it had to come eventually

I can't believe it has taken me this long to update on the last leg of my trip. Life seemed to get so busy when I got back. Plus I needed large chunks of time to relax after what was some of the craziest 5 months of my life. But the time has come. I knew that it was always ahead of us but it seems so sad now that it is here. It kind of finalizes it all. 

This little blog of mine is on its last post. 

I am so glad I started this project and that it was able to document all of my time spent abroad. Thank you to everyone who has followed along with me. It truly means a lot. 

As seen throughout the past few months I had the most amazing time in Europe. The opportunity to go on exchange has changed my life. I am grateful for all of the experiences I got to have and thankful to all of the people who made it as incredible as it was. 

To my flat2D girls, I miss you so much! I continue to reminisce about our hilarious times together. Keep living the European lifestyle, you know I will. And let's make sure we actually do meet up in Glasgow 10 years from now okay? Corinthian won't know what hit us.

Cheers xo

for a good time not for a long time

I am home from my 5 month adventure in Europe! It is crazy to think that it is all over. How has it already come to this? Didn't I just get there? Even though I have only been back for 2 days I have fallen right back into my life here at home (minus now wanting to talk about travels all the time and constantly thinking about my girls from Scotland). 
At this current moment in time I am battling jetlag. It is harder then I thought it would be. I just want to go to sleep all-of-the-time. This makes going back to work a little but harder (which I did today and was less painful then it could have been). 
As I sort through the endless amount of photos I took over the past few weeks I am going to leave you with some photos from our last infamous international wednesday. 

P.S. I kinda sort of really miss Scotland. 

an attempt at catching up

I realize that it has been forever since I have posted on here. Apparently updating while traveling this time around has been even more sparse then the last. But I have been having the most amazing time, so I'm forgiven right?
I am currently in Florence, Italy and headed to Rome tomorrow morning. This will be the last city stop on my European adventure and then it is back on a plane to the homeland (aka Canada, just to keep everyone in the loop).
Over the past couple weeks I travelled to Munich, Athens, Mykonos, Santorini, and Venice the whole trip has been amazing and I will be posting photos and talking more about each city when I get back.
For right now I am going to enjoy the rest of my time in italy by eating as much gelato as humanly possible. Oh pasta and pizza too of course. xo

the beginning of my final travel adventure

My second Eurotrip is in full swing. I met up with Mel a few days ago and we have spent the first little while exploring London. As I have mentioned before I absolutely love this city. I love the vibe, the sights, the accents, and the history. I took her around to a few things that I had done the last time I was here (Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey) and we did a bunch of things I hadn't gotten to do yet (Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, Tower of London). My favorite was the Tower Bridge, aka the one that stars in the spice girls movie. I have been wanting to see the bridge since I saw the movie (aka when I was about 8) and I can now finally check that off the list.
We met up with Sarah a couple days later and spent a bunch of time in Hyde Park enjoying the fantastic weather and catching up on each others lives. It has been so great to finally see these girls after so long. It is always nice to know that you can fall right back into a friendship after being apart.
our next destination was Munich which I was very excited to revisit after how much fun I had last time. I was read to hold that litre mug and eat a pretzel. xo

the next adventure

I am leaving early tomorrow morning for my next European adventure. I am starting in London where I am meeting up with two friends from home (Mel and Sarah). I am excited that I get to go back and revisit some of my favourite sights, and some new ones of course. After that we are off to Munich for a couple days to drink some beer and eat bratwurst. Well that's what I am going to do at least. And then comes the exciting part - Athens, Santorini, Mykonos, Venice, Florence and Rome! before coming on exchange Greece and Italy were my two must-see places so I am excited to finally get around to them. It is going to be a whirlwind 3 weeks but it will be full of tons of memories and amazing places. 
over the course of the 3 weeks I am going to try and update the blog as much as possible (with no pictures unfortunately as I will only have my ipad with me). But keep checking for updates and once I am back home in the lovely Canada I will fill you all in with pictures and more details of my adventure. For now, heres to new places, people, and lessons. xo


