After a long, and ongoing, battle with jet lag, my third day in Edinburgh began with a quick change and a brisk walk to Arthur’s Seat. It caught my attention the minute we saw it’s green and brown-capped peaks towering over the city as we drove in. I love hiking at home, and often feel nature-deprived in Chicago, and I knew I would end the semester knowing every nook and cranny of Arthur’s Seat. We were told by our tour leader and many other locals that the hike was no longer than 30 minutes, which I thought would be impossible with the height of the mountain from the ground.
The top of Arthur’s Seat was breathtaking, and I almost don’t want to describe it, for fear of ruining prospective hiker’s fantasies. The 360-degree view of Edinburgh and the North Sea are broken up by rolling green hills within the mountain itself, (there is probably a pretty Gaelic word for them that I have yet to learn), and multiple mini-peaks of jagged brown rock. Lord of the Rings fans may compare it to the land of Rohan, and foot trails leading over the edged of the green grasses make it feel like the Rohirrim is about to scoop you up and ride away with you.
My second hike to Arthur’s Seat, a much clearer day, was just as beautiful, minus having to dodge tourists that scattered the mountain (I am trying to separate myself from the tourists although most would consider me one as well). The Americans on the mountain are obvious, talking loudly, many groups of teenagers hungover from Saturday night’s first overage freedom. Although I listen to music while I hike, I often turn my volume down when I walk past people, and I am amazed at how many different languages and accents I hear.
Today’s most exciting encounter included the college’s cat, who hang out near my dorm, and a real-life wild pheasant! It reminded me of my chickens at home, another twinge of homesickness.
Last year, being in the NCAA Final Four was such an exciting time to be a Rambler. With national coverage of the basketball team, we became “the Harry Potter school” with our maroon and gold striped scarves, more famously known as the Hogwarts colors. Here, in the city where J.K. Rowling wrote many of the Harry Potter books, I see maroon and gold everywhere in windowshops, on people’s hats and scarves, and I get so excited to throw my “‘blers up” hand before remembering what they mean when they sport maroon and gold stripes. As I pass closer, their merchandise always says “Hogwarts” or “Gryffindor”. Still, I am always happy to see our school colors and it makes me feel a twinge of familiarity in this new place. I have shoved homesickness (or “schoolsickness”) to the back of my mind successfully for a few weeks (not a method of coping that I would recommend), but the maroon and gold stripes always make me a little sad. However, I am not a fan of Harry Potter, and it makes me giggle to see people line up in front of The Elephant House Cafe, famous for being the exact location where J.K. Rowling wrote many pages of the first few books of the series. They wait in the rain, snow, and sleet to get in, and from many online reviews and testimonies from people I meet who have visited, it ends up to be a disappointing experience as far as the actual coffee and cakes go. I am sure they would be happier to spend their money on food and coffee that is worth it, maybe in Cafe Arrivadolce, listening to the construction along North Sheridan Road, watching Chicagoans fight against being blown over in the harsh Lake Michigan winds as they make their way down the street. They might like Metropolis Coffee Company on Granville Ave, close to where people were paintballed by a moving vehicle last year, and where I have seen countless domestic disputes under the train tracks (there is never a dull moment in Chicago). Maybe they would like to be visit the school that made the 2018 Final Four after over 50 years. At least, that is where I would want to go right now; that is my maroon and gold.
Travel Catch Up: The Joys and Pains of Meeting New People While Travelling
Hello all, it’s been a while since I’ve written, but I have a good reason for my absence- my laptop broke and it has been quite a journey to solve my tech issues. So, I come to you from an iPad, which is a little more inconvenient to type on, but I wanted to make another post catching up on the last few weeks!
Last I left off, I was in quarantine still and hoping that I would be out in time for spring break— luckily, I tested negative on Wednesday in time for in-person midterms, and on Thursday I jumped onto a plane!
Barcelona, Madrid, and Lisbon, oh my!
My first stop was Barcelona, Spain. I met up with my friend Ellie Stotz (who I had also traveled with in Venice and visited with in Paris) and we spent 3 days walking what felt like the entirety of the city, seeing a beach for the first time in what felt like forever, and experiencing true Barcelona culture: tapas and drinks at 5, dinner at 10, and clubbing until 3 in the morning.
One of the beaches we visited– we walked out onto the stone/sand pier for the views!
Me posing in front of the gorgeous fountain we found at a large park we stumbled into.
View over the city from Park Guell and the famous tiled benches!
My favorite house of the many throughout the city by architect and artist Gaudi.
View of La Sagrada Familia from the park across from it.
Jamie, Ellie and I on our night out together!
One of the joys from this trip is that I got to meet Ellie’s roommate in Paris, Jamie. She was so fun, we went out with her and her friends from her hostel to a club, and met up with them again for dinner the following night. Unfortunately, I have not gotten to see Jamie again, and she goes to the University of Alabama, so it is unlikely that I will get to hang out with her again, which makes me sad. As I have come to learn, this is a theme from my travels, and also the theme of this post— meeting amazing people I want to be friends with, but having only a little time with them before I never see them again.
