A goal of mine this year was to travel and step outside my comfort zone to help me focus on myself, build my creativity, learn new things from new perspectives, and build my confidence.
I'm a homebody and never stay at friends houses so going abroad with a bunch of strangers is definitely outside my comfort zone.
Flicks from London, 2023.
I traveled eight hours on a flight to London, running on no hours of sleep and immediately adventured the city once we arrived. It's been one day on my study abroad trip and it's already an exciting challenge of navigating, communicating, and budgeting.
Our first stop we went to Tower Bridge. It was super cute colored a pretty blue. On our walk there we saw the Tower of London from afar. Everywhere we walked there was always something interesting or beautiful that caught my eye.
After walking around The City of Westminster, we found a restaurant where I tried Aperol Spritz that I will likely never have again. It had a bitter soda water in it and wasn’t for me. Very quickly I learned that no one is in as big of rush as Americans and they don't drink as much as water as us.
Afterwards, I walked to St. James Park. It led me past super friendly ducks, birds and swans. Once we arrived to buckingham palace, it was massive and gorgeous. I’m not super familiar with London but loved seeing the pretty gardens, the golden gate, and the many people walking inside with top hats on.
For dinner we went to The Minories which was right under a train station and very fast which I loved since us Americans are always go-go-go. I went with a group from the class here studying with me, it was really fun getting to know people and experience navigating the menu and our walk back since I was the only one with service.
After dinner we experienced the cutest bar called, Simmons Bar Tower Bridge. It was pretty pink with a disco ball, a photo both, pretty drinks, and was filled with playing American music. I went with four others that I'm close with already that I am so excited to keep hanging out with for the rest of the trip.
London definitely felt like we were in Chicago, Illinois and very weird since it was our first day and I was still jet lagged. Typically I just go to a beach and go on a boat to places I’ve always gone to so sight seeing and going to a whole different country was very eye-opening for me but I can't wait to continue to grow a new perspective, try new things, and continue to make friends.
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