Day 2

So we land in London (I think around 10am London time, maybe), get off the plane, head straight to the bathroom to change clothes and get ready for the day. Gotta love 5 American girls totally taking over a bathroom!

We tried to find Terminal 4 for about an hour so that we could check our carry-ons and head out into the city on our 9 hour layover. We finally found it and got settled, then set to the task of finding me and Jessie's college friend Kim O' Brien. Kimmo lives in Cambridge and came up for the day to shuttle us around the city so as to maximize our time there. Jessie had lived in London for a semester in college, so she was thrilled to relive some memories.

3 generations of Kappa Delta bigs and littles!


We finally found Kimmo and spent the tube ride catching up with her (congrats on the new job, by the way!!!). We got off the tube and saw, in no particular order: Big Ben, Parliament, the London Eye, the Thames, Westminster Abbey, ate fish 'n chips at a really cool pub, St. James's Park, Buckingham Palace (the queen was in!), some really old families' houses, Trafalgar Square, and some really famous pieces of art at the National Gallery.

Whew, that was a lot of stuff in a short amount of time! And on about 2 hours of sleep. Totally worth it!

Jessie, Katie, Heather and I at Big Ben


Katie, Heather, and I with some English police. Don't they look like they'd keep you safe from the bad guys?


Derrick and Katie at the awesome pub where we had a rejuvenating lunch


Derrick could not, in good conscience, leave London without smoking a pipe while walking through the streets. Ok, then...


The whole team at Buckingham Palace. This would prove to be the only group picture we took the whole week. We were busy...


I was apparently very excited to get on the Tube


These guys showed up and played us some tunes on the Tube, complete with piccolo, accordion, and plastic container as a drum. The Londoners and Charlie (blue jacket) were totally unconcerned, but I thought they were awesome! Everyone did give them some change at the end though. That was weird b/c it seemed like they were annoyed. Maybe they just had to be cool about their excitement.


Josiah and Katie on the tube. Yeah, we needed sleep.


So, I saw a lot of London! I don't know anything about any of it, or what the inside is like, but I saw it!! And miraculously, I wasn't tired at all. Way too excited, I guess :)

We made it back to the airport and retrieved our carry-ons in plenty of time. The girls and I shopped a bit at the Harrod's in the airport, then got in our PJs and ready for the 8 hour flight to Nairobi, Kenya. While we did this, the guys sat in the pub in the terminal and had more fish 'n chips (but mostly more beer...).

5 of our group decided to head to the gate and get ready for the plane while the other 5 of us decided to just hang out where we were. A restaurant was much more comfortable and interesting than the gate, we figured. We still had over an hour before the plane left, anyway.

Bad choice. After a bit Neal convinced us to head on down, so we're ambling along, chatting, laughing, remembering the day, you know, the usual banter. Until we hear the last call for our flight. No one talked or even looked at each other, we all just started booking it! I had on loooonnngggg pajama pants, flip flops, a 50 pound backpack, and the floor was slippery. Bad combo. Katie Sullivan was in the same boat, so we did what we could to truck it and not fall, while Jessie, Neal, and Josiah left us in the dust.

We finally arrive at the gate, all of us on the verge of cardiac arrest (although, I must say, running on those bouncy moving sidewalks is really fun) to find Charlie, arms crossed, disappointed father look on his face, and an airport worker with our names on a list. Not only were we late, but we had done something wrong with checking our luggage, and needed to answer some questions.

Lesson learned: Be super early when flying out of Heathrow.

Katie, Josiah, Jessie, Neal, and I. We affectionately termed ourselves "The Runners" because we continued to realize throughout the rest of the trip that we were always the 5 hanging back, taking our time, being late. You'll hear more about these jokers later.