Weekend with Mom

My mom came to visit me this past weekend and she stayed from Wednesday until Monday.  She stayed at the hotel called Richmond Gate that is a three minute walk from my campus.  I was able to stay with her every night she was here, and experienced the luxuriously large shower compared to what I've had in my dorm.

The first afternoon and night we went into town so she could retrieve some money from the ATM, and she tried Cadbury chocolate for the first time from our grocery store, Tesco.  I took her for a walk through Richmond park as well, which was full of deer.  I had classes on Thursday, Halloween, and then we headed into London to see the show Wicked.  We stopped at a restaurant near the theater beforehand.  The show was amazing and at the end, the cast had three cheers for Halloween!

On Friday we went to see the Tower of London, as we had a tour booked in addition to a boat tour along the Thames afterward.  Although it was rainy, we were still able to see everything we wanted to. We saw the Crown Jewels, and went inside various torture chambers.  After the tour we hopped onto the boat that took us down the Thames toward Big Ben and the London Eye.  We made our way to Buckingham Palace from there.  Most days we ended with a night at the hotel gym to workout together. We went to The Lass across the street from my university so my mom could try her first London fish and chips meal!

 On Saturday we went shopping on Regent Street and Oxford Street.  I surprised my mom with a gift card to the 4-floor Niketown store, so she picked out some athletic clothes that she liked there.  We went in and out of tourist shops and other stores on these streets.  We took the tube to Trafalgar Square and did the National Museum tour which was free.  It had lots of paintings and history, but it was getting late so we headed back to the hotel.  We couldn't seem to find anywhere to eat, so we ended up ordering room service, which was fine because we were both tired and cold from walking.

  

On Sunday, we took a spur of the moment trip to Hampton Court Palace for a tour.  We took the bus, which I was more unfamiliar with than the tube.  I was glad my mom got to see a palace of some sort, as there were various gardens and parts of the palace that were open to those with a ticket for a tour.  This palace also had a world-famous maze that we found our way out of in about 10 minutes.  We had pizza at a place that I really like on our way back to campus as a late lunch.  We grabbed sandwiches for dinner and then had a Belgian waffle with Oreos and chocolate sauce, and frozen yogurt for dessert.  We had to wake up early Monday morning for her to catch the cab back to the airport. The time seemed like it flew by, but only one month and seven days from now and I'll be on my way home too!