My friend Emily and I began planning this trip in February 2006. I was working two jobs at the time to save up money for this trip so pretty much all of the research was done by Emily. But after much, much, much discussion, we bought two round trip tickets to London, two Eurorail passes, made a few Ryanair reservations, a few hostel reservations, and bought a one month semester each of intensive French classes at Stendhal University in Grenoble, France through a program called Cultural Experiences Abroad. The pricetag on our six week adventure came to around $9300 each ($9800 if you include the fabulous phone bills I received after I came home). Keep in mind this amount included flights, trains, spending money, food money, souvenir money for the trip and the $4500 for tuition and deposits at the school- but still a crap load of money (is crapload one word?)
This trip was made possible ONLY because I have a family who loves me, and two jobs that both understood what a great opportunity this was for me. Thanks to Mom and Doug, Dad and Kathie, Mack and Delanie, and to Josh for being cool enough to not put up a fight when I wanted to go and for being so supportive the entire time, even when I started having my own doubts. Also thanks to Echometer and the Hawthorn Suites for giving me the time off and for holding my job(s) for me when I got back. I only work at Echometer now but the hotel is still dear to my heart (love you guys!!). Most important, thanks to all of our friends who kept Josh alive and mentally stable while I was gone. This couldn't have happened without you guys.
Okay, so May 20, 2006, our good friends Jason and Melanie drove Josh and I to the airport in Dallas. Emily and Paolo followed in his truck. I remember the nervous excitement and anxiety mixed with sadness to be leaving Josh. But I was really glad our friends agreed to go. Josh and I both needed them there! I managed to have enough bags for all four of us to be carrying something heavy, and in hindsight, I will never again lug four heavy bags across Europe. Thank God I had my entourage with me for the first hour.
Anyway, Emily and I boarded British Airways Flight #BA2192 non-stop from Dallas to Gatwick, London. The flight was about 9 hours and I have to say that British Airways is awesome. It was the most comfortable, enjoyable flight ever. Everyone gets their own blanket, pillow, socks (very soft and warm socks),eyemasks, and earplugs to watch movies or listen to music on your own televison. They fed us two full meals and gave us plenty of free alcohol. We arrived in London a little after 7am on Sunday (May 21, 2006). And FYI, when ordering coffee at the airport, "take-away" means "to-go". It was freezing cold and raining and terribly miserable. People driving by actually slowed down to laugh at us. We took an hour long train ride, which included climbing up and down several flights of stairs outdoors in the freezing rain with all of our stuff, and then took one of those double decker buses (everyone on the bus hated us because it took us so long to get all of our bags on board-not to mention we looked like dumbasses standing there soaking wet, freezing cold, four heavy bags each, huge suitcases getting heavier by the minute, wearing shorts, tanks, flip flops, and I was wearing my straw cowboy hat - only one lady was nice to us and helped us) and finally arrived at the London Backpackers Inn. Our first hostel destination. 
Now, keeping in mind the description I just gave, we walked into the London BACKPACKERS Inn. All I saw was a sea of camo green and dreadlocks, and no one offered to help the prissy American girls arriving with eight bags full of shoes, Chi irons, and environmentally damaging beauty products. I can't say I blamed them. I know we were a sight coming in the door. We were given our room on the third floor, sorry no elevator, just a steep, three foot wide winding staircase. One blessed soul finally helped us, I think because we were blocking traffic going up and down the stairs and the hippies were getting anxious. 
Our room was a tiny little cell with bunkbeds and questionable mattresses. But we were so tired and hungry we didn't care (okay we cared a little, but it was a cheap hostel). We found a little cafe around the corner and ate, then slept most of that day and that night. We didn't really see much at all of London. But we were both glad we had given ourselves a whole day to recover from the jet lag before we were to fly to Bari, Italy on May 22. By the way, I hate this picture of me but I'm putting it in anyway simply because it's the only picture I have of me in London, and yes, Emily looks like she's been confined to a hospital bed in a mental institution. We were tired,ok?
This is the email I sent to everyone when we arrived in London:
Sent: Sunday, May 21, 2006 5:49 AM
Subject: We're Here!
hey everyone
I apologize for the mass email but I'm soooo tired! It's about 12:30 in the afternoon here in London. (6:30am hometime) The flight wasn't so bad...the flight attendants were cool and gave us lots of complimentary wine :-). We took the train for about an hour once we arrived and then the bus (double-decker) to find our hostel. It's cold and rainy and we were soaked when we got here. We've got lots of funny looks so far (well deserved unfortunately but those stories will have to come after I get some sleep). I just wanted everyone to know that we got here safely, found a nice cafe for lunch, and now it's naptime. Everyone's been pretty helpful whether we've understood them or not and we've found that the best way to get where we need to go is to ask as many people as we can and then do something different and harder anyway. Believe me, it's already been crazy but we're having a great time. I'll write again soon.
Love you all,
Carrie-Anne
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