Friday, 9 July 2010

Visits this week

Today is the last day of lessons for the group and no-one can believe how fast the time has flown! This week's trips have been to Lynton and Lynmouth, which are small villages on the north coast of Devon, as well as to Bath where there is an interesting museum about the ancient Roman baths. On Monday Amaia learnt about the history of Powderham castle and yesterday investigated an amazing guitar shop in Exeter. Alvaro had fun playing football at the beach. Nicolas and Arturo had an interesting experience with a seagull in Lynmouth and Juan has been discovering himself through a psychological test he did in class. Tuesday's disco was the best yet, although it was extremely hot and sweaty! Sarah was even dancing on the chairs! This afternoon Alvaro and Sarah are going to Crealy Adventure Park, while Amaia is playing badminton. Everyone else is going to the beach to enjoy the sunshine.

Monday, 5 July 2010

London

Here's the group outside Buckingham Palace! The changing of the guard started just as we arrived which was really interesting to see (although the guards must have been boiling in their hats!) After seeing Buckingham Palace the group had some time in Covent Garden to go shopping and watch the street performers. Arturo, Alvaro and Sarah bought Hard Rock Cafe T-shirts (as seen in the photo!) Then we walked down to Trafalgar Square where we intended to look at Nelson's column. However a gay parade was getting into full swing just as we arrived and there were so many people that it was impossible to move! So we took a small detour along the river Thames and saw Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament. After that we went on a boat tour along the river and under all the bridges, finally ending up at Tower Bridge. Everybody was really happy to have finally visited London and would have loved to have spent longer there. On Sunday everyone went shopping in Exeter, played munchkin in a cafe and tried some Spanish food in La Tasca! Arturo also managed to find the most expensive bottle of water in the UK at £3.60! Alvaro and Sarah had a great time exploring the forest at Escot on Friday where they saw white owls and red squirrels. And finally, lessons are going really well!

Sunday, 4 July 2010

Hello from London!

A quick video to say hi from London!

Friday, 2 July 2010

Karaoke!

I wish I'd had my camera last night at the Karaoke to show you a video of Juan, Amaia and Nicolas singing Viva España (English version)! The Spaniards were definitely the best (and most enthusiastic) singers of We Will Rock You, Born to be Wild and the YMCA! This afternoon Sarah and Alvaro were playing football and badminton, Amaia was on a boat trip and Arturo, Nicolas and Juan were entertained by a storyteller. There's no disco or karaoke tonight because tomorrow everyone has to get up very early to go to London. It's going to be a long day but everyone's really excited! Below is a another very nice picture by Alvaro of the barbeque, complete with super chefs, swans and a rower who tried to help us fight for our right to barbeque...

Thursday, 1 July 2010

Tintagel, Boscastle and Weymouth

Yesterday Amaia, Juan, Nicolás and Arturo visited King Arthur's castle in Tintagel and the little village of Boscastle. The scenery was beautiful and the students enjoyed relaxing by the sea. As Juan said, it would be a really nice place to live (if not Spain)! Sarah and Alvaro went to Weymouth where they had an exciting time on the fairground rides. There was another disco on Tuesday evening, which was a good opportunity to meet the new students this week who have come from Montenegro, Italy and Barcelona. And tonight there is a karaoke evening! I'm impressed by how much everyone's writing has improved in so short a time. Sarah's diary writing in particular has come a long way. Today I went to see Nicolás, Amaia and Arturo acting which was very funny (and educational!) And Nicolás has a good question: why do people go on holiday to the Canary Islands when they could come to Exeter?!