Stroud, UK

As I already announced before, I went to England last week - and came home today. I had a wonderful trip and would like to tell me what it was like for me.

Welcome to England

Still needing to pack my bag, take a shower and change money, I had to get up quite early and get ready. Not that early, actually, but earlier than usual. So so damn exciting! Time to get onto the train, another train, the bus to the airport. And then, the plane. My first time at an airport alone, but everything went well and I got onto my plane without any problems (and damn, I love to fly!). After passing the borders to the UK, I saw Murray and his dad waiting for me. And his dad, he was awesome! Funny, open, talkative, and he bought me food. Couldn't be better. We enjoyed the trip to Stroud with some music in the car and as we had almost reached the town, we stopped on one of the hills, went outside and enjoyed the sun set behind the horizon of Wales. Stunning! Welcome to the UK!
Later, we went to the pub to celebrate one of Murray's friends' birthday. Such an exciting day with so many new people.

Pancakes

We took things slow this day. Getting up early? Not after that long day before! But we actually did get up at some point and went to the town to buy a toothbrush and some more things I couldn't bring (security and liquids, you know what I mean...). Tash gave us a lift home (after we had gone to Costa hmmm) and we made some pancakes. Lush!

Ice Cream Factory

 What a day to go for a walk! Okay, it was almost constantly raining, but we had an umbrella and my camera and look, England even looks great on such a rainy day! All those different shades of green, so so so much green, the hills, how great it was to see this instead of all that agriculture in Germany. We went up to the common and to the ice cream factory (and of course we got some ice cream, coco and butterscotch, hmm!). At some point, I just had to stop and stand there for a while, looking down at Stroud and all those hills around it.

  

Gloucester

The following day, we went to buy some food at Sainsbury's and ate it by the canal called Stroudwater Navigation. After that, we went for a coffee, walked back and waited until we had to get ready to leave the town. Murray's dad took us out for dinner in Gloucester and showed me some parts of the town, for example the cathedral. I have to say, Gloucester is a really weird place! So many goths and serial killers and so on, but it looked really nice at the same time. Especially the docks, where we went to an American restaurant. I had Mac and cheese and Shiehallion Pilsener, by the way. ;)

He Says She Waffles

And another rainy day, but we made the best out of it. We went to the farmer's market in Stroud quite early, where I got some souvenirs for my parents. I loved all those books, books are great, I should read more, hm, but I know I won't. However, after that, we went to Cirencester and I really didn't know what to expect from this town. We went to another hall market (and they even had dog stuff there!) and some tiny shops. It's remarkable how much love and effort is in those shops, I really got the impression that the British love making things, and even buying them. It was lovely and as we spotted a sign saying something with "waffles" on it, we decided to go for lunch. I think I got diabetes that day. This one perfect waffle with powdered sugar, ice cream and fookin' marshmallows. And a strawberry milkshake to make it even more perfect. People who visit Gloucestershire: GO TO HE SAYS SHE WAFFLES. JUST DO IT.
Anyway, after that we went back to Stroud and bought pizza and beer for the evening, collected Tom's tinder date from the train station and waited for everyone to join so we could start drinking and playing games. What an evening. Great day. Such wow.

The Prom-blem

Just as planned, we went to Bristol on Sunday to buy me a prom dress. It was quite stressful in the end, because we only had two hours until the shops would close, and when I finally had a prom dress (god damnit, everybody knows you don't find them in shopping centres!), that was about 5 minutes before the shop closed. But I got one! After that, we went to a pub with Murray's sister (and that was when it started raining again, but at least I got to try the Trooper beer - actually not that good, but I knew that) and later met up with his mum to go to Za Za Bazaar and have dinner. Nice! And it was so cool to go to Bristol, because they taught us about it in form 5-7 pretty much, I never thought I'd actually go there. But it's a really nice city.

Bye Bye Eataly

We actually did nothing that day. Nothing, isn't that awful? And the worst thing is - it was really sunny! So in the evening, we went to the town again to have dinner, but sadly the restaurant where we wanted to go was closed. We found another one, though. And the food was good. And I had crême brulée. Just perfect. We went home afterwards and watched a horror film, but I fell asleep. Oh well. But I really enjoyed that day.

 Drei Oliven, bitte

Another day doing nothing, but this time it wasn't my fault because I got cramps and genuinely couldn't leave the bed. It was nice though. Great weather. And we went to Murray's mum's house in the evening. It was such a nice place with a lot of green grass, dandelion and a nice sunset atmosphere. His brother Lachlan came over as well and we had dinner together. It was really delicious and the two guys kept speaking German to each other, at least as far as their knowledge let them. So fun, haha. Also, we talked a lot about future plans which made me feel really insecure and question my plans. Maybe I should just gain some work experience and travel a bit?

So here I am, back in Germany, after Murray's mum took us to the airport this evening and my journey took about 11 hours. What do I have to say about this experience?
I want to go back.
I really really want to go back.
I wasn't even ready to come home yet, and I miss this wonderful and interesting country with all those people I met. Luckily, I'll be back in summer, but now I really feel like I should travel more. This trip really reminded me of my time in Sweden, where I didn't get homesick at all. I just had a really nice time and was part of the life there, it was great.