Detour in York

So this is a little detour from my entries chronicling my winter trip on the continent (which I promise I will get to Mom). Over the weekend the Dickinson crew traveled via train to York, otherwise referred to as Jorvik by the Vikings (Thor!). And like all good travelers - we took a free tour! Here's what we found along the way...

Ruins from a Roman/Medieval tower. Below is a picture of it from the outside.

You can see a little bit of the park it looks over. England does a really nice job of maintaining its parks and gardens.On the other side of the green are the ruins of a Medieval abbey - one of my personal favorites.

 The guy wearing a hat like Grandpa's was our blue badge tour guide.

Next on our tour we walked along the Roman/Medieval wall

 This is the entrance to the wall.

The tower comes complete with a portcullis, however it is no longer functional (much to my disappointment) and cars travel through the tunnel. The wall surrounds the entire center of the city, breaking at only two points. We only walked along two sides of it.

We also went to York Minster - the York Cathedral. Included in the admission ticket is the climb up to the top. Several people in our group are afraid of heights so props to them for being brave enough to do this. Halfway up you walk out on the gallery. The view from there is spectacular.

 Here are a few of my fellow Dickinsonians at the top. The entire space was fenced in except for these small holes large enough to stick your head through.

 I have come to believe that every house in England looks the same. Brick or white. No exceptions.

PRAHA!!!!!!!!

January 4th
Holly and I decided to take a three hour free tour of Prague. Our tour guide was an interesting character. He had long straight hair that came down to his shoulders, a rainbow hat and he wore no gloves (an amazing feat considering that Prague was FREEZING COLD). He was very entertaining though. Lot's a funny stories. They like to add in random facts to keep their audience's attention.

The town square in the Old Town was our first stop.

A church I don't remember the name of. But I thought it especially beautiful.

And of course, the astronomical clock -

The clock dates all the way back to 1410 and is mounted on the wall of the Old Town City Hall.This is the building where Prague's famous defenestrations occurred in 1419 and 1618. Don't know what defenestration means? Neither did I! Apparently defenestration is when you throw someone out a window. I wont go into details, but what it boils down to is religious conflicts.You can find a basic run down of events here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defenestrations_of_Prague . The clock itself has the zodiac signs, the Old Czech time scale, as well as the positions of the Sun and the Moon. Every hour, a man in full trumpeter costume, stands at the top of the tower and blows a horn and puppets come out of the clock.The trumpet guy was, of course, my favorite part.


Next on our tour, we saw the Estates Theatre

A statue of Franz Kafka.

The statue is based off of one of Kafka's short stories, "Description of Struggle." In the story a man rides on the shoulders of an "acquaintance," depicted in the monument as an empty suit.
















And now we enter the Jewish Quarter. Originally the swampy area of Prague, it has since become one of the most affluent and sought after regions of the city.

Despite its Moorish design, this building is actually a synagogue.

Outside the Jewish cemetery. Holly and I went back later and saw the museum and the cemetery itself. You aren't allowed to take photos, so we will just have to make do with the images I have found online. Inside the museum the walls are completely covered in writing. It is the names of all the Jewish people who were taken to concentration camps. The massive number of names is mind boggling. The image below is merely an extract, but you can get an idea of how small the font is. Now picture that covering entire walls floor to ceiling.

(taken from http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJGIqu3Ue9iEMnd0ew9-vWste1hzxJZR3-ftfQ1CMugc-ZHJdFCqBH-sgc-kzGv-MT_3q8Gf-DVu_YsSHrMXAQ9gvUYpeCXKXAQJPvCYgVk7aFbJLMOsxR30ah9oYAjMNU_Eriemaph50/s400/Jewish_Town_and_Synagogues-Prague%255B1%255D.jpg&imgrefurl=http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/11/jewish-prague.html&usg=__YUk2cOdMgfDl8AZoiSQ76inDYvk=&h=300&w=400&sz=41&hl=en&start=0&sig2=0CO0j33RH4hmKH9sAzCXNA&zoom=1&tbnid=2iBIRkiPuGtjgM:&tbnh=147&tbnw=205&ei=Dyg6TbeKNNTQ4gaVs6iyCg&prev=/images%3Fq%3Djewish%2Bmuseum%2Bprague%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26biw%3D1280%26bih%3D585%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=276&vpy=250&dur=503&hovh=154&hovw=205&tx=158&ty=87&oei=9Sc6TaP2L5GWOtrSkIEL&esq=5&page=1&ndsp=19&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0 )

And here is a picture of the cemetery. It is insane the amount of headstones and bodies they managed to cram in there.

(taken from http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.vareen.com/Travels/Prague/IMG_1496.JPG&imgrefurl=http://www.vareen.com/Travels/Prague.htm&usg=__xCsYSKZcOUKKI54ZW16Mx_-uyfg=&h=480&w=640&sz=186&hl=en&start=108&sig2=9be5CcCxAQLust570Jo7FQ&zoom=1&tbnid=tcU9ehNGWHXCjM:&tbnh=132&tbnw=176&ei=Qyg6TcG6FIzp4waSnKWdCg&prev=/images%3Fq%3Djewish%2Bcemetery%2Bprague%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26biw%3D1280%26bih%3D585%26tbs%3Disch:10%2C2850&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=976&vpy=78&dur=244&hovh=194&hovw=259&tx=201&ty=119&oei=oyY6TbnENMObOorF_P4K&esq=8&page=7&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:5,s:108&biw=1280&bih=585 )

But back to our tour - this guy is definitely a crowd favorite.