I am leaving you with a few pictures from my time in Paris with the family :)

royal wedding

I have some exciting news! I am headed off to London tonight - meaning that I will be in the city for the Royal Wedding! It is hard to contain my excitement right now. And I am sure it will be even harder tomorrow when everything is going on. The city is decked out in British flags, people have already started camping out, and there is supposed to be a ridiculous amount of people in the streets. So basically I hope I just make it through the day alive and in one piece. 
If anyone knows me they already are aware that I have a thing for weddings. If you don't let me fill you in - I adore them! All of them, every little detail of them. But for this wedding I am most excited about what most others are probably excited for  - the dress! I am sure it will amaze us all. So here is to an amazing wedding, and hoping that it won't rain like the forecasts predicted (no one wants rain on their wedding).
After London Claire and I are off to Brussels, Brugge and Amsterdam. I will be home next Saturday to fill you all in on the rest of my travels :) Till then I hope you have a good week because I know I will. xo

the longest journey to the prettiest place

I made it home alive from Ireland - which is an amazing feat based on the trip we had. I am going to start off from the beginning, where things got pretty interesting. Claire, Amy, Kayla and I left the Glasgow central train station (headed to Glasgow Prestwick Airport which is an hour away) at 11:30pm on Tuesday. You are probably thinking "why would they do that, no way does their plane leave until the morning", and you are right, our plane wasn't flying out until 7:00 Wednesday morning. But of course, it is just our luck that trains stop at 12 and don't start up again until 5 forcing us to take the last train out. Due to our budget conscious minds we decided it would be fine to sleep in the airport that night. We didn't really consider the possibility that it would be the tiniest airport ever, leaving us to sleep on the cold, tiled floors - aka we didn't get much sleep (or any at all really). I have never been so cold in my entire life - we were so thankful to finally get on the plane. 
We flew into Dublin (45 minute flight) where we all had a bit of a panic attack on the plane during landing. See we passssed out once we got in the plane and then ryanairs inability to land smoothly led us to being startled awake thinking we had hit some sort of building, or crashed into the ground. Definitely not the most pleasant way to wake up. We then had to wait 2 hours (which is when we decided it was a good idea to wash our face, change our clothes and make ourselves look presentable again) until we had to get on a lovely 4 hour bus ride to Cork. 
After what felt like the lengthiest amount of travelling ever, we arrived in the beautiful town of Cork! It was sunny (a nice change from the cold we left in Glasgow) and the river running through the town made it all seem picture perfect. 

Kayla, Claire, Amy and I

We were staying with Kayla's friend Joe, who she goes to school with back home. He lived in an apartment with a few other people that were so cool and accommodating. We quickly dropped our bags off at his place and then he took us for a tour around Cork for the day. We went to his university campus, walked along the river, saw Saint Fin Barre's Cathedral, and just enjoyed our few sober hours in Ireland. 

University campus

Fell in love with this part of campus

Claire and I

Saint Fin Barre's Cathedral

River running through the town

Outside the cathedral

Loving the buildings

It was a perfect way to start off our trip. The next instalment of the insanity that was Ireland will be posted tomorrow (I am still dead tired from the lack of sleep I got while being there). Goodnight xo

something like an update for your sunday night enjoyment

So I thought it was about time that I gave an update of sorts on my life here in Glasgow. I also wanted to reveal where I will be headed over our spring break (it may be breaking my bank account but it is sure to be amazing). So here goes my list - if you know me well then you know that lists are my favourite way to do things. I can't believe this is my first one on here. Anyways, life update:

