Golden West Camp 2013

My blog posts are coming a bit haphazardously this summer, but I guess that's somewhat fitting. Before I finish editing and posting more Europe details I wanted to take a minute to post about camp. GWC happened two weeks after I got back from Europe and was the last major thing on my calendar.

As most of you know, Golden West Camp is a big part of my life. It's a ministry that is really important to me and that I'm willing to devote a large chunk of time to every year. Going into this summer I was worried that my crazy schedule would mean that I wouldn't be able to go into camp as mentally and spiritually prepared as I would like to. I knew I could get the pre-camp work done, but I was worried about what state I would be in when July 20th rolled around. Even as I was driving up to camp I was telling my friend, who was in the car with me, that I didn't feel like camp was about to start. It didn't matter that I'd just spent the last week running around doing admin stuff for it, I think my brain was just fried at that point.

While this year wasn't my most amazing year, it was a great year of camp overall. Like always, I'm incredibly grateful to have been a part of it. I've talked to enough of the campers, either during camp or after we got back, to know that this year had an impact on a lot of them. I'd say that makes this year a successful year.

 

I was blessed to have an awesome cabin that had four girls from my church plus two wonderful girls from Tucson. All six of the girls are going to be seniors this year and it was a lot of fun to have an entire cabin of girls from "my class" right before they start their last year of highschool.

It's the beginning of the end for my time with this class of students. It's hard to believe that I only have one year left with them. I'm looking forward to making the most of it!

{England} Mind The Gap

I looked at my calendar today and realized that I arrived home from my Europe trip over a month ago. It feels like it was just yesterday but at the same time I feel like a year's worth of stuff has happened since then. I had intended to blog about the trip either during the trip or right after, but that obviously didn't happen. But nonetheless, here we go...

I have to admit that going into my trip that England was actually the least exciting for me of the three (technically four) countries that I was going to visit. I knew I would enjoy seeing London, but I saw it as something basic that you really should do on your first trip to Europe. It wasn't something that I was giddy excited about. Little did I know that I was going to fall in love with British culture and just London in general. It's an amazing city with an endless list of things to do and lots of fun quirks. Even though they speak English like us, British English uses fun words in place of some of ours and I find those differences amusing. I also found the stereotypes about Londoners being reserved and unfriendly to be largely inaccurate. It didn't hurt that every single guy had a hot British accent, since you can't really go wrong with that.

I spent four and a half days in England, about half of which I actually spent in London itself.

Some of the highlights and/or things I did in London itself were:

(click on pictures to see them larger)

The Tube - I loved it! I've decided that living in a city with mass transit is something that I need to make happen at some point in my lifetime. I love figuring out the best way to get from point A to point B, I love maps, and I loved spending a lot of time walking around a city instead of driving. It's no wonder that a lot of Londoners are quite slim.

 

A bike tour - I wanted to find something to help me stay awake that first day when I arrived in London. My sister went to Edinburgh for 24 hours, so I was on my own as far as keeping myself awake. The night before I the trip I stumbled upon the idea to take a bike tour and I'm so incredibly glad that I did.
It was a "night tour" (however, it wasn't dark until after 10 PM) that covered most of the major sites south of the Thames. I loved exploring the city on bike (left side of the road anyone?), the tour guide was awesome, and it was just me and a family of four so it practically a personal tour. It was a fantastic way to orient myself with the area (my hostel was by the London Bridge) while also keeping me awake. Plus, the tour ended with a stop at a local pub where I got to have my first beer in Europe. It was a house ale that was utterly fantastic and I'm incredibly bummed that I can't get it again.


Big Ben - Of course I had to go see him. I got some better shots of just Big Ben, but this is one of the only decent shots I got that actually has me in the picture.






Speaking of classic pictures...

Continuing on...

British Museum - I've concluded that I'm not much of a museum person. As much as I can appreciate the fact that this museum has some pretty awesome stuff in it, I was over it in about five minutes. The wall to wall people didn't help matters either.

Science Museum - However, I did greatly enjoy the Science Musuem. I guess it's just the engineer in me. The Google exhibit in the basement was fun, so make sure to check that out if you go.








Buckingham Palace - I happened to accidentally end up around Buckingham Palace about 20 minutes before the changing of the guards, so I decided to stick around and watch. I ended up squeezing into a front row spot when someone left, but it was on the side that seems to be further away from most of the action. While it's fun to be able to say that I've seen the changing of the guards, I actually left partway through it because I got bored. And then I couldn't cross the street to get back to the Tube station because of course that was when the horse procession went down the street. But it is cool to be able to say that I've seen it. One more touristy thing that I can check off!

Thames River - There were multiple times during the trip where I got to walk (or bike!) along the Thames and I loved it every time. When I go back to London I want to rent a bike and just bike along the Thames for a good long bit of time. You can see some major landmarks along the way, not to mention that at night you see all of the locals hanging out at various pubs and you feel like you get a true idea of what life is like in central London for the locals.

 

Kensington Palace - I was trying to avoid doing too many things with entrance fees since there are so many free things to do in London, but I'm glad that I went ahead and paid for this one. I felt like it was a deep dive into the royal history of England. The garden was beautiful!

 

Hyde Park - One thing that I wish I had spent more time exploring while in London were the parks since they seem to have so many amazing ones. I only got a small taste of Hyde Park, but it was fantastic. Next time I'm in London I want to rent one of the bikes and just spend a couple of hours exploring around Hyde Park.

 


Westminster - I had intended to actually go inside of Westminster, but as things turned out it ended up only being something we stopped by briefly. Someday when I go back I want to see the inside of it, since I'm sure it's as stunning inside as it was on the outside.





More about the rest of my time in England to come soon!