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From there, we headed to Madrid. Ellie only had one day there before she had to quickly go back to Paris for a school project, and I had another 2 days there by myself. Ellie and I explored most of the highlights our first day, so the following two I got my first taste of solo traveling seeing some museums, visiting everything that we had missed, and finding plenty of cafés.
The lake in the middle of El Retiro Parc, the “central park” of Madrid.
The Royal Palace of Madrid
Palaza Mayor, which our hostel was right down the street from.
One of the main government buildings, featuring some flags in support of Ukraine.
There was a lot of gorgeous architecture around El Retiro.
It was a cloudy day when we arrived in Madrid, but the view from the rooftop restaurant/common area of our hostel was still pretty cool.
Because I was alone, I decided to take this opportunity to make some new friends (especially because I still am not the best at eating dinner alone!) My first day without Ellie I explored a ton of museums by myself, and revisited our favorite park, and met a boy named Nate who was studying in Madrid on a semester abroad from the University of Massachusetts. I also met a boy from Cornell that I hung out with the following day, so while I guess I was doing a “solo trip”, I wasn’t truly alone.
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Then, I headed to my last destination for break, and potentially my favorite city of all the places I have visited, Lisbon, Portugal. It felt like a European San Francisco (somewhere I also love), complete with a giant red bridge, famous trolleys and hills, and beaches– though it had a lot more history and, of course, Portuguese culture.
There were many artisans selling the tiles and other handmade and hand painted pottery that Lisbon is famous for!
A cute street with a great example of the famous tiling on facades of buildings throughout Lisbon.
We visited the old royal palace, and to our surprise and delight, the grounds were filled with peacocks!
Ellie posing on our way to a vegan restaurant for dinner.
The fountain in the plaza outside of our hostel, which also happened to be in the same building as the famous train station there!
The sun came out mid day, and the views over the city into the ocean was incredible
We stayed in an amazing hostel where we made a lot of friends that we got to spend time with everyday. There was a group of boys from London staying there for a few weeks that we met, and we also made friends with some of the people who worked there. They stayed for free and worked as compensation, and boy was I jealous of that lifestyle— they just got to hang out with their friends and meet people from all over the world and make new friends all of the time.
The “closest” friend I made in Lisbon was a boy from Germany named Johan that was working at our hostel. This was someone I could definitely see myself being friends with, we had the same music taste and interests, and he was really fun, but I got 3 days with him before I came back to Rome. This was the first instance of me being really sad about leaving friends I had made, because this was someone that I truly felt a friendship forming with, but considering that he lives across the world, I will likely never see him again in my life. While I am jealous of the hostel-worker lifestyle, I’m not sure how they deal with people leaving all of the time, it’s hard to comprehend that these people come into then are likely gone from my life so quickly!
Ellie sneakily captured a picture of Johan and I when we were all walking back to the hostel with the group of friends we made.
Our hostel! It was so cool, this is the picture of the main communal area, filled with plants and couches, from the stairs leading up to the private rooms. This was such an awesome place to stay.
Hostel friend 2: Liam, an artist and tattoo artist from London.
One big cross over episode
My next trip with friends was to Amsterdam in the first week of April! The theme of this trip was old friends meeting new friends— as a friend here put it, it was “one big cross-over episode”.
I went with my roommate Cosette, and learned that my friend from high school, Darren who studies at Georgia Tech and is currently abroad in Metz, France, was going the same weekend. He was traveling with 3 of his friends from school, and we met up with them at the Van Gogh Museum. It was really neat to see him again and to meet his friends, and for Cosette to meet him, I had never had college friends meet high school friends in person before! His friends, Emily, Anahita, and Katie were super cool, and I’m sad that I didn’t get to hang out with them more! (Are you noticing a theme yet?)
We visited the Keukenhof Gardens for the very first weekend of the Tulip Festival!
Just one of the many canals with cool houses. Fun fact, there are a lot of houses and buildings that are leaning forward or to the side because the structure under water had deteriorated a bit!
The canals at sun set were so gorgeous– this was right around the Anne Frank house.
One of Van Gogh’s final paintings before his death, at the Van Gogh museum.
On Sunday Cosette and I hung out with a girl named Andrea who had been staying with us. She took one of the beds in the room in our hostel, and she is our friend Malena’s friend from high school! We explored markets and got some famous apple pie, and she was really cool to hang out with but it was odd to meet her without Malena being there. I’ll luckily see Darren when we’re both home, but the other 4 I likely won’t, which, again, so sad.
(left to right) Me, Cosette, Anahita, Katie, Emily and Darren took a selfie in front of the canals.
Darren and I took a picture to show our friends from high school that we had found each other in Amsterdam
Cosette, Andrea and I on our way to get some famous apple cake at Winkel 34, a cute cafe!
