A Day Trip to London

While we were in Birmingham for the studying part of study abroad, the last day of the program we went to London for a day and it was a fantastic time!
 
We took a train to get to London initially. It was really fun getting to travel by train since that is not the most common way of traveling in the US. When we got off the train, we were initially going to take the Tube (or subway), but it was very hectic. Instead, we all piled into taxis and made our way to the hotel.
 
Once we were all checked in, I did my Covid test so I could get back into the US. Once we were all done with that, the group made our way to the hop on hop off bus tours. We got to see many sights like Trafalgar Square, the Tower Bridge, and Big Ben. It was really cool getting to see all these locations in person and just online or on tv!
 
Eventually, the group went off in smaller groups for some free time. My group went to a nice restaurant with a great view of Tower Bridge to start off. Afterwards, we walked over it and got some cool photos of the river. Once over the bridge, we walked around some preserved ruins from London long ago and eventually found ourselves in a nice green area. Part of the smaller group then split to go see Buckingham Palace while me and a few others went and walked around the area near the greenery.
 
There were lots of nice shops and cafes in the area my smaller group visited. I ended up getting gifts for my family at a little gift shop. Afterwards, the original group I was with after the bus tours met up and got dinner at a restaurant not far from the main event for the night: seeing Mamma Mia at the West End!
 
The entire group met up at the theatre and went inside to see the show. I had only seen the movie at that point so seeing the live performance of it was spectacular! It felt more energetic and lively seeing it in person! After the show, we all got into Ubers and made our way back to the hotel.
 
The next day we left bright and early to fly back to the US. The program as a whole was something I will never forget! But the last day in London was truly a time where everyone was so happy to be there either because of us coming home or it was the last time some of us would see each other and we just wanted to have fun. Either way, it was a fun time that I would always choose to do again and again!