Liverpool

I have to say, after nearly a week of scattered sun and quite a bit of rain in Dublin, I was thrilled to wake up this morning and see that it was sunny here in Liverpool. Maybe not warm, but sunny at least. I wasn't positive on what I wanted to do here, really, since it's sort of just a stopping point for me, but I knew I at least had to go to the train station and pick up my ticket I bought for Friday to get to London.

So I set off with my city map, not sure how long it would take me. Paris, I was staying in the city center, but it'd take me at least 10 minutes just to walk into town. Dublin, if I took three steps out of the hostel I was somewhere else. Liverpool, as it turns out, is quite a bit like Dublin. It's really not too difficult to navigate, and I found the train station without a problem and managed to pick up my tickets. I took a look around the station, trying to figure out my bearings a bit for Friday. I can NOT have a repeat of the fiasco in Rome. Fortunately this time, everything is in English so if I'm desperate, I can ask nearly anyone for help.

Realizing how small the city center is, I decided to walk down to Albert Dock. It's the main dock Liverpool is known for. They estimate nearly 9 million immigrants went through the dock in the last century. That's pretty fantastic. The dock was super cool. I don't think I've been on an actual dock before, so it was neat. It was a lot bigger than I thought it'd be too.

After walking around the dock for a bit, I spotted the Liverpool National Museum and went inside. And it was free, so that was a nice bonus. It was interesting to walk around because it explored the history of Liverpool and all the parts of its development. It explained the history of trains finally being built to connect it to the rest of England, the dock, the immigrants, and other pieces of the history that's been discovered over the years. It talked to about more current things like sports and music and what they influenced in Liverpool. It was quite was interesting. Although some of the life size statues they had freaked me out a bit. They looked shockingly real. A couple times I thought a person was standing in a glass case on display.

I have to tell you guys this funny story. I was just out and about today and was stopped at one point to consult my map and this group of girls, probably my age came up and told me they liked my sunglasses and wondered where I got them. Ok, well they're just a cheap pair I have from home -- So I told them I just brought them from home. They kind of looked at me. I told them I brought them from the U.S. All four of them went "Oooh --" then the one girl said, "So that's where your funny accent's from." Yup. I'm the one with the funny accent. And I've thought about it before, where I feel like I sound funny compared to everyone else, but no one has ever said anything. I had a small laugh about that after they left.

So after the musem, I still had a good piece of the afternoon left, so I walked to the Liverpool Cathedral. It's the largest cathedral in England and was only built in the early 1900s. Holy crap, you guys, this thing is massive. It's hard to explain the enormity of it. I bet at least 200 decent size houses could comfortably fit in there. Easy. It's strange because so often I'm impressed with the beauty of so many of these churches and the grand scale they were built on, then usually later on I find myself wondering, "did you really need to gold filligry in the ceiling?" At the time many of these were built people were poor and dying of starvation in the street. How many taxes were imposed on the citizens so the church could look as beautiful as it does? It's just crazy.

I don't really have any great plans for tomorrow other than to walk to the train station again to see how long it takes. I'm debating back and foward between pulling my duffel there Friday or taking a cab. I'll see how the walk goes. And this is going to sound horrible, but I think I'm ready to come home. The constant packing and moving is starting to wear on me a bit and I'm really lacking the motivation every morning to get out and do stuff. I'm glad there's a lot I want to see in London so the time should fly. I think though, I miss my bed, not packing up my shower stuff every time I take a shower, hot water, I miss cooking, driving, and all of you fabulous people. I didn't really feel 'lonely' today, but just more tired that had nothing to do with the amount of sleep I got. I'm not thrilled about going back to work, but everything else, yes.

Thanks again for being wonderful yous! Love from Liverpool! (does that sound like it could be the name of a movie? Hmm)