Friday and Saturday trips!

Well... as it turns out folks - I do NOT have swine flu... only strep throat. Which still sucks - yeah but it's manageable - i'm getting a couple of days off school and the medicine is working so I'm a lot less miserable now - which is a good thing for sure.

On Friday night I headed up to the very north of London to go to this really cool Irish pub that's in an old Catholic church - beautiful building inside and out - but totally converted. The pews are now benches for the tables, the stage is now where they have live bands, etc. AND - the street has the most AMAZING views of London - straight down these steep streets that remind me of San Francisco and then in the distance - all of London to see. It was beautiful.

I had purchased a ticket and everything for Amsterdam for the weekend - but Northwest totally screwed me over - so no ticket - no Amsterdam. Long story - but I'm pretty sure I hate them. So instead me and a friend took a train down to Brighton. Brighton is on the southern coast of England on the Atlantic Ocean. it is BEAUTIFUL! The picture right here is of the Palace Royale - One of the many King George's built it as a beach house / party palace to entertain guests. It is Indian on the outside and Chinese on the inside and HUGE.




One of the walk-out piers and the waves were crashing - it was really really windy that day so the waves were whipping up something fierce. It was pretty chilly with the wind blowing in cold off the ocean. It was a very cool town with lots of little street markets - on the weekends a lot of the smaller streets in downtown are pedestrianized so all the stores and restaurants just flow over the sidewalks and into the street. it was really cool actually.




There is some VERY expensive beach front property just north of the road. and it lines the whole beach for MILES. And beaches in England are NOT what most of us think of - that is NOT sand - it is rocks. Rocks and Shells. You can tell better from the next picture. But it doesn't stop people from laying out on the beach and running on the beach barefoot, etc.
It really was a beautiful beach.


There is also Brighton Pier right here on the
beach where there is a HUGE pier extending quite a distance into the ocean and on the pier there are all of these restaurants and pubs and games and rides and shops, etc. It reminded me a lot of the Boardwalk in Santa Cruz, CA actually. It was a lot of fun. Great way to spend a Saturday.

We had a blast, got some sun and the weather didn't haunt us too badly at all - it was a little cold but only rained on the train-ride there and on the train-ride back - never while we were actually outside!