Submitted by Jessy Buckter on the 2014 spring semester study abroad program in London, England…
As this semester is coming to an end, naturally we have been getting more and more work in our final weeks. My weeks are now filled with writing papers and doing work, but I still take time to explore over the weekend because there is still so much I haven’t seen. This weekend, my friends and I decided to take a day trip to Brighton. Brighton is another part of England that is by the water and only an hour long train ride away from London. As much as I love the city, it is nice to escape to a smaller, beach town for a little bit. Brighton was very cute. It had a long boardwalk and a huge pier that was filled with amusement rides and arcade games. This type of stuff always reminds me of summer, which is my favorite time of year, so it made me really happy. There was a lot of shopping to do there, too. The streets were filled with thrift shops, little bakeries and thrift stores. All of the shops there seemed like they were individually owned which I really like because then everything is so unique. Since Brighton is right along the water, they are known for having good seafood, so we had to get fish and chips for lunch. This was my first time having it and I cannot believe I waited so long. It was amazing. After a long and exhausting day in Brighton, we decided to head back to London. Brighton was a lovely city and I would love to go back there one day during the summer.
On Sunday, my school offered a riverboat cruise to Greenwich, a part of London I have not yet been to. We had the perfect weather that day to be on a boat. The boat to Greenwich took about an hour, but we got gorgeous views of London throughout the whole thing. When we arrived in Greenwich, the first thing we wanted to do was see the prime meridian. Greenwich is home to “Greenwich mean time” and where the prime meridian lies. When we found it, we saw exactly what you would expect: a line. Since longitude and latitude aren’t actual lines across the globe, there was a small little plaque and a short line to indicate where the prime meridian was, just so people could take pictures in two hemispheres. The whole thing was quite underwhelming, but now I can say that I have stood on both sides of the world at the same time.
We next went to the market in Greenwich to get lunch. This is probably the 10th market I have been to in London ,but I will never get sick of them because each is so different. Greenwich was a beautiful little place and it seemed so far removed from London; there were less people and it seemed more like a town than a city. I had a wonderful weekend getting to explore different places outside of London