Playing ketchup

Get it?  Playing ketchup = playing catch up...   :)   What?   Don't roll your eyes at me!  This is MY blog thank you very much and I'll be as cheesy as I want with it....  hey, if you're reading this then you're probably either family or friend (or myself) and you already know that I can be quite the cheese ball.   Mmm...cheese..   I'm hungry.   Did I mention my randomness, too?  Don't judge.

My trip is coming to a close.  All these people I've been meeting have been/are traveling for a month or two (or more), it makes me feel like anything I say about my two whole weeks is just not justified.  Time is such a funny fiend.   How is it possible that the last 3 days have felt like 3 weeks and yet 3 minutes at the same time?  Who's up for a seminar on time perception?

Gollygeez, I have so much to catch up on here in the good ol' blogosphere about Holly's Holiday.   I haven't written about my last day in London, didn't give many details about Paris, and man alive, I have so much to write about from bella Roma.  Not going to lie, some of it just may not make it from my memory through my fingers to the keyboard inputting info into this blog.   (Anyone else think the word "blog" is really weird?)

As a sidenote, because that's how I roll, different countries' keyboards are really strange.  The essentials are all in the same place (ie, Tab, space bar, numbers, letters, Enter, Shift, etc) but the symbols are all screwed up. 

Okay, down to business.

So my last day in London was... Thursday of last week?  Yep.   Once I finally dragged my lazy butt out of bed in the morning, I went down to St Paul's cathedral.  The inside is just completely gorgeous.  I climbed the 517 steps to the [very windy] top, which has just as good a view as the Eye of London, except free.   And not so claustrophobic/bad for people who are a little nervous of heights.  Not that I'm a little nervous about heights, of course....   Really though - can you believe I climbed up AND down 517 steps?  And didn't die of panic?  No fights with gravity this year. Yeah!    Is it lame to give yourself a high five?

After St Pauls, I crossed the Thames circa the Millenium Bridge (picture the bridge that the Death Eaters destroyed at the beginning of the most recent Harry Potter movie) and because I'm a total theater junkie and adore Shakespeare, of course I checked out Shakespeare's Globe Theater which isn't actually Shakespeare's Globe Theater.  Shakespeare's Globe burned down in 1613, which incidentally is when Shakespeare stopped writing..  Coincidence?   The tour guide lady was a total riot.   I wonder if the tour guides are also actors/actresses... but I didn't think to ask then.  I learned a lot about it, though!!   And there was a very nicely dressed stagehand cleaning the stage while we were all standing there, he talked to us a bit and..  let's just say, I'd vote for him.   Biz-ness!  

What did I do after the Globe?.. Oh!  Hampton Court Palace!   They do this reenactment of Henry VIII's wedding to his 6th wife Catherine Parr with all the period dress and such, but I didn't get there until about 4 pm so it was basically finished.   But I picked up a good ol' audioguide and did a couple of the tours.  Saw the Great Hall and I just had visions of Beowolf going in my head.  I sat in the Queen's chair, some random dude took a picture of me sitting there, walked around the King and Queen's apartments, yada yada..  I know the British people of the times were quite a hardy people, and being in that palace I can imagine even the king and queen being hardy themselves.   Kinda tough, ya know?   The gardens were pretty nice, there were a few really cute ponds and these big trees/bushes that had leaves all the way to the ground.. they looked like giant green Kisses.  (You know, of the Hershey's Kiss variety.)   Really gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "I kiss the ground you walk on."

After that I pretty much just made my way back to Meagan's place to shower and pack and get ready for my train the next day.   Yay!     It was so awesome staying with Meagan, she was so sweet to let me stay there!   I'm pretty sure I left my pajamas there, though...  Go me.

So, Paris.  What have I left out about Paris?    Monday was my last day there, and I had every intention of spending practically the whole day between the Musee d'Orsay and the Louvre, thanks to the forecast of rain.  Which came true.  Very true.  And very wet.    And of course, because I'm an ignorant traveler who didn't think to check the hours of operation for the museums, I got to the Musee d'Orsay and it was fermé.  Which is French for "We hate Holly so we're going to close this museum on Mondays."   Getting to the Louvre from the d'Orsay on the Metro would have been ridiculous and taken forever and included about 5 different changes, so I just walked.   I got pretty soaked, but honestly it was kind of fun!   I love the rain, and that's one thing I really miss about Maryland..  It just doesn't rain enough in Utah.  And even when it does rain, it's such pansy drizzling that barely lasts 5 minutes.   Anyway, back to the story!

The Louvre was pretty sweet.   I didn't really take any pictures, and I didn't spend a TON of time there because a) I was drenched and cold, 2) I was still kind of mad that the Musse d'Orsay was closed and I couldn't go see the Monet collection, and d) I was just tired..  Did a bit of souvenir shopping and just went back to my hostel to get in some dry and warm clothes!   Got some dinner, played on my computer, talked to the Aussie girl that was one of my roommates, and went to bed.  Voila.  Exciting, non? 

I had to get out to this random Port Maillot metro stop to catch the shuttle to the teeny tiny Beauvais airport at around 6:15 AM for my 9:15 flight.   It took about an hour and 15 minutes to get to the airport, so it's understandable!  :)    I wish I'd been able to change my attitude more in Paris, I probably would have had less of a rotten time overall, but... it felt SO good to take off the ground and make it up into the sun above the clouds on my way to sunny, beautiful Italy.

OH!   So, because these two airports were so stinkin' tiny, we got to walk out on the tarmac and walk up the stairs to get on the plane - I've always wanted to do that, like in the movies!

Then comes Rome.

And more details of this shall come at a later time.  :-D   I need to re-pack all my crap, and they're making an awesome dinner here at the hostel that smells amazing.   


You know what they say about traveling...   Once you pop the fun don't stop!   Wait...that's the Pringles slogan.   Same thing, though - once you've started traveling, you never really want to stop.  I'm excited to go home tomorrow, I miss my family and my friends and my bed...ohhhh my bed...  and being able to eat Gluten-free easily.   I don't want to quit traveling quite yet.   I want to go to Florence with Signy and Carolyn, to Cinque Terre and Nice and Barcelona with Andy, to Switzerland with the Dubin brothers, to Venice and Greece and Prague and and and...  Hey parents, I'm not possibly some kind of heiress am I?