The coastal towns of Whitstable & Herne Bay

Today the sun was shining and there was barely a cloud in the sky! It's quite possible that this was the last warm day for a while here (although I certainly hope not!). The flatmates and I chose to make the most out of this gorgeous day and explore the seaside villages nearby. We hoped on a bus and headed toward Whitstable.

The journey by bus only took about 15 minutes, unlike our 2 1/2 hour walk earlier in the week! Today the town was alive and full of people, all wanting to soak up the sunshine. The pace of life is slow in Kent, and most people walk without a purpose and just enjoy, unlike that of Los Angeles. We walked around town a bit and then to the boardwalk, where we found an oyster and seafood stand called West's. I ordered 2 oysters and a mixed small cup of seafood! The taste was incredibly fresh and I was glad to have tried a 'Whitstable oyster.' There was a market nearby that had a tent full of fruits, veggies, olives, feta cheese, and candied nuts. We all bought a little something from the stand. I, of course, bought candied cashews, that I proceeded to eat as "lunch" for the next couple hours.

After soaking up the sun in Whitstable, we took the bus to Herne Bay. The bus was a rather bumpy ride and reminded me of Indiana Jones at Disneyland! When we arrived safely in Herne Bay, we walked around the boardwalk a bit, before relaxing at an open air diner for a while, and then heading home. It was a nice, relaxing day with my new friends. Looking forward to more great memories at Farthings Court...

View from the bus stop...not bad

Alex & Adrianna

David, myself, and Michele

Whitstable boardwalk

Flat mate photo

West's Seafood

Seafood mixed cup

Oyster time!!! Cheers!!!

We liked him

Candied cashews

Incredible feta cheese sold here!

Surviving the crazy bus ride!

Herne Bay

Part of Herne Bay's old pie can be seen in the distance

Herne Bay

Bonne Chance Fellow Travelers

Lindsay

Societies Fayre (aka FAIR)

Today was the societies fayre at the University of Kent. Basically there are over 200 societies/ clubs: ranging from charity, music, and language clubs to Anime, shooting, and religious clubs. There were many booths set up around central campus with flyers on information and events within each club. In an effort to get more involved on campus during my short stay here, I decided to join a few. I joined the history society (of course), the dance society, and the music society.

I didn't receive much information regarding the history society but I assume they get together at pubs and local eateries to discuss history and topics of interest. I'm hoping to gain a lot of insight from these meetings and broaden my historical perspective. The dance society seemed like a lot of fun. They offer dance classes multiple times a week and include all sorts of styles of dance such as Zumba, jazz, ballet, and more! The last society I joined was the music society, which includes instruments and vocals. There are various levels depending how involved you want to get. Most societies have introduction meetings next week, so I am hoping to get more information. Most likely, I am only here on campus for the autumn term and I want to make the most of my experience here. Getting involved in a society or two (or three) seemed like a good way to do so!

Bonne Chance Fellow Travelers

Lindsay

Information Day?

Wednesday was our induction meeting for postgraduates within the humanities department. The roomies and I had all received various emails with different dates and times of meetings. After deciphering these emails, we arrived at the conclusion that we would go to the Woolf College foyer at 1PM for our meeting. Sure enough, after arriving we discovered that we needed to be there at 2:45PM for our induction meeting.

We decided to walk around campus a bit and our first stop was the Templeman library. The library is 4 stories tall and took us a while to explore. After 45 minutes, we went back to Woolf just to check if there was an information meeting at 2PM and sure enough, there was! It was a small informal meeting for us students in the Paris option MA program. It was nice to meet others students from our program and get some questions answered. Most of us are studying different subjects, but we are all going to live and study in Paris for the spring term. We also discovered that we live right next to each other in our dorms and decided to go out for drinks together on campus last night at K-bar and Woodys.

Woolf Postgraduate College

Templeman Library

K Bar

 

View of Canterbury Cathedral from UKC

Bonne Chance Fellow Travelers

Lindsay

Walking to Whitstable

On Tuesday, my new flatmate David and I decided to go for a walk to Whitstable; a small beach town that located on the North Sea. Over the weekend, I had found a trail called the Crab and Winkle Way, that led to the town, so we decided to check it out. It turns out that the walk is 6 miles and about 2 1/2 hours long. The scenery was beautiful and the surrounding area is known as the Blean. The Blean is one of the most ancient forest areas in southern England.The Crab and Winkle Way was actually used as early as the 9th and 10th century to transfer salt from the sea to the town of Canterbury. It was a beautiful walk, but walking one way was definitely enough! We decided to take a bus back to the university. Thank goodness for that bus!

