I know I never finished writing the rest of my trip down, but here it is. I need to get this down because I’ll soon be leaving L.A. for another adventure at a new destination I will soon announce :)

Day 4 and Day 5 kinda collided into each other. Michele, Penelope, Olivia, and I all left the party a few hours after midnight. Ashley and Wyatt stayed behind to crash because they didn’t have anywhere else to stay. But after walking half way home, they caught up with us. They just weren’t comfortable staying there; one of the guys at the house had taken some cocaine or something… he was acting sketch. Anyways, there was no room at P & O’s for all 6 of us to sleep… so Olivia went to sleep while we all hung out on the rooftop, just talking. 

We had a pretty amazing discussion about the past few years of our lives, what has gotten us to this point and made us into the people we are today. That’s what’s so interesting about traveling and especially couch surfing. You meet people who are always on the move or who want to be on the move as much as possible… and I feel like we’re a minority in that. Most people don’t understand it and most people give me a perplexed look like “what are you running from? what’s wrong with you?” when I tell them all the places I have traveled and plan to travel in the near future. When I tell them I wouldn’t mind living out of a backpack with just a few basic essentials and a camera. The truth is, I’m not running from anything. Why would I want to just stay in one place for years at a time? In essence, why would I want to constantly be comfortable? To me, it’s about pushing my boundaries, testing my limits, and seeing just how far I can go. Traveling can tear me down and build me back up all in the same hour. It forces you to live every minute in the moment with spontaneity and freedom. [okay okay end rant]

Anyways, I made some awesome pasta with the only noodles I could find and skyped my Mom from the rooftop. It was one of those moments, where you think to yourself: what the hell am I doing. I am spending the new year hanging out on a rooftop in London eating pasta with no sleep. This is my life. This is happening. hahah. We decided to wait for the sun rise… turns out the sun doesn’t rise until 8AM this time of year! But as we sat on that rooftop, we could see everyone rushing to start their day. I guess that’s always interesting to be looking down on everyone from a high point in a new country, just observing and people watching. 

After the sun rose, we decided we might as well all 4 of us cram onto the fold out couch and try and get a few hours sleep before visiting Tate Modern. We slept a little longer then planned, but soon packed up and headed into town. It was raining ridiculously hard; not a good combo when you have a huge DSLR camera and no camera bag. I’m convinced there was some type of London parade that day that we were not invited to because at noon the city was scarce with people and we were literally the only people on the train. Tate Modern was beautiful, I think I enjoyed the art even more because I was in some hypnotic trance from barley sleeping. I never finished the whole museum, I crashed on one of the benches I was so tired hahah. Europe straight up turns me into a hobo with no regrets. I no longer care what people think of me.

We don’t go out to eat, we go to the grocery store and buy stuff to make sandwiches. I’ll save any penny that I can some days. We were just on our way back home when we decided to take a stop and see Buckingham Palace, it was our last day in London after all. So we hang out at this coffee shop debating if we have enough energy to go and find this place. We go out on the street and I have no idea where we are going, but I like to pretend that I do sometimes (I am stubborn) So I ask a bus driver which way Buckingham Palace is and he points left, but Wyatt swears that it’s to the right. So we split up and say whoever finds it first; cool. 30 minutes later… Michele, Ashley, and I are so lost it’s ridiculous. We somehow end up in the middle of mini time square London version. Wyatt calls us, “Where are you guys? I’m here” Despite asking 5 people for directions and various maps posted around the city we still can’t find this place. Eventually, after another 20 minutes and a long walk through a dark scary weird park… we arrive. It was night, so there wasn’t much we could do. We looked at it for 10 minutes and then headed back home.

Wyatt and Ashley part ways with us to go stay at a host across town and we vow the next time we see each other will be in Paris. dundundundun. so excited!   To be honest, I don’t remember what happened this night… pretty sure I slept for a million hours rolling into the next day. 1,2,3 crash.

Thank you! No problem :]