Alexis Slavicek

Winds or what? Windsor Castle!

I woke up, and was so sad to leave London.  It is one of my new favorite places.  We had to wear our matching blue shirts, so I didn’t have to pick out an outfit. We also looked like we were on a kindergarten field trip, but it was funny.   We hopped on the bus at 9 a.m. to take a tour of Windsor and the Windsor Castle.  After the hour and a half bus ride, we met up with our tour guide who showed us all the fun things around Windsor and the history behind the town and castle.

Then, we actually got to go inside the castle, and the queen was actually in at the time.  Also, since the new royal baby was born a few days ago, we had just missed them being there the day prior.  For the tour inside the castle we had an audio tour guide, but I had picked the kids option for the tour because it really spiced things up and made the trip interactive and fun.  It would tell me the history and then ask me to find an artifact in the room I was in or it would quiz me.  A lot of the rooms in the castle had beautiful paintings on the ceiling. There had been a fire that caused damage to some of the original pieces, so they explained where the renovations were from that.  It was really just so unreal to be in a castle that was built hundreds of years ago.

Now, what I am about to talk about is probably my favorite part of the trip. The cat in the Queen’s courtyard came up to me and asked me to play with it!  I was so honored because I already miss my cat and it looked just like her, so I decided that the queen’s cat is my cat’s grandmother.  It was a beautiful moment.  So, me and the queen are basically family too now.  On a real note though, that just meant so much to me, and I was having a bad day, but that helped my attitude I was starting to get a little.

Then, I met with a few people for lunch.  I had a beef & ale pie, and it was so good I just wish the crust was a little softer, but it was a little beef pie.  So, cute.  I saw they had a TK Maxxx, which is our TJ Maxxx because I really needed a carry on for the flight home, and I figured that’s where I would go if I was home for one. I found the perfect rose gold one. By that time, we had to meet by the bus again because we had to take a 2.5 hour bus ride to Statford.  It wasn’t too bad because Ed Sheeran had just released a new song so I listened to that most of the time.

We arrived at Stratford, and it was a quaint little town.  It was so cute.  There were little pubs, shops, restaurants everywhere.  We walked to a group dinner at The Old Thatch Tavern, where we had pork chops and potatoes with vegetables.  Walking back to the hotel, I stopped by their little grocery store, and I noticed their Lays (like the chips) were named Walkers here.  Back at the hotel, the group decided we were just going to stay in tonight and catch up on blogs.  Everyone came over to mine and Emma’s room because it was huge.  We did facemasks and listened to good music and just had very relaxing night.  We also ended up getting a 3rdroommate tonight because another student was feeling sick, so her roommate came to stay with us.  I really love it here though.  I don’t think I could ever live here, but such a cute place to be.  The whole U.S. shows not working in the U.K, I’m not here for it.  All I want to do at the end of the night is watch my shows, but I can’t! #firstworldproblems