Chelsea Physic Garden and My Final Thoughts

On the last day, we went to the Chelsea Physic Garden. It was similar to the Kew Gardens. Full of awesome botanicals, not as large, but significantly more informative. We went on a 45 minute tour, that explained about the different plants. It was beautiful and amazing.

Ethan and I at the Chelsea Physic Garden

These blooms are shaped like hearts; they were
thought to help with heart problems

Sound familiar, Harry Potter fans?

Deadly Night Shade. Useful in medications, but
poisonous when eaten raw

know what these are? Quinoa plants!

used for agave nectar. also used to make tequila

cannibis

Sunflowers can be used to remove toxins from soil.
They were planted near Chernobyl after the incident.

The plants were organized by flower, edible (even a specific "superfoods" section!), useful, medicinal, etc. I loved it!

It was sad that we couldn't get to everything, but I think a week is just about as much as we can handle before we get seriously homesick (it's also all we could afford. ha!).

I enjoyed the use of the tube; Ethan did not. Our hotel was nice, but honestly, next time I think we'll skip the "authentic hotel experience" and stay in an American chain hotel. I like having air conditioning and free internet. That sounds very sadly American, but it's the truth.

The trek home was long, but pretty uneventful. We had two changes; one in Amsterdam, and one in Minneapolis. We only had an hour to get to our gate in Amsterdam AND we had to go through security again at our gate! Amsterdam is notorious for drugs, so I suppose they wanted to make sure no one picked up anything in the airport.

In Minneapolis, we had to go through customs. I always get nervous going through security and customs, which is so silly because we were obviously not bringing back anything we weren't supposed to. After customs, we had to collect our luggage and go back through security. It will never cease to amaze me how, for lack of a better word, stupid people can be. NO LIQUIDS, NO FOOD, NO SHARPS. What part of that do you not get?

We flew economy, because we're poor college kids, but we did catch a glimpse at the first class/business class cabin and damn. If and when we do go to New Zealand, Australia, India, etc., twenty some hour flights, we're going to pay a little extra and sit in the fancy cabin. We were a little cramped (worse for gigantic Ethan than for short, little me), but for only eight hours, when we mostly slept, wasn't too bad. But over twenty hours? We want to be comfortable!

Overall, we had a great time. We enjoyed our trip, but we're definitely glad to be home.