England first time!
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I usually don’t travel over spring breaks as they are quite short and most schools in the US have spring breaks around the same time, so everywhere is just crowded. However, this break was special because I went to visit my boyfriend in England! We hadn’t seen each other for a while (aka 8 months at least), so I didn’t hesitate to go there when I had a chance. Though I had been to many countries in Europe, I had never visited England. I went there for 5 days, not including the flight time, but I felt like I got a very rich British experience thanks to Poy.
I flew from O’hare to JFK and then to Heathrow on Friday the 11th. It took me long enough to go from Champaign to O’Hare and even longer from JFK to Heathrow. I didn’t realize how far apart we were until I got on the flight. Luckily, it was a redeye flight. I slept through the 12 hours flight from NYC to London. I arrived at Heathrow around 7 AM. I then took a train to Paddington Station in the heart of London to meet Poy. We didn’t do anything much on the first day except strolling around Oxford and having dinner with Poy’s friends at Al Pasado, a fine Spanish restaurant.
The next day, Poy gave me a tour around Oxford. We went to almost all the famous colleges in the area and all important landmarks, such as the bridge of sign, Radcliff camera, the divinity school, Magdelen College, and Christ Church. Since Poy is a Potterhead-ish, the places we went to are all related to Harry Potter. (Christ church’s stairs and dining hall were used to film Harry Potter 1.) At lunch, Poy took me to the dining hall of Lincoln college, which is his college. We had fried chicken, chips, peas, and a red velvet cheesecake for dessert. All of these only cost 4 pounds! In the afternoon, we went shopping at Westgate Mall, and Poy got his new favorite sweater from H&M. At night, Poy took me to a bar that his friends recommended, Rusty Bicycle. We were so in love with their options of alcohol and the chicken wings we ordered!
On Monday 14th, we took a train to London for a one-day trip. We energized ourselves with Costa coffee at the station and then headed to London afterward. The first place we went to Tower Bridge, took a ton of pictures, and crossed the bridge to get a cup of ice cream and a hotdog from a food truck. The view of the tower bridge and the river while we snacked was amazing! Okay, we just snacked, but we went almost straight to have lunch at Gold mine, a famous Chinese restaurant. We ordered braised duck over rice and some dim sum. Though the food was super delicious, I realized that food in England was even more expensive than in the US! How crazy! After we were full, we went to the British Museum, which has a great collection of mummies, Egyptian artifacts, and the arcs of the Parthenon. (The picture above is the natural history museum, not the British museum lol) We had such a great time in the museum and then finished our day at the great Thai, a Thai restaurant where they served grilled chicken and papaya salad.
On Tuesday, we went to Warner Bros. Studio Tour London – The Making of Harry Potter, the one and only place that Poy wanted to go to on this trip. Since the studio is outside of London, we had to book a train from London to where the studio is located too. Again, we had Costa coffee at the station before we went to London, but this time we also got Ben’s cookies! (It was so rich and delish) Since we booked the visit time around 2 pm, we got some time to stroll in the city. We went to King cross to snap a picture with the 9 3/4 platform and enjoyed the architecture of buildings in London. We also got twisters from KFC as lunch. Surprisingly, KFC in England is so much tastier than that in the US. Then we headed to the Harry Potter studio! The place was so gorgeous. We got to see several settings used in the movies and also the real costumes Harry and his friends wore! We also had butterbeer and butterbeer ice cream along the way. The most impressive setting for me is the ruined Gringotts bank, where they use a screen in the back to display the dragon. We had a magical time there!
The trip almost came to an end, but our plan had not finished. Our big plan today was to go to Stonehenge (or a pile of rocks as my dad describes). We bought a package to Stonehenge with an agency. It cost around 50 pounds per person, which is cheaper than buying a round trip and an entrance ticket. It was showering when we arrived, and after we finished our tour, it was pouring! We were so lucky to have a chance to snap good pictures before the weather went bad. Because of the weather, Stonehenge was all covered in mist. It gave such a different mood than what we saw in the picture, but we loved the scenery so much! We also had lunch at Stonehenge. Actually, it was more like snacks since we only had steak pies (but it was good!). After we took a bus back to London, we went to see Mama Mia at the musical at night! The show was so great, much beyond my expectation. We came home singing Mama Mia songs non-stop!
The trip now came to an end. We went to see many landmarks in London, such as the London eye, Bigben (which was now almost completely renovated), James’s park, Westminster Abbey, and Buckingham Palace. Along the way, we saw caramel peanuts and couldn’t resist the smell, so we bought one cup of peanuts and also a cone of ice cream. It was sunny that day, so we decided to buy Shake Shack and have a picnic in James’s park. In the afternoon, we went to the natural history museum to enjoy a great collection of fossils. It was so great that all the museums in England are free to visit. Since I had to take a Covid test before going back to the US, we went to do an ATK test in the evening. After that, we had dinner at Co&Ko Korean food and went to Harrods (just to buy a teddy bear, not any brand-name products lol). And that was the end of the trip. I flew back to the US the next morning. My first trip to the US was so amazing, and I didn’t even have to plan for a single bit thanks to my sweetest host :)
Before this trip, I had never been to Texas or New Mexico. Initially, our plan was to visit only Big Bend National Park in southern Texas, near the border with Mexico. However, we stumbled upon a blog where the author mentioned that there are several other national parks not far from Big Bend. In fact, the area is home to four remarkable parks– Big Bend, Guadalupe Mountains, Carlsbad Caverns, and White Sands. Despite their proximity, these parks are incredibly distinct from one another. We thoroughly enjoyed exploring the unique natural beauty each had to offer.
After we found out that there are some flights from Willard (a regional airport in Champaign) that are inexpensive, we started flying out from here instaead of Chicago. We got a really good price of plane tickets to Seattle, so we decided to go to more national parks! The two parks that we visited were Mount Rainier and Olympic National Parks. We thought about going to North Cascade as well, but the time was limited so we planned to visit there next time. Visiting these two popular national parks in the fall was such a good choice–less crowd, nice weather, and fall foliage!
Midwest surprisingly offers us many national parks to visit all year round. One of the national parks near Illinois is the Mammoth Cave National Park in Cave City, Kentucky. We rented a car from Champaign and drove around 5 hours, excluding small stops in Indiana. We had never been to Kentucky before, and we believe that not many international students had been there. Plus, this was the first time we visited a cave in the US, and we start with the world’s longest known cave system!
We’d been thinking of visiting South Dakota to see Mount Rushmore and Badlands national park for almost a year. Then an opportunity came when one of our friends gave us a buy-one-get-one-free coupon from Delta. We did not hestitate even a bit in buying two tickets for a round trip from Chicago to Rapid City, SD. Although it was an impulsive trip, we had a lot of fun observing the wildlife in the great plains of South Dakota and North Dakota.