Catching up with our cousins in London

London Day 2

Today we caught up with our cousins George, Riley and Aunty Pene. They travelled all the way from Cornwall to London to come and see us.

Together we had an awesome day, doing lots of walking around some famous sites in London like London Eye,




Big Ben (the tower, not the actual bell)

Ben and Big Ben

and Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guards.

Then we walked through the park and had lunch Aunty Pene had prepared, she's the best!

Just when we had finished lunch it started to rain, but not to worry: Next stop was the Natural History museum... we saw huge Dinosaur bones!

Ben and the Giant Sloth 

I

It was awesome to be able to see our cousins and share a wonderful day with them! Till next time!

Hello London!

London Day 1

So, when we arrived at the hotel on Tuesday, we almost went straight to bed as we only had a very short sleep on the plane. It was only the afternoon but we didn't care, we just needed a rest! We woke up for some dinner but then we went straight back to bed again... so we won't count this day :-)

When we finally woke up the next day (Wednesday), we had already missed breakfast time in the hotel... so first we went to get some food and then on the tube (Underground) to London Tower. 

London Tower was first built over 900 years ago by William the Conqueror. The first tower that was built now has a lot armour on display, but over the years they built walls and lots of other towers too. We saw lots of crowns and other displays and we had a great tour guide showing us around and telling us interesting stories!

Bye San Fransisco - we're off to London!

Traveling to London

On Monday it was time for us to pack our bags again. But first: breakfast!

Pancakes was the favourite breakfast for the Loud Monkeys. We could order these in the kitchen of the Hostel - very yummie!

Then we went to the laundromat down the road, as we managed to get an impressive pile of washing in a very short time!

Once the washing was dry we quickly put it in the suitcases and we made our way back to BART

 
We arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare before check in opened... so we could just sit down and relax for a while.

 After a bit of excitement when we went through security (alarms went off, bags needed to be checked and Inge had to be checked for explosives or drugs) we were allowed through to the gate and we saw our plane.

When we boarded the plane the Loud Monkeys were sitting in a row next to each other. 

After we arrived we had to take another train to the hotel, this train is called the Underground - quite a landmark in London!

 


 

Some more pictures of San Fransisco

Some more San Fran pictures

We took soooo many pictures of San Fransisco... here are a few more!

Below pictures are when we walked from the Hostel to Fort Mason, quite a long walk but so worth it once we got there. From the top of the Fort we could see both the Golden Gate bridge and Alcatraz.

After this long walk we had a massive lunch at The Cannery down at Fisherman's wharf... very yummie!

After lunch we explored Fisherman's wharf a bit further and then we were quite tired, so we decided to make our way back to the hostel. As it was quite a long way back uphill we took the bus. We saw some awesome buildings while on the top deck of the bus and a very cool fire truck!

 On the second day we went to Golden Gate bridge, as you will have read in previous posts... After visiting the bridge we went to Golden Gate park for lunch and a play at the playground. The park is beautiful, with a science and a modern art museum. There is a band stand with musicians playing and some beautiful statues and fountains. It was again very very hot so afterwards we went back to the hostel for a rest. The hostel lobby and mezzanine was very cool and they have relaxing areas with couches and chairs for reading or catching up on the blog

On a Sunday, dinner was offered to guests for a donation only, with all proceeds going to a local church looking after homeless people in the area. Dinner was absolutely delicious (beans, salad, yummy fresh salsa, and burritos) and afterwards we tried to have an early night because the next day was a travel day again!

Hi Room 7 - by Ben

Hi room 7 

Wow what a hard time in San Francesco like the scorching sun it felt like 40 degrees Celsius!
But there are cool buildings some survived the earthquake and followed a big fire that destroyed a big part of the city a long time ago.On Saturday we went to this port in 1864 fort Mason fortified the port fearing attack from I actually don't know.The next day we went to the golden gate bridge that took over 4 years to build which started in 1933-1937 I know a very long time,anyway here's some photos.
See you later :)

The Golden Gate Bridge - by Alex

the golden gate bridge

 

Yay today is the day when we walk over the golden gate bridge.
When we got to the middle of the bridge  I saw Alcatraz, which is a prison island.
When we got off the bridge we went to golden gate park and had a rest.

By Alex

Finally... We're leaving!

Finally! We're leaving!

The time has come, the suitcases are packed and the taxi has arrived. Time to go to the airport, we are very excited!

Check in we could do ourselves by using the kiosks and we had to lift our very heavy bags onto the conveyor bags... bye bye.. see you in San Fransisco.

Then we went through immigration and security. All our bags got scanned and we had to go through a  walk-through scanner ourselves.

We had to wait quite a long time before we could board the plane, this waiting was a bit boring. But then finally... we were alllowed to go on the plane!

We were sitting all next to each other on a row. At the back of the seats in front of us were little monitors and we could chose our own movies and games to play. A little while after take off, we were given dinner - the choice was beef or chicken.

Then it was time to go sleep. Sleeping on the plane is actually really hard because the plane is so noisy. Everyone got at least a little bit of sleep.

About two hours before landing, the lights came on again and everyone woke up for breakfast. We weren't very hungry, but we had some fruit and yogurt anyway.

Then, it was time to land... we could see a bit of San Fransisco through the windows... very exciting!

After the plane landed and we disembarked (big word for getting off the plane), we had to wait a very very long  time to get through immigration. Inge had to be scanned, finger printed and a picture taken... They did this with every adult. No wonder it take so long to get through immigration.

But finally, we were through and our bags were already waiting for us!

San Fransisco has a train station right outside the international terminal, so convenient. It's called BART and all we had to do is buy some tickets and get in. There were little gates, you had to put your ticket in and it would pop out again and the gate opens. We had to do this one by one with our luggage... it's almost a like a game. Inge would put the ticket in and shout and the Loud Monkeys "GO!" one by one until we all got through, with our luggage.

The train was super fast and got us to the city within 30 minutes. When we got out of the train station it was amazing, the sun was shining, there was a little market and street artists performing... what a nice welcome to San Fransisco.

It's a bit weird to think that we left on Friday evening in New Zealand and we are now in San Fransisco at 3 pm that same day... we've traveled backwards in time!
 
The Youth hostel was about 15 minutes walk away... But... it seemed ages with all the luggage and we were quite tired from the trip.

The Hostel is part of the Youth Hostel organisation and it's a very welcoming place. We are in China town so there are little Asian restaurants everywhere. 

Our first dinner in San Fransisco was Vietnamese takeaways... Sooo yummy!

We are sleeping in a four bed dorm, with our own little (tiny) bathroom. It's simple but comfortable and perfect for us. After dinner we all had a shower and off to bed... even though we didn't think we could sleep that easily in strange bed and hearing lots of strange sounds... soon everyone was fast asleep!