London

Sometimes we need to get away

Look at different things

To come back to ourselves

My European trip was off to a rocky start, starting with missing the night bus to the airport.

I had spent the day cleaning out my house, packing things and putting them away, lugging suitcases on the train to Barcelona to leave there and frantically cleaning while on the phone with my family until 2am. For two weeks I technically didn’t have a place to live, so I decided why not explore Europe, travel to my friend’s hometowns that spanned across beautiful destinations and make the most of being young, crazy and untethered to anything. My plan was 4 days in London, then 4 days in Sligo, Ireland and a week in Berlin. I’m so lucky to attend such an international University and find friends across the world to stay with!

After a brief nap at 2am I headed to the night bus in Sitges, the only way to the airport at 3am for my Ryanair flight at 6

See, usually this bus is 10 or 15 minutes late (typical Spain) but the one time it was on time, I wasn’t. And I wanted to scream when I saw it pull away as I walked up with my backpack ready to go. I panicked, praying to find a way in the middle of the night to get to the airport from Sitges. I paced around, trying to find another nonexistent night bus while drunk people coming from the Pride parade roamed the streets. Eventually I got a taxi and had a very deep 4am talk with the driver who told me that he hasn’t said a lie in 7 years.

Once I got to the airport and found my gate, they told us the flight was delayed 4 hours

And then 4 hours turned into 7

And then once I got to London, sweaty and awake for 24 hours there was a problem with my debit card that had to be solved over Facetime to the USA

So, altogether a stressful beginning but here’s some takeaways from that whole experience:

Don’t book flights for 6am, even if they’re 20 Euros cheaper. Just don’t.

Always be early/on time for the only night bus there is

Be prepared for the absolute worst case scenario when it comes to Ryanair and flights in general

Don’t forget your pin number hahaha

Don’t panic, everything can be solved

But once I got to London and finally made it to my friend’s house, a nightmare turned into a pleasant dream.

The past four days have been spent exploring London, watching the world cup, drinking English cider and playing with my friend’s pet snakes.

We went to Camden market, laid in the grass on Primrose hill, walked around Central. We looked at pieces by Dali, Pollock and Monet in the Tate Modern and my personal favorites by the Guerilla Girls (all the free exhibits of course). We even visited our other friend from school who lives in Chiswick, and spent the (rare) sunny day in the park listening to music and playing with his dog. I’ve watched more football than I have in my life before.

Now I’m in the airport headed to Dublin then Sligo, stay tuned for more stories hahah