Winding down now for the end of the semester. At this point, I’m just trying to fit in all of the things I wanted to do, but haven’t gotten around to yet. On December 10th, a friend and I went to The Breakfast Club, and yes, it is themed like the movie.
The food is great and it has a secret bar that I finally got to go to. To get to it, you had to walk through a fake fridge that hid a hole in the wall and go underground, below the restaurant. That night, a bunch of people that I’ve grown to be really close to did a Secret Santa exchange that was super cute and also really cliché but hey, who cares?
The next morning, I got up way too early for my taste and took a bus tour to Stonehenge and Bath. As much as I hate getting up early, it was nice getting to Stonehenge before the crowds started pushing in. It also happened to be particularly foggy on the hills that day so the pictures turned out really eerie. Surprisingly, the stones were a lot smaller than I was expecting, but nonetheless cool to finally see in person.
Bath was also adorable, with little restaurants and shops. It reminded me of Edinburgh with all of the hilly streets and lack of cars. We also ended up being there on the last day of the Christmas market so everything was decked out in garland and lights and there were small pop up shops and street performers throughout the city center.
On the 12th, I had a goodbye dinner with some other friends from Rollins in the CAPA program. We went to this burger place in walking distance from our university called the Greedy Cow. We’ve been a couple times before and LOVED it. Obviously we had to go back one more time before heading back home. The next night, I said goodbye to more friends from the University of Pennsylvania at a bar around the corner called O’Neills. I wish I had been there sooner and gone more often this semester. It was small, but not too crowded and a great place to hangout and dance.
This past Saturday, the 16th, I checked off one more thing I had to do before leaving: The Nutcracker. We booked tickets to the matinee weeks ago and I had been looking forward to it for so long. As a dancer, I couldn’t be in London during the holidays without seeing the English National Ballet perform the Nutcracker. It was beautiful and made me miss dancing back at school so much.
We did some more last minute things today, like the Camden Market one last time and visiting Westminster to get once last glimpse of Big Ben and the London Eye. We also went over by King’s Cross and saw a Christmas tree covered by a large block of ice.
It feels weird to be heading home tomorrow… I’m really excited, but also kind of upset. I’ve been living in a different country for three months but it only feels like a few weeks… There is no doubt in my mind that I will be visiting London again in the future!