Arriving in Ealing

Where exactly do I begin.......I guess with the plane ride over.  My trip to London was extremely pleasant, due to the fact that I slept for most of it.  I took my first taxi ride ever and landed outside of Newman Court, the apartment complex where I'm living.  While it's location is a bit farther from central London than I had initially been hoping, my preconceived notions were blown out of the water after I took a good look around me.  I live in a beautiful, somewhat residential neighborhood, filled with little shops and pubs and loads of trees.  So naturally the first order of business for those of us that were able to stay awake that first night was to hit the pubs.  We made our way to a pub called The Shanakee, pictured below, where I ordered my first strongbow of the summer.  After sitting with the locals and pretending I knew something about football (soccer) we meandered out of there in search of somewhere else.

 I sadly did not take a photo of my first meal here, the classic fish and chips, mostly because I was too hungry to actually stop and pull out my camera.  But nonetheless I'll happily describe it to you, I ate a huge hunk of fried cod with a tiny wooden stick on top of a bed of fries served to me in a cone made out of pieces of paper.  Needless to say, it was absolutely delicious and I was enamored walking around my new surroundings stuffing my face with a piece of fish as large as my head.  We made our way to a different pub called The Grove where I promptly ordered an Amstel beer and sat in plush chairs in the corner, this pub was geared towards a much younger audience and I felt quite at home.  After drinking a solid three drinks me and my flatmates were exhausted and managed to find our way home to Newman Court.  All in all it was a delightful first day filled with delightful food.

The first pub I meandered into (photo taken from the top of a double decker bus)

My First Drink in London, a strongbow cider