First Solo Adventure
For Easter break, I had my first solo trip! I was headed to London, England for 3 days, and Edinburgh, Scotland for 2 days. My first day in London I walked around as much of the city as I could, finding cute markets and a huge thrift store, seeing the Tate, a modern art museum, and getting dinner with one of the girls from my hostel, Linda who was from Munich.
I found Borough Market, a cute and crowded market with a ton of food vendors for lunch before heading to the Tate.
Tower Bridge, which was only a 10 minute walk from my hostel.
Brick Lane was also very close to my hostel, which has a ton of vintage shops and markets, including this, the largest market all underground!
On Saturday there were a ton of food vendors and artisans out on Brick Lane as well.
d!China town was all decorates
The British Museum was gigantic, I spent 2 1/2 hours there and felt like I barely scratched the surface!
The next day I did some more exploring, then actually got a cool opportunity to hang out with people! I had made a friend named Ella when I was staying at my hostel in Venice, and she lives in London working for Netflix. Ella invited me to hang out with her and her friends that afternoon/evening. Ella, and her friends Lydia and Megan, took me to Camden, and up to Primrose hill which had a view of all of London. That evening I got to meet their flat-mate Jonah, and they took me along to a going-away party for their friend Monika. They were all very sweet when I had to leave, giving me hugs and making me promise to follow them on Instagram and stay in touch.
The view of London from Primrose hill.
Me, Ella, and Lydia (I stole this from Megan’s instagram story post, so don’t mind the stickers and tags!)
The houses in Primrose were so cute.
I am not sure how people handled making friends while traveling back in the 90s and early 2000s. I am so thankful to have social media to be able to stay in contact with these people. Even if it’s just seeing a glimpse of their life every now and then, it’s still better than in the past, when it’d really just be chance to ever run into them or hear from them again!
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My next stop was Edinburgh. I stayed in a really awesome hostel, right at the foot of the famous castle on the hill, and it was in a great area overall. I also had someone to meet when I got there! My friend Christian Kephart, back at Loyola in Chicago, had a friend from high school Dervla, who had moved there from Ireland. She moved back to the UK for university, to the University of Edinburgh, and agreed to show me around the city! The night I got in, she met me outside of my hostel and we went to a popular chain in the UK called Spoons for dinner and drinks. We ended up getting along extremely well (we have the same music taste and sense of humor, and love to tell/hear stories) and I went back to her apartment with her to hang out more! We also texted Christian to make sure he knew that his two friends were getting along.
The picture Dervla and I sent to Christian
One of the many famous Gothic churches throughout the city, this was on the Royal Mile.
My hostel and the view of the castle on the hill from it!
Diego and Dervla leading the way to one of their favorite look-out spots.
The view from the hill the 3 of them took me to!
(stolen from BeReal, the new social media app the 3 of them made me get) Alex and I are in the large picture, with Diego and Dervla in the top left!
The next day I walked, again, what felt like all of Edinburgh (I have a thing with walking 10+ miles while exploring new cities as I have learned). Then Dervla texted me and asked if I wanted to hang out again with her that day, and meet her flat-mates. So that afternoon I spent time in a famous park there called the Meadows with Dervla, and her two friends Alex and Diego. They were really cool and fun to get to know, and we ended up spending the rest of the day together, getting food, showing me things I had missed on my self-guided walking tour, and going back to their place for a movie.
I think that this group of people was the hardest to say goodbye to. How we interacted felt exactly like how my friends and I back in Rome and back in the States interact, and I really felt like we could have been great friends if I got more than 48 hours there. But unfortunately, they study in Scotland, and I study in Rome/Chicago. It was still amazing to meet them though, and I’m so glad I did. It made my Easter break a not-so-solo trip.
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So, that’s me all caught up on trips with new people! I have less than 2 weeks now, and will give an update on my last few trips with friends, how I’m feeling about going home, and what finals season in Rome is like. For now I’ll leave some advice for any students that may be reading this who are considering going abroad:
1. Stay in hostels when you travel, don’t exclusively stay in Airbnb’s. It’s the classic way for young people to travel, and it’s an awesome way to meet new people. You can use the website HostelWorld to find well rated ones or ones that are good for young people/partying, and they’re much cheaper than other alternatives!
2. Put yourself out there to meet new people. Traveling with your friends is great, but there’s genuinely nothing better than being able to come back from your time abroad having made friends from all over the world. (Plus, you’ll always have somewhere to stay if you travel to where they live in the future!) Small groups when traveling with friends makes this easier!
3. Be active on Instagram. You may already be, or you may have gotten rid of it as a social-media cleanse, but it is a great way to keep in touch with anyone you may meet, whether it is people from your school studying abroad with you, or people you meet while traveling. It is also a wonderful way to document your time abroad, in case you don’t want to blog about it 😉 Many of my friends, including myself, have made separate accounts to document our time abroad, and it’s so nice to look back on, and is also a great way to keep friends and family updated on what you’re doing! (If you need an example, my account is lauren_goesabroad, feel free to check it out!)
Well, that’s it for now- if you read through all of this huge update, thanks for sticking with me!
