7/1/2016
Today was possibly the longest travel day of the whole trip.
Most students were up and running around to get ready by 4 am. We snacked on a
quick breakfast and left the Sleepy Lion as a group of even sleepier students.
We made a short trip over to the train station and piled in to train number one
to get to the airport. Of course, we ended up in the airport where scenes from
the new marvel movie Captain America: Civil War were shot. (We saw an ant during
the flight, which we are convinced was ant man. Sadly, no view of Iron Man.)
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| About to take off from Leipzig. |
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| Leipzig from the air. |
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Look familiar?
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The first flight was pretty short, and many of us slept the whole way. We had a
three-hour layover in Cologne where, like the tourists we are, the two of us
(Stefaney & Katrina), bought cologne. After naps and lunch and some little
mini adventures walking around the small area of the Cologne airport near our
gate, we boarded our second flight filled with excitement to see London.
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| London from above. |
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| Leaving Cologne and off to London |
Our
flight took forever to land, causing a little bit of anxiety, but we powered
through. Our little group sluggishly made our way down the escalator to our
first London tube ride, which lasted about an hour (30 minutes longer than expected,
and two hours longer than we were hoping to wait). Dr. and Mrs. Lauterbach
couldn’t join us for the ride, since they graciously took care of some subway
card details (as they have been doing most of the hard work ironing out all the
fine details since we’ve arrived) so David led us from the train station to the
hostel. The Generator hostel has the coolest layout in their main lobby, which
can best be described as a bar connected to the main hostel check-in area.
Upstairs are all of the bedrooms, each floor with their own theme (Poppins,
Bond, Dr. Who, etc…), and two communal bathrooms. Once we all got settled in,
we all went our separate ways for dinner. A group of us waited at the bar for
one other student to get back from a run before leaving, which turned out to be
a good time as we started up a conversation with the friendly barkeep who
introduced us to some other native Michiganders visiting London for a few days!
After a fun little discussion of how Michigan would be THE place to visit for anyone
coming in from another country, we parted ways from our new friends and headed
to a nearby restaurant called Giraffe, and got some juicy home-style burgers
(among other things). Dinner was a much needed hearty feast, and it felt good
to finally get some food in our bellies. By the time we walked back to the
hostel, we were ready to go into a food-coma/jet-lag induced deep sleep.
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| Leaving the London underground |
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| A secret candid shot of the group at the hostel, waiting for further instructions. |
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| Poppins/Third floor theme |
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| The bar inside the hostel |
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| Katrina's ribs from dinner |
- Katrina & Stefaney
I too was bummed about not seeing Iron Man. However, the ant may not have been Ant-Man, as he is just a really tiny man, but rather one of his many ant followers. Like Ant-thony, more or less his noble steed in the film. Sadly Ant-thony died in battle, but he had a many brethren, so I am sure you found his cousin. I wonder if he would speak German though. Well understand it, I should say, because ants don't talk like that. Unless different ants have different ways of communicating due to their location, but I think I may be overthinking this. But yes, The German-understanding-cousin-of-Ant-thony, the one the likes to fly. Does that make him a flying ant then?
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