Starting Europe Off Right - London!

We survived the overnight flight to London, but still haven't been able to straighten out our sleep schedules after being in this time zone for a whole week. Nonetheless, stepping onto European soil was a breathe of fresh air! And it was also fantastic to be able to understand what people were saying to you (rather than fighting through our lacking Spanish skills). While in London we stayed with Courtney, who is one of my best friends from college and played on the soccer team with me. It just so happened that one of our other best friends from the team, Alex, and her boyfriend were in England visiting friends and family, so within a few hours of landing we had a glorious, but all too short, reunion for the three of us! In fact at one point, I laughed so hard that I was crying. You can always count on Alex to provide some entertaining commentary.

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Illinois Soccer Reunion! I-L-L... (photo cred to Doug)

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Tower Bridge

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Westminster Palace

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Big Ben (or Elizabeth Tower now)

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Buckingham Palace

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Buckingham Palace
As I had already been to London, I decided to use it as a recharging station and skip the sightseeing aside from a run that took me around the city to all the main spots. It was Doug's first time though so he walked all over the main areas and checked all the big one attractions of his list: Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, toured the Houses of Parliament, Hyde Park, Shakespeare's Globe Theater, Tower of London, Borough Market, Primrose Hill, Regents Park, the London and Tower Bridges, Buckingham Palace, etc. We said "Hi" to the Queen for all of you. For those that have never been, London is a very culturally diverse place. It is also very elegant. The architecture is awesome, the buildings have so much detail. There is also a lot of money in the city and Doug was fascinated by the quantity of extremely expensive cars driving around. I got groceries and cooked meals for the first time in over two (2) months! It felt great. I also got to play pick up soccer one night and then in Courtney's Sunday league another day, which pretty much made my trip :) We got to meet and hang out with all of Courtney's London friends as well! (None of whom are actually British, again stressing the diversity.) On Saturday we went to the Juventus vs. Tottenham Hotspur soccer (or dare I say football, the real type of football) match which was awesome! The Spurs got the W very convincingly. It was so nice to be able to stay in an apartment instead of a hostel all week. All in all, I'm pretty much convinced to move to London and I didn't want to leave. But Norway was calling our names so it was on to the next adventure! Thanks a million for hosting us, Courtney!



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Wembley Field - Hosted 1948 Olympics

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Go Spurs!


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Just like old times :)

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