Just Beachy

June 12th - Saturday - Day 20

Everyday you learn something new. well today i learned that England doesn't have sandy beaches. they have rocky ones. and the water is COLD but clear, and it was awesome! if you couldn't guess we went to the beach today. well we traveled south to Portsmouth Harbor and took a Ferry to the Isle of Wight to visit the Dimbola Lodge in Freshwater. 2 fun facts about this Isle, one is that Jimi Hendrix played his last UK gig at the Isle of Wright Festival in 1970, a fortnight before he passed on, and this year marks the 40th anniversary of his death. and the Dimbola Lodge had a statue of the rock star in the front strikeing his usual pose with a guitar. The Dimbola Lodge is the home of the late Julia Margaret Cameron, who was the first female photographer and one of the firsts to use it as a fine art medium in stead of a documentary tool. She got her first camera at the age of 48 for her birthday from her kids, and almost instantly fell in love. We went to the Dimbola to see some of her work, where she lived and her darkroom.

After we visited and had some lunch, where i broke a chair go me, i walked down to the beach to put my toes in the water. and it was so cold! but cool! i collected some rocks and one sea shell from the beach. we took some photos and goofed around. after we got on the bus and headed back to the ferry. I realized that on this trip we have ridden in every type of mass transportation possible, Planes, train, trams, subways, vans, taxi cars, bus, double becker bus and now ferries! lol.

over all we had a great day! my feet are killing me and my ankle is so swollen but i chugged lots of water so i hope that helps. we will see! tomorrow is a free day again and i think i am going to go to white chapel and walk around on the same streets that jack killed his victims i might take a walking tour, we will see :)

Love,
Natasha

All by myself

June 11th - Friday - Day 19

Wow i cant believe we only have 10 days left here! its almost sad! last night the group came in the room informing me that we are drinking across the hall, so i joined and omg. very interesting. we met Hanna's alter ego Pearl and she dubbed one of the other girls drunk side as Stella, then it was Ruby Stella, it was comical. finally we convinced Hanna that she needed to put pearl to bed so she went down stairs to Jen's room to crash. she was a mess. after she left the party fizzed out so i went to bed officially and slept pretty good for once. Got up this morning and had breakfast again super yummy! i enjoy their cereal and juice a lot, i really do.

after breakfast we all met in Jen's room and tried to plan the day and everything they was planning didn't sound interesting to me so i went off on my own and saw the natural history museum and the London aquarium and walked around. while walking around i saw a lady sitting with her pug and my heart jumped. i walked over to her and asked if i could pet him and she let me, i ended up talking to her about pugs for like an hour! her family has had pugs forever, she remembers her grandmother having a pug! his name was Elvis and he was sooo sweet! looked like snotzy but not as floppy. my battery died on my camera so i didn't get a picture of him :(

the history museum was awesome they had a blue whale skeleton, an adolescent not full grown adult, but he will still huge! they also had some really cool geological exhibits and they had this maniacal t-Rex that was so realistic he was frightening! a few of the kid started screaming and where scared to death to go near it. i video taped some of it. he was neat.

the aquarium was interesting, pretty standard stuff but they had the walk way that was all glass and you could walk over the shark tank! and they had a place where you could pet star fish and other annemities and they had a ray tank and a few of the rays where flirtatious they was funny. i taped them too. now that i am back i am icing my ankle and sleeping we had a huge day tomorrow!
Love,
Natasha

Did that really happen?

Photo Below

June 10th - Thursday - Day 18

today has been by far the best day of this trip. nothing can ever top what i did today. You want to know dont ya? wel i will start with the morning and dont you dare scroll down to find out! I woke up around 930 to go down stairs for breakfast with the group then i skyped with josh for about an hour. it was nice. i really miss home, as much as i am enjoying my trip i wish he could have came with me. anyway after i skyped i went down stairs to return armon's computer to him i discorved the new plan for the day was to visit westminster abbey, where i planned to see issac newtons tomb, and then lunch then some sight seeing and shopping and possibly ride the london eye. i stayed with them for a bit and ate lunch. we went to westminseter, where it cost 12 pounds to go in so we voted no, so i didnt get to see him tomb, which is fine i can just watch Da Vinici code if i want to see it that bad lol. after all that we took the subway to Oxford Circus and they all went off to shop and i walked a little bit and tried to find the 1st hard rock cafe, but no luck so i went to the hotel to use internet to look it up and found it. so i let Kacie know where i was going to the hard rock and took off. when i got there i walked around a bit in the rock shop and then went to the cafe where i got a bite to eat, sat down and had a shot and some twisted macarroni. i asked for it with out peppers and when it came out it had peppers and i was sad. i started pickign them off and apparently i was making faces while i did cuz the manager came over and asked me how my meal was and i said fine, and he asked me what i was picking off and i told him that i had ordered it sans peppers and it came with peppers so he apoligized and then got me a new order and some bread and a coupon to tour the rock vault and get a photo of me on prince's couch. i was like cool thanks walked over to the rock shop and into the vault, which we learned was the same vault the queen kept the crowned jewels in untill 1999 when the bank went under and hard rock bought the building. anyway inside was amazing they had so much stuff! original les paul played by les paul signed by les paul! Jimi hendrix's flying v guitar! Beatles harsicord that they used for st peppers album!
anyway i walked over to the guy and showed him the coupon and he asked me if i would like to hold one of the guitars and i said sure, which ones can i pick from and he told me oasis and then he said kiss and i didnt hear the other two, naturally i chose kiss and i looked and it was Gene Simmions AXE GUITAR! i nearly had a heart attack! so naturally i picked that one! he handed it to me and i sat down on princes couch and he had to run upstairs to make sure the entry way was secure so i was alone with it for a god 2 or 3 minutes before he took the photo, it was so cool! the other guitar was Steve Val and i think sting i dont quite remember. but anyway the pooint of the day is that i got to hold gene simmions guitar and it was awesome! i walked back to the underground and caught the tube back to earl's court and came to the hotel the whole time i was in a daze. it was a great day! tomorrow there is talk of oxford or stonehenge so i am going to bed so i can get up early to enjoy our free day!

