Sept 25
Tonight we went on the Ghost Tour. I was a bit bummed that it wasn’t very scary, but it was a lot of fun. We heard a lot about the city and the history of the witch trials and tortures. We also heard about poltergeists that haunt the graveyard and tombs that we were in. In that graveyard, is the grave of Tom Riddle and McGonagal, who was an awful poet. These were right across from The Elephant House where JK Rowling wrote some of Harry Potter and it is across from a castle that inspired Hogwarts. Charles Dickens also got inspiration from this graveyard. He thought that a grave read “Ebenezer Scroogie -Mean Man” and he wondered what kind of person someone would have to be in order to have that put on their tombstone. However, the stone actual read “meal man” because he sold cereal in the market. But I guess it’s good that Dickens couldn’t read very well...ironic.

Sept 26
Today we left Scotland to drive to York. We walked around the city a bit and went into the city walls. Then we went to Evensong at Yorkminster. That Abbey is huge! The stained glass is beautiful and the oldest in Britain. After that we went to dinner and then walked around until we found our way back to the hotel. It was kind of hard to find our way back because on the way there we found out that a woman from Searcy, the accompanist for our musicals, passed away today, so needless to say, we were all a bit sad and distracted.
Jenn, Jillian, and I had a girl’s night tonight and cuddled and watched “Pretty Woman.” It is going to take a while to get used to British commercials, but some of them were really funny.
I am so excited to get to London tomorrow!


Sept 27
We spent this morning walking around York some more and doing a bit of shopping. I decided that I wanted to take a picture sitting in the lap of the Constantine statue, so I climbed up there, right as a great big group of tourists were coming to see Yorkminster. Apparently one lady saw me and crossed herself. I just laughed, because it’s Constantine, it’s not like I was doing some sac religious and climbing on Jesus or something.
Then we got on the bus and drove to London! We have settled into our flats. Jillian, Lolli, Jenn, Courtney, and I are living together. It should be a lot of fun because they are great girls and we get along really well and have a ton of fun. We also have the smallest flat, which is awesome. The others have 7 and 8. We have a bedroom of 3 that Courtney, Jenn, and I are in and Lolli and Jillian are in the two-person bedroom. We also have 2 bathrooms with two showers in our room, along with a living room and kitchen. The only downside is that we live at the very top of the building, which is several stories up; so carrying up all of our luggage was quite an adventure. I am just go glad to be unpacked and to not have to live out of a suitcase anymore.
We can climb out our windows and go to the other girl’s rooms on the fire escape. Since we didn't have internet yet, the roomies and I watched weird British soap operas and some movies.

York: http://harding.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2053736&l=48376&id=71005171