and room to spare!
The finished product. I'm all ready to go!
About to head through security at Salt Lake City
Saying bye to Mom!
Now here's how the plane rides went down. Things went crazy from the start! We got the AA check in desk in SLC at 10:45am, exactly 2 hours before my departure time only to find out the plane was delayed till 1:50pm, which put the arrival time in Dallas at 5:30, 20 minute before the BA connection to Heathrow was scheduled to depart. Bad news. The ticket agent of course said we'd never make it, so she rebooked me (and the five others who showed up after) on another AA flight out of Dallas to Heathrow for 7:40. That was all good except for the shuttle I'd booked to pick up our group from the airport was scheduled for our original arrival time of 8:50am. After Jeff placed the international call and acted as transmitter with a phone in each ear, I finally got that moved to 10:45am for our new flight time about 3 minutes before I went through security.
About 15 minutes later I met up with the rest of my group up at our gate. It turns out that about 4 other kids hadn't changed their booking and were going to try and make the 20 minute connection. Well, we didn't end up leaving SLC till almost 2:30 and touched down at DFW at 5:35. Those kids RAN to the terminal shuttle since we arrived in C and the BA flight left out of D and luckily they held the plane for them and airport workers whisked them onto the plane right before the doors shut at 6pm (Their luggage did not make the plane, however). Meanwhile, the rest of us began to enjoy our seemingly short layover, got some dinner, but soon found out we'd been delayed again, from 7:40pm to 8:22pm thanks to a man who had a heart attack on the inbound plane. Paramedics had to board so it took a while to get the plane ready for our flight, but finally we boarded at about 8:00pm. At 8:22 I remember looking at my watch as I sat down in my seat, 21B (aisle - not bad) next to another girl from my program, actually. But wait! The captain notified us that there was a mechanical problem, so we end up sitting on the tarmac for another 2 HOURS before the plane FINALLY takes off. The estimated arrival time in London was now 12:35, practically 4 hours after the original time!
The plane ride was okay after that. They fed us our meal, I got a curry-ish chicken with rice dish. After about the first couple hours I tried to get some sleep and ended up sleeping on and off till about an hour and a half before we landed, which is when they fed us breakfast. We got a nice croissant, yogurt, juice, etc. We actually touched down in London at 12:20, and me, Alison, who I sat by, and Nick, who was in the row in front of us went straight to Customs and got through in about 5 minutes. It was a breeze for me cause I just said what the directors told us to, but apparently the other kids' people were a little more inquiring of their travel reasons. After that, we went down to baggage claim and there we met up with the other three girls on the flight and all went to go find our shuttle. I had been worried that he'd be totally gone or that the company would charge me extra since the plane was two hours late, but thankfully we only had a little trouble finding our driver at first (Yes, he had one of those signs for us!), but he drove us straight to the 27 Palace Court in very quick fashion! It was really surreal walking out of the airport for the first time as we headed to the van. It so fun to see all the cute streets, cars, buildings, shops, and houses along the way, though! I should have taken pictures at Heathrow, but it didn't happen, sorry!
We arrived safely at the Centre a little before 2pm. Drs. Crowe and Miller, the program directors met us and we got our room assignments and took our stuff up to our dorms, but soon we headed out onto the walk that Dr. Crowe had made into a kind of scavenger hunt to find major spots in Hyde Park/Kensington Gardens, which is right down the street from the Centre, the V&A Museum, the local LDS chapel, as well as the 3 nearest tube stops, some local eateries, and shops like Boots and Tesco. We had a check off all these places and get a picture at each one. I went with a big group, so others took most of those "see, we were here!" photos, but I did snap a few along the way!
The group at the Peter Pan statue: Kelsey, Allison, Emily K., Amy S., Sam, Haley, me, Nick, Lindsey
Round Pond, Kensington Gardens
Royal Albert Hall, on the south side of the Park/Gardens
Prince Albert Memorial, directly across from the eponymous hall.
A pretty view along the Serpentine.
Tons of paddle boats and people out enjoying the river, and park in general for that matter. You can see the top of the London Eye just above the trees to the right (it's not the bigger ferris wheel in the middle)
Princess Diana Memorial Fountain
Just a quaint traffic intersection
The Hyde Park LDS chapel, which actually has a distribution center, church employment services, and everything. It looks like a mini version of the Manhattan Temple, except that it has a taller steeple part, as you can see.
The Victoria and Albert Museum. Just the gate actually since it's huge -- 12 acres in the middle of London!
We got back from the walk after 2 hours and 15 minutes, just in time for dinner. Everybody unpacked and settled in the rest of the night and went to bed . I think I'm doing okay in terms of jet lag. I went to bed at 11, but I did pop awake from 3-5am last night, then woke up at 7:15 so I could get ready before breakfast crew at 7:50. Today was a fun day, our first full one in London. Things are only getting busier, but I will do my best to keep up with blogging! Coming up...the Royal Wedding!
Less than 7 hours till I head off in the morning to go catch a glimpse and join in the festivities!