UK 2017

Our last day of digging was uneventful. We cashed out on finds on Thursday, our grand total being 22 Roman writing tablets, the most found in a week (in a day) since 1982. Personally, I contributed 3 writing tablets. One of which being complete and confronting, meaning closed like a book preserving the writing inside. …

Second to last day on the site, to see a small site trench transform into a ditch was amazing in only 2 weeks. Through hard work and a lot of sweat it has progressed so far. From a clay layer to the silty sticky mess along a rock berm, this trench was quite a challenge. …

Today is our first day back in the “trenches” after our trip to Edinburgh. It’s actually pretty nice to be back in Vindolanda. It’s funny that we’ve only been here for a week but it already feels like home. Each morning begins with a home cooked breakfast from our Northumbrian housemaster Pauline. Pauline is, in …

I have always been grateful for this opportunity but for the first time since arriving in the U.K, I was overwhelmed with gratitude. Here I am living my dream! My first day on site excavating was everything I dreamed it would be and more. Digging is addicting! The thrill and excitement that rushes through me …

I’ll say it outright: I love Vikings. I love everything about them, down to the teeniest of details. If someone looked at my bookshelf, about half of one shelf is dedicated to them. And because of this, York has been one of my dream locations for visiting for about five years now. It’s not too …

When we first spotted Conway Castle it is easy to see that this was an imposing structure to all that encountered it.  We dubbed this Castle “the castle-ist castle” and for good reason because Conway Castle is exactly what you think of when you think of medieval castles.  Located on the north coast of Wales …

I’ve now seen Canterbury and Dover. Renaissance Festivals will forever pale in comparison. Canterbury Cathedral’s history dates back to 597 AD and it is still a working church today. That’s nearly 1500 years!  As we walked around the cathedral, I had to continuously remind myself that it was real, not a reproduction.  We could have …

I think I can go ahead and say that thus far, my birthday has never been boring. This year, I turned 25 in London, and the day turned out to be far more of a whirlwind than I expected. On the bright side, today was definitely the day we got to play tourist. If you …

Today was our first full day in London and we went for a walking tour of Westminster where all the touristy stuff is when you think of London. I had never realized that so many attractions were so close together; standing in one spot and just turning around you can see The London Eye (that …

When I first got my flight information for this trip back in December of 2016, I had a moment of wondering, first of all, what was wrong with me in the sense that I was subjecting myself to what amounted to twenty-four straight hours of travel; a drive to Windsor Airport, a connection flight on …