Ok the title may be a little misleading since I’ve only seen three places, but that’s good enough in my book! Before I left York, my floor mates opened up their homes to me for a couple day stay if I wanted to (I know I know they are great mates!). The first stop was Liverpool!
Liverpool
I left York for the last time and headed to Liverpool. Well really a little town called St Helens about thirty minutes outside of Liverpool by train. St Helens was not the best of towns, unfortunate to say and my friend, Lee, mainly introduced me to his family. They all fed me copious amounts of food so I was MORE than happy! After two nights, we got a hotel room in Liverpool to explore. Now, I do not know if you have heard of any of Liverpool’s reputation for being kind of a dirt hole, but they are wrong. Liverpool was a clean and lively city that had character seeping out of every side street I passed! We started our day by exploring some museums and sights (Fast Fact: all the museums in Liverpool are free!). Later that day, we went to get a taste of the Liverpool night life and guess where we ended up? The Cavern Club! For those of you that do not know of the Cavern Club, this place’s claim to fame is that it is the birth place of The Beatles! In 1957, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Pete Best played the Cavern Club as “The Quarrymen”. By 1961 they had a pretty good following and changed their name to “The Beatles”. Lastly in 1962, Ringo Starr replaced Pete Best, and the rest (as they say) is history. Super cool right?! The next day, before I had to get my train to Canterbury, we went down to the Liverpool docks and walked along the water. I’m not lying when I say that Liverpool was one of the coolest cities!
Canterbury
After a four-hour train ride down from Liverpool, I arrived in Canterbury. My mate, Esther, picked me up and drove me around to show me the city. I was basically back in York. Canterbury was so extremely similar to York it was uncanny! Both have a massive church in the middle of the city, both have a mix of super old and modern buildings, and both have the similar stores/café. Deja-vu let me tell ya. After this little tour, Esther took me back to her house and boy was it British. Directly behind her house sat this small church casually built in 1043 and her house was once where the vicar (like a priest) of that church lived. So her house also casually has a wall in it that is at least four hundred years old (still baffles me how old this stuff is in this country). My favorite part of this trip was going to see the White Cliffs of Dover which are only about fifteen minutes away from her house (check out my other blog post to hear about that!).
South London
After about two nights with Esther, she drove me to South London! Charlie from my floor was the first person to invite me to his place way before it was time for me to leave, so I have been planning to come here for a long time. Once I got here, Charlie kept asking me what I wanted to do and go see around London. I told him to treat me like a friend from the area and do what he would do on a normal day to day basis. I will always prefer to see the real side of a town over the touristy parts (well to be fair I would also like to see the touristy parts, but I have already seen them so that’s why I said what I did). Now I can honestly say that I know the best place to get wings in South London and all the best pubs!
Although knowing where all the cool places in South London are is cool, I must say my favorite park of this trip was going to Thorpe Park (an amusement park in West London). We messaged all the floormates that lived in the London area and, to our surprise, they all came along! We knew there was going to be no lines because the forecast predicted rain in the morning and a very cloudy day. Also, just like forecast predictions, it was wrong, and we had only one-hour rain drizzle followed by a full day of bright sunlight and clear skies! The prediction scared many potential goers and we got to stay on the rides repeatedly on most of the rides. It was AWESOME!
To wrap this all up, this little tour of the UK only made leaving even harder than it already was. I have gotten to see more of this wonderful country which has only made my admiration for it so much deeper. I cannot wait to return! UK = Future Home.