Literally talking French

Bonjour! Today I will go to Paris and on Monday I will fly back home and go back to school. :/
In Paris I will see the Eiffel Tower. I will go bungie (bun-jy) jumping off the Eiffel Tower if my mom will let me. = - (
The thing is, forget mom go to dad. There's always more than one chance. My dad just LOVES
LOVES LOVES bungie jumping.Yesterday, we were hanging loose.I will also see Notre Dame.
This time my mom is doing the roof tour. Last time she couldn't go because she was pregnant.
My little sister was in my mom's belly. signing off speedmonkey265. (Oh and P.S. I have now changed to mista munky.)

Stonehenge, a Castle and IKEA!

Another Day of Speedmonkey's Adventures.

Yesterday I went to Stonehenge!

While there I listened to an Audio Device that gave me a "tour" and provided some interesting information. I learned that if you are here at Stonehenge during the Summer Solstice - you are able to see the sun shine through the center arch (I told my Mom that I want to come back and see that...)

During the Winter Solstice though, the run will rise across the "setting" tones (which turn RED when it rains!)

It was quite a trip to get to Stonehenge...we had to take two trains and a double decker bus (here is a shot of our view of the road while riding the bus.)

When we arrived, the first thing I noticed was the smell of Sheep poop. It turns out that Stonehenge is in the middle of a sheep field and has highways running on both sides.

After leaving Stonehenge, I went to Sarum to look at the castle grounds of King Henry I. His castle was one of the first places in the 13th century that had a bathroom inside!

Here is some information and a picture of the actual "Pit"!

While walking around, we ran into a camera crew from Ikea. They interviewed me for a commercial to be shown in Great Britian and asked me questions like "What does Billy do for Ikea?" (I told them that he was a very important person at Ikea...but Mom says that it is actually a name for some Ikea furniture.)

Well -- Speed Monkey signing off!

Harry Potter and Alice in Wonderland

Warning the following is rated L as this is a long post...I wrote it before going to the internet cafe so mom doesn't have to pay for me to think....she is going to type it for me. Mom also decided that renting a car in England was probably not the smartest thing to do. They drive on the wrong side of the car and on the wrong side of the road and she would still have to shift gears. So we are going everywhere by train or bus or walking.

Yesterday we took the train to Oxford to see where Harry Potter was filmed. Oxford is really old with alot of different colleges there. We saw the Bodelean Library which is the library in the Harry Potter films. The Divinity room which is the Sanatorium in the movie is there but I was not old enough to go in so I had to look at it through the windows. They had a show about music there and how important it is in important events. I listened to the music and singing from the coronation in 1937. It was OK, but I still like rock better.

We also saw Christ Church and it's hall. THe hall is what the dining room in Harry Potter is based on. Harry Potter was not filmed in it (they needed it to feed the students). They built a model of it and filmed there. The room is really big and really old. All of the pictures are of important people who went to school there. For lunch they were having pork loin with baked apples, shepherd's pie and coq au vin. This is very different from my school because we never have that kind of food, the tables are bigger and fancy, the teachers eat in the same room and people serve you here. (picture above)

There is really no Harry Potter stuff in Oxford...they all talk about Alice in Wonderland and that stuff is everywhere. The story goes that Alice is based on a real girl that lived at Oxford because her father was a college dean. A dean is really important, kind of like a principal. The rabbit in the book is based on her father. He ate dinner at the head table in the Hall and when he was done he could leave. For the important people so they didn't have to walk through the students, there was a secret door with a spiral staircase they used to leave the Hall. This is the rabbit's hole. In the fireplace, the thing that holds the logs has heads on it with long necks, just like Alice gets in the book and some of the other characters are based on stuff in the stained glass windows. A cat named Dinah, liked to climb the chestnut tree outside the library where the author worked. this is the Cheshire cat in the book. At Christ Church there is a bell named Tom. Every night at 9:05 it rings 101 times. This is for the 101 original students of the college who had a 9:00 curfew. It rings late because for some reason Oxford time is five minutes behind Greenwich Mean Time (so yesterday I was only 4 hours and 55 minutes ahead of you)

We also went to the Museum of Natural History. Thie dinosaur footprints were very big. Inside we saw lots of stuffed animals like a nile crocodile and a dodo. There were lots of bugs too. Some of these were alive. (Picture above)

One more short post and then we are off to Stonehenge.

in Reading England.

It has been 4 days in England and right now we are in Reading. We got here last night and our key to the B&B didn't work so we had to wait for the man to come let us in. London was pretty high tech and cool. We saw a movie screen as wide as a football field and as tall as our house. We went to the London Theatre and I saw Zorro. I rode the London Eye which is the biggest observation wheel in the world. The first day it broke down just before we got on, but it worked fine the next day. I really like the Namco Station which was a video arcade. I saw street performers and was in two street shows. I also got to see the changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace. We were in the front row but it was freezing. The food is not too bad - I love Gelato - golden vanilla rocks! and beetroot juice is really good. I got to ride on a double decker bus, the underground,

in a taxi and on a train. Today we are exploring in Reading and in the next two days I will see Stonehenge and Oxford.

Here's a picture of me flying to London :)

Hope you like it!!!!!!!!!!

And here is one of the London Eye at night, I've been staying up late.

We have been walking everywhere...even at 11:30 at night. There are alot of people up at that time. Speedmonkey signing off.

The Delay....

Our flight got cancelled! We showed up at Roa airport...but the plane didn't :-(

We were arranged on another plane which comes in 5 more hours...so to pass the time, we played cards, walked to Sam's and got a Slushie. Now we are back at the airport...and are still waiting for the plane. 3 more hours to our adventure begins!

P.S. - I guess I could have stayed in school today (but we didn't know that)

Speed Monkey signing off...and still waiting for the plane!

My Mind Map

It's a little hard to see (If you click on it it opens up in a different window so you can see it) but here is the mind map I drew about my trip. My dad says a mind map uses your whole brain and is a way to capture ideas without writing a list. Making a mind map can be about anything and you can put anything you want on it. It has to have a picture in the middle that shows what it is about and the ideas come off of that.

Can't wait to leave, I'm pretty sure my mom will take alot of pictures. She always takes ALOT of pictures.

Less than a month away

My trip is now less than a month away and Mom and Dad are busy planning what we will be doing. This is what I know - we will spend a few days in London - they want to show me some of their favorite places, see a show or two, ride a double decker bus and more. After that we will be going to Reading where my Dad will be busy with class. I will be hanging out with my Mom and we will be going to Stonehenge and Oxford. After that we are taking a really fast train that uses a chunnel to get to Paris. I will get to see the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, eat French food, see a palace and more. Then we take the train back to London where we catch the plane back to our home.

In Reading we will be staying in an apartment over a bakery and in France we will be in a hotel near the center of Paris. It will be a great adventure.