Ice Skating, Stonehenge, Salisbury

On Saturday night, I went ice skating at the Museum of Natural History with Diana and Alli. It was a lot of fun. We skated for our allotted hour and then indulged in some Swedish mulled wine
which was very tasty.

Apparently, as I observed on Saturday, ice skating is not as popular in the UK as it is in the US. During our skating time, I did not see one person who had brought his/her own skates -- everyone was using the ugly blue ones you borrowed from the museum. (By the way, the skates I was using were horrible and definitely needed to be sharpened. Also, I'm pretty sure that my left skate had the blade of a right skate because my balance was off all night. It made for some interesting encounters. haha.) Plus, while skating, we saw at least 10 different people fall -- some fell multiple times. In the US, I might see one or two or MAYBE three people fall during a skating session -- because most people have a general idea of how to skate, and if they don't, then they are extra careful and stay at the wall. (I can proudly say that Alli, Diana and I did not fall once.) Also, one of my major complaints about Londoners is that when walking down the street, they don't stay to any particular side, and they will walk right into you; well, this translates to Brits on ice, as well. People would pretty much skate into me and not apologize. I would wobble for a bit and then get my balance back. I also saw two guys (on separate occasions), neither of whom was a skilled skater, who somehow got themselves turned around and started skating directly into me. In one case, I skated around the guy at the last second and he immediately apologized; in the other case, the two of us looked at each other and I saw that he had no idea how to stop our inevitable collision, so I put my hands out to stop him from knocking me over and then skated around to his right. So, it was quite an interesting night, to say the least. I always love ice skating and it was fun to experience that in the UK.

Ice Skating with Diana

Alli, Me, and Diana on the Ice Rink

Skating

Alli, Diana, and Me

Diana and Alli coming around the bend

I was skating and trying to avoid the man in the khaki coat beside me who did not know how to skate.

Having fun skating

The three of us on the way home. :^)

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Yesterday I went with the BU Social Programmes to Stonehenge and Salisbury. The bus ride was nearly 2 hours, but I was able to sleep most of the way. Unfortunately, it was not a great day for a daytrip because it intermittently rained all day long.

I had been really looking forward to seeing Stonehenge. The stones were quite impressive, but the area they're in is unbelievably windy; so, the wind (and at times, the rain) was very distracting from the actual site. We got audio tours with our admission, but our guide provided his own tour, so I just listened to him. Here are some pictures:

The big lumps in the grass at the top of the hill are barrows where remains and artifacts are buried.

The stones


The stones

The stones

The stones

The stones

The stones


The heel stone. On the longest day of the year (June 21), the sun rises just over this stone at the perfect angle to shine directly through the stone display.


The stones




The stones

We spent an hour touring Stonehenge and then got back on the bus to go to Salisbury. At Salisbury, the tour guide gave us a tour of the Cathedral Church. As we were walking into the church, it started pouring and it was so windy that the raindrops blew into us and stung -- like hail.

Cathedral Church

We couldn't take pictures inside the church. Inside were the tombs of several royals and also the best preserved copy of the Magna Carta. When we left the church, the sun was shining and the weather was great. Katie, Steve, and I wandered around until we found a pub called "The Queen's Arms" (ironically, it has the same name as the pub around the corner from our dorm) and we ate there. Afterwards, we walked around Salisbury for a short while before we had to get back on the bus to come home.

All in all, it was a fun daytrip, and I'm really happy that I got to see Stonehenge (especially considering that was one of my life goals); however, I would recommend to others who want to visit the site to go during a warmer and less rainy season.