October Break

They have this fabulous idea in Scottish education call October break. So we had of from Oct. 10 to Oct. 20 and decided to do some exploring. We will have six weeks in total off during the year, so hopefully we will have many adventures. My parents were in town after spending a month in Sweden, Estonia, Russia and the Ukraine. We decided on a nice jaunt down to London again and then to the south coast to vist my cousin Debbie who married an englishmen years ago. Since we only spent less that 48 hours the first time down, we thought we would spend more time and do some of the tourist stuff. On the first day, by accident we went by the fountain that they built in memorium for princess Diana, it is in the middle of Hyde Park and it was a beautiful October day. We then had tea and crumpets at Harrods department store. We then went to St. Paul's Cathedral. After dinner we dropped off my parents at the hotel and went for a late night walk around London, ending again in Leicester square. The next day we went and saw the tourist hot spots of London. We went first to the Tower of London where you can find more history than in a book, not to mention the priceless crown jewels. We then went to the number one tourist spot in the world the London Eye. I will be honest, I had no interest in going on the eye, but it was a pretty cool experience and everyone should try it at least once. The pictures that are included from the first two days are Monique at the Princess Di memorial, Monique with a beefeater (which is what they call the guards at the tower) and finally some shots of London from the top of the world.

Field Trip to York

Hello again all of you loyal readers, although I doubt that I have any left. Those of you who doubted my ability to continue with updates every two weeks were unfortunately right. We have had company for the past month. We have been on our October break and I have had a ton of grading to plow through. I should, however, be able to catch up on the past month in the next couple of days or at least by the weekend. I start with my first blog about some of the students that I have had the pleasure of teaching. Ms. Young, one of the geography teachers in our department planned a trip to York. It is a city in central England that at various times served as the capital of the country. York has a fascinating history that spans the history of England. They have recently done a number of archeological digs in the area and found many remnents of ancient, roman, viking, middle ages and victorian history. The town is well known for the Jorvick Viking Center as York was a major Viking town and the site of a famous, but overlooked battle between two king Harolds in 1066. The English king won but was defeated a month later by William the Conquerer of Normandy changing English history. The students got to go to a mock dig and see how a dig site works. They then went to the real dig and finally to the Viking center. The students were all S1 students which would be like 7th grade in the United States. They all had a blast and we all learned a lot. I do not have any of them in class, but quite a few of them are on my rugby team (i am like third assistant) and they all like to hear me say awesome and hamburger, not quite sure why. Anyway fun was had by all. Will post again SOON!! I promise

Cheers