We Made It!

When I was younger, flying Virgin Atlantic to get to England was one of my favorite parts about making the trip. They cater to every kid’s desires. I walk on board and I am gifted a bag/backpack of goodies and then once the flight starts I have a cornucopia of movie, television, radio channels to choose from and an endless amount of Super Nintendo games right on my own personal television! Sleeping on the plane? Never an option when you have so much entertainment to take advantage of! Well, this was what I was looking forward to this time round. Well all my hopes came crashing down when the captain made his “Welcome” announcement explaining the two hour delay. Apparently, the map that tracks our route and location had to be disabled due to the new fear imposed by the Nigerian terrorist attack. Since the map is connected to the whole entertainment system, the whole entertainment system, movies, Nintendo, and all, was disabled. Oh the horror! So Virgin was restricted to just one movie at a time, which was painful and disappointing. And another note, they now lock the bathrooms 20 minutes before landing, again as a response to the latest terrorist attack.

On a side note, I never understood why American airlines could never make a decent cup of tea. No, creamer is not the same thing as milk. Virgin had these cute little tubes of milk that one could use to put in their tea. What a concept! I don’t know why American airlines only offer half & half! American could learn a thing or two from the Brits. ;-) Well, I had three lovely cups of tea on Virgin, which were very soothing.

Stacy and I are in London now, and although we thought we packed lightly, and in retrospect we did for 7 months travel, but when you are moving around from airport to tube station to hostel and all over again, our 50 pound suitcases and 35 pound backpacks are not so mobile. We get some stares from passersby, probably thinking we’re novice American travelers who packed all our lives into our bags for a 3 week trip or something, but that’s not the case as we all know.

Stacy and I are getting really excited for New Years! But we’re staying in 3 different places for our 3 nights in London, and we dread the move from place to place. But hey, it’s what you have to do when you’re on a budget. The place we stayed at last night literally doubled their prices for the 30^th and 31^st, knowing that tourists will pay the extra bucks for a place to stay. Not us, we’re too broke for that! So we’re moving on to the next location, despite the dread of the actual moving process.

Be in touch after New Year’s! Don’t forget to email!

Cheers,
Annabelle (and Stacy)

P.S. I provided a map of Africa last post, and now it's time to quiz your knowledge of the continent we will be spending 7 months! Have a little fun and check it out!

http://www.sporcle.com/games/africa.php

8 Days and Not Enough Time

Phew!
Well I'm done with finals and I guess that is a start, but now I have so much to do before I leave! I can no longer use finals as an excuse to not get prepared for Africa. I'm so excited but really, I wish I had more time. Even coming home 3 days earlier would have been helpful, but of course with my luck I had the last final on Saturday!
So what do I have to do? I'm waiting for my netbook to be sent to me because I refuse to take my mac. This way if it gets stolen, I won't be AS bothered, and regardless, it's just a lot more portable. I'm excited to have this little companion! I just bought an external hard drive on ebay, so hopefully that will be here in time too. This way I can ave unlimited amounts of room for all the (amazing) pics I'm going to take! 7 months of pictures. I think 500 gigs will be enough!

What's my itinerary looking like as of now? Well firstly, I'm doing the UC Study abroad program with my friend Stacy who goes to UCLA. We've been good friends since the Hamilton Soccer Team brought us together. She didn't think she'd be friends with a white girl, but hey, I guess she made an exception for me! Backpacking escapades are nothing new for us. We had our first adventure in the summer after graduating high school where we spent 5 weeks traveling in Spain, Italy, England, and Portugal. We came out of the trip closer than before, and I hope by the end of these 7 months, I'll be able to say the same!
Stacy and I leave December 28th 2009 from LAX where we will be taking Virgin Atlantic (my favorite airline since I can remember flying to England!) to London. We will be in London for 3 nights and we can't wait for New Year's! We have tickets to see Calvin Harris, Deadmau5, and Justice in the Millennium Dome! (Picture included above)
New Year's day we'll be heading over to my grandparents in Woodbridge, a little town in southeastern England. Four nights there should be the perfect amount. We'll also see my Granddad (my father's dad) who is 94 and the most sprightly individual I've ever known. I could tell you countless tales to substantiate my claim, but I'm sure I'll have something new to tell after we see him for afternoon tea!
We leave from London on January 5, where we will have to transfer in Dubai for our flight to Accra, the capital of Ghana. It is at this layover that we will meet up with the other UC students studying in Ghana. Somehow Stacy and I managed to get on the same flight at the UC group was taking! We'll be studying until May 15, when finals end and our outbound flight is July 1 from Johannesburg. (Yes, we are going to the World Cup!) So for those 6 weeks, we have no definite plans, but we are thinking that we might go to Senegal and/or Gambia. We are pretty much open to where the wind blows us!

That's all for now. Welcome to my blog and please comment and send me emails! Although internet will be sparse for the next 7 months, I will reply when I can and would love to be posted on your life!
I'll probably post my first update after New Year's from the local Woodbridge library. Keep a lookout for it!
Thanks for all the love and support, I can't express how much it means to me.

Keep in touch,
Annabelle