OBU in London - July 17-18 (Travel to London)

This summer, I had the privilege of spending a month in England with a group of 15 students from Oklahoma Baptist University.  Dr. Lindsey Panxhi (an English faculty colleague) and myself, along with our respective spouses, conducted a faculty-led Study Abroad that spent four weeks on the ground in London teaching OBU courses to OBU students while being immersed in the culture and history of Great Britain.  These are our stories!

Reykjavik Airport and horizon

Days 1-2; Tuesday & Wednesday, July 17 & 18 – travel to London

2AM - finally packed!

My flights home from Phoenix (I was in the Grand Canyon from July 8-16, then turned around immediately to fly to England the following day) were late – I didn’t land in Oklahoma City until 10:45.  I was at the front of the plane, and beelined straight out.  Got the car, and made it home by 11:30.  It was sure nice to see and hug everybody!  I threw my rancid Grand Canyon clothes into the wash, and started getting other things packed for London.  Got to read and pray with both girls for the only time in 6 weeks – so I treasured that.  By the time my laundry was done and bags were packed, it was 2:30.  Then we were up at 7:15 to get ready to go!

Dropped Keilani off at Natalie’s, and Alethea at Zoe’s.  Took Troy with us to pick up the rental vehicles at Enterprise.  Vanessa got a Nissan Altima (these are becoming very familiar to us), while I drove a truck!  Nissan Frontier or something like that.  Pretty nice set of wheels.

Andersons + 10 in DFW airport

We met our 6 students (Noah, Anna & Katie, Emma, Casey, and Stephanie) at OBU, and left at 10:00.  Stopped at Dairy Queen in Gainesville for lunch, then on to the DFW (Dallas – Ft. Worth) airport.  It’s a huge airport complex – felt like we drove for miles to get to the rental return lot!  Once inside, it took some doing to find the right international terminal, and then the right airline line-up.  I was glad we left lots of wiggle room.  We met up with the other 5 flying out of DFW (Allison, Chloe, Rachel B, Sydney, and Sierra) – Sierra was a bit late, but we all made it through and to our gate just fine in the end.  Yay!

Andersons + 11 at DFW gate

Flight Tracker: DFW=>KEV

There was about an hour to spare at our gate before boarding – our Icelandair flight left at 4:30 PM.  Overnight flight – yeehaw!  The flight was 6.5 hours, but with the 5 hours time difference between Texas and Iceland (Reykjavik) we arrived at 4:00 AM.  I wasn’t able to sleep a wink on the whole flight – watched 3 movies and read a bit instead. 

When we landed in Iceland it was daybreak – a fairly bleak, gray, and cool (7 degrees Celcius) morning.  We landed and had (got) to walk outside to a shuttle bus, which took us to the airport terminal.  The terminal, though relatively small, was very well set up with stores (groceries & souvenirs) geared for travelers making connections.  If I hadn’t been dog-tired, I would have really enjoyed the time.

We met our other four students (Saydi, Kalyne, Rachel F, and Lauren) in Iceland at the airport!  Success – no one got lost.

Flight Tracker: KEV=>LHR

Our flight from Iceland (KEV) to London (LHR) was supposed to leave at 7:30AM, but was almost an hour late.  So we landed in London about noon.  Heathrow airport was not as overwhelming as I had feared.  We were able to all make it through customs and to baggage claim.  Unfortunately, Rachel F’s bag didn’t make it to London – it stayed in Iceland.  We were promised that it would be delivered to our hostel by supper time tomorrow (Thursday).  (Incidentally, it didn’t make it … the delivery guy apparently showed up well after midnight Thursday night, and of course no one answered the door.  So it wasn’t until supper time on Friday that Rachel got her bags.  Two full days without her stuff!  Poor girl.) 

 

Our room @ Pickwick Hall

The other side of our room

Anyway, between the delayed flight, customs, and dealing with Rachel’s missing bag, it was about 2:30 PM that we were ready to leave the airport.  Glad that we already had Oyster cards and knew how to get to our neighborhood, because by that time everyone was exhausted!  We got on the Tube, and made it (on Piccadilly Line) to Holborn Station.  From there we got turned around a bit, but got safely to Pickwick Hall at about 3:40.  We got room assignments, and gave everyone 45 minutes to get unpacked and settled in their rooms.  Short team meeting at 4:30 to go over the schedule for the rest of the night and Thursday morning, and then we gave them money and set them loose for supper in the neighborhood.

There are tons of restaurant choices within a 5-10 minute walk – Vanessa and I settled on “Belgo,” a French-Belgian restaurant up the street.  We shared a pot of steamed mussels and a rotisserie ½ chicken, with mashed potatoes and house salad as sides.  It was absolutely delicious – a fabulous first meal in London!  Our dessert was a chocolate fondue with fresh fruit and bubble waffle – yummy!  All we had on the flights was granola bars, and then a breakfast sandwich in Iceland – so we were very hungry by the time supper rolled around.

The whole team was tired – everyone came back from supper and pretty much went straight to bed.  I had my first good night’s sleep in almost two weeks!