Northern England

PRESTON:

We got to go see the Preston temple! Which was the coolest thing ever. Preston is also the first place that the missionaries taught when Joseph Smith sent them overseas. And it's where Pres. Hinckley served his mission!

MOORS:

Ever read Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights? We got to go to the moors that inspired parts of those novels! We also toured the Bronte sisters' home.

We hiked all over the moors and for some reason decided that we would only have conversations through singing, which was hilarious.

Jordan kind of got caught on the barbed wire...

Claire, Jani, Me

YORK:

This is a fantastic little English town with one of the largest cathedrals in Europe! The buildings are so old and I felt like I was walking around in the 1800's.

Constantine, draped in wool.

The Romans are coming! And yes, we wore these hats all day.

Ghost Trail: hilarious, but also kind of creepy -- not because of the ghosts, more because our tour guide = creeper.

Durham Cathedral:

They filmed a scene from Harry Potter here!

HADRIANS WALL:

Ever heard of it? I hadn't either... but it is the wall that used to mark the border of the Roman Empire! So on one side was England, and on the other side was Scotland, cool huh? It was also quite the hike through sheep-herding fields to get up to it, which explains the victory pose below...

We did the wave on the wall!

And then I led Jordan down the mountain, blindfolded.

THE LAKE DISTRICT:

This is probably one of the most beautiful places on earth!

Here are some highlights:

• The hostel ran out of food for us = fries for dinner
• Molly fell in the river haha!
• Went to William Wordsworths home and read his poetry in the woods
• Went to Beatrix Potter's cottage (she wrote Peter Rabbit)
• Dance partied on the dock, and the ferry, and in our hostel...

Dance party on the dock

We had story time on the ferry across the lake

This was really funny at the time...

Our hostel! Right on the lake.

LIVERPOOL:

This was a side trip, because only 16 of us decided to spend the night in Liverpool. So on the way back to London on Friday, the directors dropped us off on the dock (literally) and we were on our own. Which meant checking into a hostel by ourselves and booking our own train tickets home! Very grown up stuff.

Liverpool is amazing! Not only because it is THE birthplace of The Beatles, but over 30,000 saints left England to sail to America from here!

Yes, we did go on The Beatles magical mystery tour. Yes, I did see the birthplaces of Paul, John, George, and Ringo. Yes, I did see the strawberry fields. And yes, we did go to a semi-concert in the same club that The Beatles performed in over 200 times!

Oh and yes, we did meet a woman from Kentucky who is attending school here and getting a masters degree in The Beatles... Didn't know that was even possible??

Oh and we also went on the ferris wheel that is right on the docks! We nicknamed it the "Liverpool eyelash" hahaha

And yes, I basically lived in my trench coat all week, in case you hadn't noticed.