Leaving London

Well, our stay in London has come to an end. We'll be leaving tonight from Luton at about 2-3am to get to the Waterloo train station in London, where we will take a Eurostar bullet train to France at 5:30am. The Eurostar train uses the 'chunnel', or the underground tunnel that spans the divide between England and France - we should arrive in Paris at about 9-10 in the morning.

Our stay in London was certainly eventful. We got to do a lot of sightseeing in downtown London and the surrounding area, as well as go out in Luton. A lot of our stay here was also very relaxed as we booked Hostels and Hotels for the countries that lay ahead. Personally, I was able to visit some of my family in Cheshunt as well as visit my cousin. I'll probably have to visit more family on our return trip for one more evening.

I think overall, despite the rainy weather, we had a great time here in England. One caveat is that it's very costly here...about 10 pounds per day transportation expenses, 20 pounds eating expenses, and about 20 pounds miscellaneous (pubs, sightseeing costs, etc.). Overall, a little more than our recommended budget of about 40-45 pounds a day. However, seeing how this is one of the most expensive cities in the world (among these are New York and Tokyo), we will probably have a much more relaxed budget as we go on. We will also be eating at less 'restauranty' places and trying to venture out into the markets.

Pictures from our London trip are forthcoming...

Cheerio,

Eurotravellers.

Greetings from London

First of all, sorry for the delay of our first post from London. It has been quite an eventful 3 days here to say the least. We arrived at Gatwick at roughly 10:30 a.m. local time on May 26th and purchased our one way ticket to Luton (Sachin's place) which is about 45 minutes away by ground train.

As soon as we reached Luton, we relaxed, napped a bit and showered. We wasted no time in beginning the British festivities and dined at Nando's, an English chicken joint where we tried a variety of beers including Corronberg 1664, StrongBow, and Stella. The Strongbow, which is actually a cider, seemed to be the favorite of the group.

After returning to Sachin's we got ready to go to an apartment party of some med school students here in London. After meeting his friends and sharing some stories, we head out to Whitehouse, a pub/club in Luton. We returned home at around 3 am, just in time to catch the end of the mavs game on gamecast.

The following day we left with Sachin and Nabeel(Sachin's friend) to do a little sightseeing. The weather was horrible. I think we have seen the sun twice since we have been here. It was pretty much pouring all day, but we managed to go to the National Gallery to view artworks by Monet, Manet, Da Vinci etc. We were also able to spend time in Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus, and later enjoyed a few pints at a beautiful pub along the banks of the Thames right under the Tower bridge. One misconception we realized was that the Tower bridge is the actual bridge you think of when you see London, not London Bridge, which is just a normal bridge.

At the end of the night we were able to experience the nightlife of London visiting some nice clubs as well as some local pubs. One thing we have all taken away from these past 3 days is that London is ridiculously expensive. The British pound is two American dollars so everything is pretty much double what we pay back home if not more. Also the weather is really nasty here. All in all however, it's not all the different from America. One final note, we did visit a restaurant in downtown London called the "Texas Embassy" which serves Mexican food. The smell of fajitas took us back briefly to Austin.

Future plans: Joel and Anand will be arriving in the next two days and we will be departing to Paris via the Chunnel in the early morning of June 1st. From now until then we plan on visiting Buckingham Palace, London Eye, Stonehenge, Westminster, Tower of London, Big Ben, Globe Theatre, and St. Paul's Cathedral.

That's all for now folks...keep checking periodically and hopefully can keep up with y'all demand. More to come later....

Cheers mates,
EuroTravelers

First Post!

This is our first post! Soooo....we haven't left just yet, but we're all finishing our packing in Dallas and we're about to leave for Houston in about 5 hours. We're staying there for one night then heading out to the UK!

Just so everyone is clear on this, we'll be using this blog to post all of our travel accounts on a weekly or biweekly basis for your enjoyment. If you have no idea what this is all about then here's a quick summary - last semester we decided that we needed to have one of the best senior trips...a trip that would surpass all expectations and one that we would remember for ever. Thus, after many months of planning we now have...dum dum dum...EurAfricAsia Summer Trip '06!

We begin our journey in the UK (London) for about a week. June 1st we are taking a train into Europe where we will visit all over France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Germany, Netherlands, and other countries. July 1st we fly to Zimbabwe, Africa where we will also visit South Africa and Botswana. July 18th we fly to Bangkok, Thailand where we will stay for a week. Our trip finishes with 1 more week in Hong Kong, China, and our final week in Tokyo, Japan.

The total trip is 2.5 months and promises to take us around the world and back!

So, you all are now up to speed. Stay tuned to this site to hear more about our crazy travels and adventures.

Cheers.