Now this man was a very important figure in world history. This is the man who started it all, the man who.......played chess?? That's right folks, this is the man who started the INK WARS!!!!!! Wilhelm Steinitz was an Austrian chess player who became a world champion. He apparently revolutionized the way that chess was played and wrote a book about it. His rival wrote a book in response. Wilhelm wrote a book back. His rival wrote another book...and so on. National hero.

We ended our tour on the river, and Holly and I explored Charles Bridge.

 Tell me that hood isn't awesome???!

Back in Norwich!

 So for those of you who don't know, I have been on an epic journey for the past two weeks, hitting up Prague, Bratislava, Vienna and Salzburg. UEA gives its students a month long winter break (and a month long spring break!! - jealous yet?) so my good friend Holly and I decided to use that time to travel. Holly's friend Rebecca, who is currently studying in Malaga, Spain, also joined our adventures.
Here's a map of our route:

 

We began our journey in London. From Stansted Airport, we flew to Prague in the Czech Republic. A few days later we traveled by bus to Bratislava, Slovakia. Another bus took us to Vienna in Austria. And finally we took a train to Salzburg, also in Austria. 

The next few posts will chronicle my adventures across Europe, dutifully recorded in my handy-dandy notebook (thanks for the journal Mom!). And of course, there will be pictures along the way!

So let's begin with day one in Prague, January 3rd.

Holly and I wake up at the crack of dawn to catch the bus that will take us to the Norwich train station (where we will then catch a train to London Stansted Airport). HOWEVER - England neglected to inform its American visitors that January 3rd happens to be a bank holiday. Grrr. The next twenty or so minutes involves a lot of swearing, jumping up and down, cursing the British, and finally a phone call to the local cab company. Great start. Luckily, our fortunes seemed to change for the better, and we had no more trouble with transportation. 

Sadly, by the time we arrived in Prague it was dark and we were all exhausted. Rebecca was sick and continued to be sick throughout our entire journey. She chose to sleep in the hostel while Holly and I went to U Bulinos, the traditional Czech restaurant down the street. On the recommendation of the Czech Inn staff we tried the garlic soup (now a personal favorite) and a platter of different meats. It was all delicious.

Here's a map of Prague itself to give you a bit of an idea of the city. 

(image found on Google)

 Our hostel, the Czech Inn (pun intended), is located near the main train station. It was a quick tram ride into the Old Town. Once there, you could pretty much walk anywhere.

 (Don't worry, I will post actual pictures in the next entry.)

Norwich in Winter

Season's Greetings!!!!!
Hope everyone is having a merry ol' time. This is a picture I took on the way to class Monday morning. You are looking at Earlham Park, located conveniently right next to University Village where I live. The walk to class is about ten minutes long, which stinks on cold, rainy days, but can be very refreshing on clear ones.

So what has happened since my trip to Ireland last month? Well, there have been a lot of papers. Research takes up a lot of time (especially when the internet is down - thanks UEA, please get your act together) and then of course there is the regular everyday assignments for each class.

My children's literature class took a mini field trip to the Forum (Norwich library) to hear the children's librarians speak. I was horrified to learn that if a book gets returned to the library with even so much as a pencil mark, the book gets shredded. Are they insane?!?! You don't destroy books! What kind of a library kills books? This is apparently a nationwide policy. (Brits please take note - you have just lost serious man points)

Anyway, the library itself, besides its campaign for discrimination against battered books, is actually a very interesting place. The main hall has new exhibits, fairs.... and there is always something going on just outside. This is what I found the last time I went.

Pretty cool, huh? You know the Ardsley library never has anything like this. One time when I walked past and they had a huge blow up pool and what looked like two giant hamster wheels. You were supposed to go in the bubbles and then walk on water! Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera. And even more unfortunately, I didn't have time to try it.

Here are a few random pics for you:

Me and the girls on Thanksgiving at KQ's house.

 Laura's birthday dinner.........not my Laura.....the Aussie Laura 

(she's the one in the yellow sweater in the middle)

 These are my flatmates, minus Elvish who never seems to say very much. Next to me is Claire, then Parisha, Alex (top left) and Jamie (top right).

Me and the girls from flats 4, 5 & 6. 

And a few extra pics from Ireland

 About to kiss the Blarney stone!!! The guy has to hold onto you otherwise you might fall through the gap - although there is a nice sign that asks you to consider how unsafe it was before they installed the two very thin, good for nothing safety bars.

Killarney

We started off our day on a good note - when we got out of the Killarney train station we saw a rainbow (I wanted to look for a pot of gold but...) You cant really see it all that well in this picture, but I think the church is pretty too.

And here are some pictures of the town. Its mostly made up of little shops and pubs.

The first stop sign we've seen in months. Seriously - they do not exist in England.

Welcome to Killarney National Park!
The land was originally privately owned and then turned over into Ireland's first national park.

Here's Muckross House, the Victorian mansion where the lords and ladies used to live. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert paid a visit once.

That first picture with the mountains is the view of their backyard. Not too shabby huh? And here are some more!!!