love,
natasha

Media Museum

June 9th - Wednesday - Day 17

today was the national media museum. and it was AWESOME! i really enjoyed it! we saw some AMAZING things. first we saw the archive for a popular British newspaper that was well over 50 years old, some stuff was older and i twas kept in its original condition. very cool
then we went down stairs and saw the photo exhibit and she took us to see the private museum collections. which was just so cool. i cant even explain half of what i saw you will just have to see the pictures i upload. they had all old gaming systems like the commodore and Sega's and Atari's. it was neat!
oh and we saw a bunch of old film cameras and the Muppet used to film BUDDY!!! it was awesome!
omz we saw a special effect make up exhibit that had the ORIGINAL Dracula fangs on display, and Frankensteins eyes and wolf mans furr! very neat!
finally we saw original Talbot photos graphs was well as his book. we where inches away from the firs negative, thou we couldn't see it cuz the room wasnt safe for it. we saw original work my Julia Margret Cameron and just so much stuff! not as over whelming but just as cool!
tonight we went to a VERY nice Italian restaurant and i had pesto sauce with noodles and green beans and potato's, oh it was so good! tomorrow is a free day and i am not sure what is in store, but i know it will be fun!
Love,
Natasha

more Van Gogh

June 8th - Tuesday - Day 16

toady we went to the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery, both where pretty awesome. i saw Picasso! Child with A Dove from 1901 in the blue period, and i saw VAN GOGH!!!! 7 of them! including Sunflowers and Van Gogh's Chair and Two Crabs! it was awesome! i also saw some more Da Vinci and some Michelangelo and Bronzino and Raphael! i saw so much, that again it got overwhelming and i couldn't appreciate it all. after we went to the museums we saw in the square in front of the museum and people watched for a while, it was funny Hanna kept spotting gingers. and then her and Jen drew whales on each others toes. after armon found us we went and ate at a bar n grill called HA-Ha it was pretty good.
after lunch/dinner we walked back to the underground to go home and do our photo crit and discussion. it was interesting and i saw that my new idea needs more work. but that is the point of a discussion!

love,
natasha

Lacock Abbey

June 7th - Monday - Day 15

Lacock Abbey! which is where Harry Potter was filmed, well parts of the first two films. i walked with Kacie and she explained it a little but mostly was in ahhh, and it was adorable. and it is also the location where the first surviving negative was taken. it is the place where Fox Talbot lived and he took a picture of a Latticed Window, and it was beautiful! we toured the abbey all after noon and then we went and did a workshop where we did Salt printing, a process the Talbot used himself. first you coat the paper with a 2% salt solution and then in the dark you coat it with a 15% silver nitrate solution and then you set in in the sun. like the photo above :) for lunch we went to this lil tea room, and i had a turkey and cranberry sandwich with tea, supper yummy! oh and we road in a double decker bus! we rode on top in the front. super crazy! and we took a taxi to the abbey and it was WEIRD being on that side of the road, very weird.
oh and i rolled my ankle. fun.
Love,
natasha

Chill Day

June 6th - Sunday - Day 14

Today was a free day and the group decided to go to the tower of london and london bridge. i elected to stay at the hotel for a few reasons, one to rest my feet, 2nd it was to expensive. so i stayed here and organized my photos. i have 2,390 photos in 37 folders now and it takes up 9.16 GB of space. i am a shootin fool! lol. Its probaly more like 2,340 images becasue one folder is for my assingment and i copied the images in to that folder and it has over 50 so far that i can use on my assignment. 13 of which are my current favorites :) all and all a pretty calm day. i am about to head out to find a market so i can get some tea and sugar and possibly some dinner.
well that was interesting...took me forever to find the tea and sugar. lol. mostly just a chill day. the group got back and already had ate so i went and got a sandwich. yum. tomorrow is lacock, woot woot

Love,
Natasha