• I am going to Ireland for St. Patricks day this year. I am leaving on Wednesday morning and coming back on Saturday. I will be staying in Cork at one of my flatmates friends apartments (free accommodation is my favourite). It is sure to be one wild week with my wildest of flatmates. Oh and I am hoping to meet up with some friends from back home AND the girls that I met in Sevilla - all very exciting.
• This past week has involved me writing my first essay of the semester - yes that is what I am currently procrastinating from doing. I haven't written an essay since November so it is proving a little difficult to get back into the writing mode. I know, I know everyone is thinking, that girl goes to school over there? It shocks me sometimes too. 
• When Claire and I came home from Spain we had lovely little <3 and XO notes on our doors from our lovely flatmate. It still makes me smile when I have to open my awkwardly heavy door and sit in my too-small-it-makes-me-go-crazy-writing-an-essay room. 
• A long story short I am now using a very ghetto version of the phone I had when I was 14. It really can only...well actually I am not too sure what it can do. It can send a text. But is very bad at telling me the time and having the alarm go off at the right time. Oh and it is pink - that I like. 
• I bought an alarm clock due to the lack of reliance my UK flip phone provides me. 
• We got snow yesterday. Snow may be a bit of an overstatement but still, there was white stuff on the ground and I was not happy about it at all. Therefore I refused to leave the flat. Currently I am hoping that mother nature does not give us anymore of it. Rain is fine. Snow is not. 
• I bought a new jacket :) and I am so so so in love with it. I lost a part of my trench coat a few weeks ago (also a long story) and therefore it looks kind of awkward on. This new coat is also beige but totally different then a trench. I will get some pictures in it soon to show you all. (this may be another reason my bank account is hurting right now?)
• SPRNG BREAK plans have been finalized. Claire, Amy, Kayla and I will be travelling to - dun dun dun - Salzberg, Vienna, Prague, Berlin, Munich, Paris, Lyon, Barcelona and Madrid from March 31st to April 17th. We could not be more excited! Knowing us it will be an insane trip. Europe is so not ready for Flat2D. 

That is all for now. Glasgow still rocks. I am still so in love with it here. I still don't want to ever leave. So basically not a wholeeee lot has changed. Back to the essay? I suppose so. xo

no entiendo, but you still rocked my world sevilla

No entiendo = don't understand, which was basically the amount of Spanish I was able to learn while spending the weekend in Sevilla. Thankfully I was staying with some girls who knew a bit of Spanish that could help Claire and I make it through the weekend - aka order us beer, sangrias, and churros con chocolate. 
Claire and I took the train to Liverpool where we flew to Sevilla Thursday afternoon. This trip was an interesting one. We had a bunch of transfers to make and were terrified the whole way that we weren't going to make it. Plus we were feeling a littttle sick from the night before (the plentiful amount of trains and buses did not make this better). But we did make it, and Claire's cousin Hayley, and friend Mel were there waiting for us at the bus stop to take us back to their apartment. We ate some brie, nutella and crackers, got ourselves ready for the night and basically ended up just drinking at their place. Perfect for us since we had the longest travel day. 
We enjoyed a nice sleep in on Friday (actually I think we did every morning) before walking around Sevilla, enjoying the sights and indulging in as much of the Spanish cuisine and beer as we could. We shopped, drank sangrias, had churros con chocolate for the first time, and I fell in love with Spanish culture and architecture. I am still amazed at the concept of siestas - closing down stores for 3 hours, enjoying food and beer before heading back to work. Definitely a lifestyle I could get used to. 

Churros con chocolate

Explosions of colour

Saturday was spent meeting up with another one of their friends from home who is studying in Barcelona, and his two friends. We ate the most delicious gelato, enjoyed some cruzcampo beer, took in even more of the colourful buildings and orange trees lining the streets, and finished off the afternoon eating the most delicious food from cien montaditos. The serve these little tiny sandwiches and the most wonderful bread. My favourite was tortilla de patatas. I could eat them forever. Saturday night was a highlight of the trip, including costumes, Cadiz and a trip. But more on that later!

Orange trees

Centro

Hayley, Claire, Mel

Banco do Espana

Fountains galore

Beautiful

Mel, Hayley, Claire and I 

Sunday was a recovery day for all of us. We drank more beer to make us feel better. And walked over to Triana, which is on the other side of the river. It was definitely a needed relaxing day after the night we had. Claire and I landed in Liverpool and 11:10 pm and had to wait until 7:40 in the morning to catch our train back to Glasgow. We slept (well attempted - slept might be a bit of a stretch) in the airport - oh the life of a student traveler. 
Sevilla thank you for being so amazing. Thank you for making my fall in love with Spanish architecture. Thank you for setting the place for me to meet some amazing people. You, your laid back culture, and your warm weather have won me over. See you in April (yes I have decided to go back to Spain, this time Madrid and Barcelona, because I loved you that much). Best first European trip ever. Stay posted for lots of more photos!