Gorgeous open fields

Blean forest ahead- one of the most ancient forests in southern England

Love the sky

Whitstable

Very different from the yacht clubs near Newport Beach, CA

Oysters are a very popular dish in Whitstable

Cappuccino and a ham and cheese sandwich

Bonne Chance Fellow Travelers

Lindsay

Canterbury Town

On Monday, my new roomies and I decided to walk into Canterbury. The walk downhill took about 35 minutes. Our "exhausting" journey into town had caused us to work up quite the appetite so we decided to eat lunch at a traditional British pub. The pub was extremely charming and had outdoor seating in the back of the restaurant with tables and chairs that overlooked a canal. Deciding that simply being in England wasn't good enough, I chose to order fish and chips and English tea.

Upon finishing a nice meal, we headed to the cathedral to explore. We spent almost an hour walking slowly and quietly around the cathedral with admiration. During our amazement, a cathedral attendant explained much of the history behind parts of the cathedral. In fact, she pointed out a relatively new portion of stained glass in the cathedral that was created in the mid 20th century. She explained that the work was done by Hungarian Jews. She advised us to look closer at the faces in the stained glass to see if something looked familiar. Apparently, Walt Disney employed the same or similar Hungarian Jews to work on the Disney characters. Suddenly, characters began to pop out of the glass at me! I saw King Triton from the Little Mermaid, and Jasmine from Aladdin, and many more familiar faces. I've attached the photos below. Take a look yourself and see what characters you can find in the Canterbury stained glass! Quite interesting!

After a long (and sometimes circular) walk uphill to our dorm, the roomies and I met another flatmate, Michelle. Michelle is from Luxembourg and is studying English and American Literature. She speaks 5 languages and is also in our Paris program. Alex decided to cook dinner Monday night and made a fantastic mushroom risotto, with salad and red wine; in which we all ate and drank happily while listening to some John Coltrane....

Mini-Door

Crooked house with Dickens quote

Canterbury Castle

Alex and I

Roomies

First proper pot of English tea on this trip

Canterbury Cathedral

Stained glass (Top Center: Jesus? King Triton? )

Look closely at the faces. Disney like?

Bonne Chance Fellow Travelers

Lindsay

Arriving...

Settling into life in Canterbury has been relatively easy so far. Granted, it's only been a couple days but the campus life here has been very nice. I have already done so much and feel very comfortable. On Saturday morning I took a taxi to my dorm and check in. The type of dorm I live in is more of a small 2 story house. On the ground floor is two bedrooms, a bathroom, and the kitchen. The second floor has three bedrooms and another bathroom. The layout of the house is actually quite comfortable.

I was the first of my roommates to arrive Saturday. I unpacked my items and decided to walk around the campus to familiarize myself. The campus is pretty large and I walked for quite some time. To walk to central campus from my dorm, you have to pass through a small wildlife area. It's really nice and green and is full of rabbits, squirrels, and birds. I can imagine that my attitude towards this will change during the winter months when I am freezing on my way to class.

Upon arriving back to the dorm from my jaunt around campus, I met the first of my flatmates, Alex. Originally from China, he spent the much of his youth in Vienna, Austria, before moving to the UK to study at Cambridge. Shortly after Alex settled in, our next roommate, David, arrived. David is from Holland and has studied in the UK before for part of his undergraduate degree. Interestingly, during that time he met his girlfriend, who is from Escondido, California! What a small world! All of us are in the Paris option postgraduate program at Kent. However, we are all studying various topics. Alex is studying film, and David is studying creative writing, while I'm studying modern history.

Saturday night, the three of us decided to go on a 'tour' around campus. Sure enough, this tour was actually a pub crawl to some of the bars and clubs around campus. We met up with the other postgraduates on this tour and had couple drinks before calling it a night.

Sunday morning came and I actually slept very nice. Thank goodness the bed in my dorm is very comfortable. That was actually one of my biggest concerns about moving, leaving my large Tempurpedic behind! Upon awakening from a blissful slumber, I decided to use this day to go into the town of Canterbury to get a sim card and a UK phone number. David decided to get a number as well, so he hoped on the bus with me. We accomplished our task fairly quick and checked out the cathedral grounds a bit before returning home before dinner. Sunday night the three of us set out again for Canterbury for dinner at a Moraccan/ Spanish restaurant. We had been invited to dinner by another 'Alex' we had previously met on Saturday night. The other Alex invited two of his friends from Romania to join us. Both the ambiance and the food were incredible. What a great weekend to start the new term!

Here are some photos of my flat at the University of Kent...

Ugly orange wall (my only complaint)

View from my dorm

Bonne Chance Fellow Travelers

Lindsay