London Trip
Our Residential Trip to London, written by The Squirrels
After much anticipation the day had finally come…we were off to London, there were nerves and excitement but we all knew we were off to experience new things.
We went to the Imperial War Museum, we could barely hold our excitement in. Ready to learn even more about World War 2 we looked up above our heads and there hanging from the ceiling were mighty spitfires. We all loved it because there were lots of different exhibits, video’s, models, real artefacts and more.
We saw fighter planes, weapons, a huge missile, tanks and a model house from the time of WW2, We crawled under a table into a Morrison Shelter and explored an Anderson shelter also. Our guide explained using a map how the war had spread across the world.
After lunch we walked to our next experience, the London Eye. There was a long queue but it moved quickly and it was worth it! From our private pod we saw Buckingham Palace, Horse guards Parade where the Soldiers were practising, the Shard, St Pauls Cathedral, the River Thames and much much more. As we got higher and higher it got better and better.
After the London Eye we walked through the streets of London passing by the almighty Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, the Horse Guards at Downing Street and a statue of Winston Churchill. We headed towards Trafalgar Square where we saw Nelsons Column and the huge Lions. We went into the National Gallery where we passed by some of the most famous paintings in the world. Until we came upon the one we were there to see…SURPRISE! It was amazing to see it in real life after we had spent time looking at prints in school during our enrichment week.
From the National Gallery we hopped onto the coach and headed to our lodge accommodation. We were excited but a bit tired. There were butterflies fluttering in our tummies as we looked forward to finding out what our rooms would look like. From the coach we saw The Olympic Park and Wembley Stadium. We arrived at 6 30pm and headed straight in to dinner, we enjoyed Burgers, Jacket Potatoes, chips and Waffles for pudding. From dinner we went to our lodge, changed into our home clothes and had a good run around to burn off even more energy. Bed time came too quickly but eventually we all got off to sleep.
The next morning after breakfast and packing up our belongings we got back onto the coach and headed to Kew Gardens where we were in for a treat. We explored the grounds and headed to a magnificent Victorian house full of incredible paintings by Marianne North who was a famous Victorian botanist and painter. She travelled the world to paint all of the plants she saw. After lunch we split into two groups, one group continued to explore while the other headed off to the Palm House for a workshop. In the Palm House we saw many exotic plants, our teachers were devastated to discover that the coffee bean plant could be extinct within 50 years!! It was very hot and humid in the palm house, we saw a banana plant, a very useful plant indeed. We could use the leaves for a shelter or to wrap food for cooking as well as eat the fruit and the flowers to keep us alive. We had to be mindful, some plants are toxic so we couldn’t touch them without permission.
We met back together at the lake where we saw some enormous fish, who popped up to say hello. From Kew Gardens we boarded the coach for our journey home. We were feeling so accomplished, we had faced our fears and beaten our nerves and spent the night away with our friends. We were exhausted but happy and full of memories of the things we had done, just one more exciting stop to make. We stopped off for a quick bite to eat and regain our strength at Burger King, what a treat. On returning to school we were pleased to be reunited with our families who had missed us far more than we had missed them!!
We can’t wait until next year and our next residential.