On Saturday I went on a tour of the Cotswolds in the English countryside.  I think there were about eleven of us from Hult that went.  We visited 4 different villages, and it was super fun and beautiful and cold.

The first village was Moreton-in-Marsh.  Our tour guide, Ron, said that it was a typical market town.  There were really just a lot of shops, and once you got past the main drag it was residential.  So pretty.

• this town was just my size!

• mind the old folks, please.

The next town, Stow-on-the-Wold was where we ate lunch.  But the general consensus with the people I hung out with was that we picked the wrong restaurant.  After we had already eaten, we found a bakery that had really delicious looking pot pies (and pastries…).

• I got put in the stocks.  Fun fact: these are stocks.  The kind that your head and wrists go into?  Those are called Pillary.

The next town we went to was Bourton-on-the-Water.  It was really beautiful.  They call it “the Venice of the Cotswolds.”  It’s got this cute little super-shallow river running through it, with tons of ducks.

And the last village that we visited was Burford, where we were able to have Cream Tea.  I think it was Earl Grey tea, and you put milk in it.  I never would have thought that I’d like milk in tea, but it was really really good.  It also came with a warm, fresh scone with clotted cream and fresh strawberry jam.  Those of you who know me well probably know that I don’t like fruit, so I had to pick the raisin things out of my scone and I didn’t try the jam, but it was very delicious.  And clotted cream sounds super gross, but it’s also very tasty - and not at all fattening…  It’s somewhere between butter and whipped cream.  YUM!

After tea in Burford, we headed back to London.  Amanda, my new friend from Indianapolis, and I decided to head to Covent Garden when we got back, so we could see the Christmas lights there.  I thought it would be a little more spectacular, but it was fun nonetheless.  They have a Kiss-mas Tree there, where the tree only lights up when a couple kisses underneath it.

So that was my Saturday.  It was a very long day, especially because it was so cold in the Cotswolds.  But it was a lot of fun, and I accomplished my goal of seeing the Cotswolds in November, which is apparently one of the best times to go.  A great way to ring in my 2-month anniversary of being in the UK :)

Yesterday I was able to do absolutely nothing, which was awesome.  And I got to Skype with my best friend, which was amazing as usual.

As of tomorrow, I get to go home in ONE MONTH!  I never would have thought I’d be so excited to go back to Port Orchard from London, but I’m compiling a list in my head of all the things I want to eat while I’m home, and all the wonderfully American things I want to do with all my wonderful American friends and family.