martes, 16 de diciembre de 2014

LINGUISTIC IMMERSION TRIP TO EXMOUTH, ENGLAND (23rd-30th NOVEMBER 2014)

A group of 39 students and 3 teachers from Nazari Secondary School  spent a week in Britain (Exmouth and London) from the 23rd to the 30th November 2014.
One of the students who went on  this fantastic trip (Guadalupe Martín Pino, from ESO 3B), has written a beautiful diary about our wonderful experience there, and I want to share it with you. Thanks a lot, Guadalupe!
This is her diary:

Day 1 - Sunday, 23rd November

We met in front of our school at 7:00 am (that was a bit early!) and got on the bus that would take us to  Malaga airport. There, we had to queue (a very British thing!) and wait a lot, but finally we got on the plane and it took off at 11:15. The flight was quiet; it was the first one for a lot of people, and also the first trip out of Spain, and they were very excited.

We got off the plane about 2 hours later, and went through all the waiting and queuing thing again. Finally, we got on a bus and started a 5 hour-trip to Exmouth, with a small stop to get something to eat.

When we got off the bus, our host families were already waiting for us, and they took each of us to what would be our homes for the next week.

 


                                                                              Exmouth beach

Day 2 - Monday, 24th November

We met all again at 8:30 in a square near the school, called the Strand, where they told us about the rules, our responsibilities, etc. Then, for the next 3 hours, we had classes inside the school.

We were organized in three different groups depending on our English level, but we all had the same class hours: we had two lessons of one hour and a half each, separated by only fifteen minutes of free time.

When the lessons finished, at 12 o’clock, we had an hour and a half of free time to eat the packed lunches our host families had prepared us, and after that time we met up together again at the Strand.

We did a little tour through Exmouth: we went through Magnolia Centre and Manor Gardens, and ended up in the beach. Exmouth has a beautiful beach; it was calmed in our stay, but our guide told us that sometimes the waves are so big that they reach the nearest houses!

Then, we went back to the Strand and they gave us a quiz about Exmouth. In groups of 4, we had to do the tour again to answer the questions. It was quite fun.

We finished at half past four, and some went to go for a walk and the rest of us went to our homes.


Day 3 - Tuesday, 25th November

After the lessons, we went quickly to the train station to get on the train to Exeter (a quite big city near Exmouth), and we had our lunch on the train. When we arrived at Exeter we visited a very interesting museum and Rougemont castle (built by William the Conqueror) along with its beautiful gardens. Then we had a bit of free time for ourselves, which we used for going shopping. We met at a beautiful Christmas marked in front of Exeter’s cathedral and went back to Exmouth.



 

Day 4 - Wednesday, 26th November

Lessons were as interesting as usual, we always learned a lot with them. This time, after lunch, we went to Mountlands School again, to do something called “British living”.

We divided in three groups and rotated between three different activities. One of them was about recognising all the music stars and songs that appeared in a pop mash up. Another one was about the Simpsons; after seeing an episode (in which the Simpsons went to England on vacation), you had to answer a lot of questions. The last one was about asking questions to the people on the street, and then trying to answer them ourselves. I really liked the last one: I love going out to the street and asking random people questions to see what they think about any subject.

 


Devon cream tea

Day 5 - Thursday, 27th November

That day I tried the Devon Cream tea, a speciality of this area. It’s a cream tea served with scones, which you can fill of jam or custard. Simply delicious.

In the afternoon, after lunch, we went to Exmouth Leisure Centre, where we spent an hour swimming and then had a dancing lesson. It was a lot of fun.

 

Day 6 - Friday, 28th November

That day, after lessons, we had: shopping time! We went to Exeter again, and had a lot of free time to go shopping. There were a lot of interesting shops, but, sadly, most of them were very expensive.

We arrived at Exmouth at 4:30, and we went to our homes. But, at 7:30, we were outside again: it was disco night. We danced to Spanish hits for two hours, until 9:30, when we had to go back to our homes. It was too soon for a lot of people, who, I’m sure, would have loved to keep dancing all night.



Day 7 - Saturday, 29th November

At only 7:30 am, we had already said goodbye to our kind host families and we were all together waiting for the bus, which first took us to breath-taking Stonehenge and, after 5 hours, left us at the doors of our hotel in London. It was called Ibis, and we didn’t like it very much; the bathroom was really tiny for three people, and even for one person, I would dare to say. Anyway, that’s how cheap hotels are.

After leaving the suitcases at the hotel, and though it was already a bit dark, we walked through the streets of magic London and got on a boat that led us on a little tour through the Thames river. From there, we saw the London Eye, the Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament and a lot more. It was all illuminated and really beautiful.

We got off the boat and walked to a free buffet restaurant, where we ate pizza and pasta. Finally, we went back to our hotel in the underground to sleep.


Stonehenge


Day 8 - Sunday, 30th November

We woke up at 7 (some of us even earlier) to finish packing our suitcases and to eat breakfast. An hour later, we were walking towards the underground, which, after a really long one-hour trip, left us at Camden Market. We then had an hour and a half to go shopping. Some shops were literally amazing. We loved this part of London; it was a pity that they didn’t give us more free time to explore it all.


Camden Market

 

We had to buy our own lunch, which, after our free time, we ate in the long trip to the airport. We got on the plane and, in no time, we were landing in Malaga airport.

I started to miss England as soon as we did.



GUADALUPE MARTÍN PINO. 3º ESO B