A Visit to London

Seeing as though last week was our half term break, my best friend and I decided to take a short trip up to London. Living in Wales, very close to Cardiff, it's not too far to go just overnight. Despite the fact we've never been to London without a 'responsible adult' to keep us in check, we decided to just go for it. We talked to friends of her parents and they said we were more than welcome to stay with them in their house near the center so we booked our train tickets and that was that!

We set off on Wednesday morning, getting a train from Cardiff Central to London Paddington so that we arrived around 11am. We went straight to drop our things off then headed out in search of a bookshop that we'd seen on Google that looked like something from Harry Potter. It was called Daunt Books and I can honestly say that it was worth having to use the Google maps app on my phone to find it. Although neither or us ended up buying anything there, it was a great place to have been.

After going to Daunt Books we had a bit of lunch in "Eat" and then got the tube into the more central area of London. We walked through Soho with all it's cute little shops and walked all the way down to Trafalgar Square. By this time it was absolutely freezing so we went in the National Gallery for a bit of warmth and wandered around looking at the paintings for a bit as both of us are currently doing GCSE Art so it made us feel like our visit had been somewhat educational. We then headed over to Waterstones where I picked up a beautiful copy of Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen as a souvenir. After a bit more wandering round which lead us to in Covent Garden and a quick drink in Costa, we headed towards The Strand for Pizza Hut for tea and then home for the night.

The following morning we were up and out of the house by about 9.30am, which for someone who is not a morning person, like myself, is pretty good. We headed straight for the area that everyone thinks of when they think of London, the Thames by the London eye, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament. We walked from the tube station right along side the Thames all the way up to Westminster Bridge, then back down and to the Tate Modern art Gallery. After a little wander around the Tate, we had a quick look at the Globe theater from the outside, had lunch a bit of lunch and then headed home.

Even though our trip was only overnight, it was an amazing experience and one that I definitely plan to repeat. It was such an easy thing to do, the only thing preventing us from being able to go up and stay in London regularly is the price of the train tickets. My friend and I have already decided the trip will be repeated in the summer and I can't wait.