London Museum of Water and Steam When planning my Engineering in London trip, family and friends often asked me, “Why London?” or “What do you gain from taking classes over there?” My response to those type of questions usually consisted of regurgitated variation of, “well, the industrial revolution began in London blah, blah, blah…” Before […]

The week before classes started Orientation Week helped me find new friends and settle down in this city. The day before classes started a new friend of mine invited me to go hiking ten minutes before the group left! I’m usually shy when it comes to going places with new people but I decided to take the chance and was not disappointed with the experience.

The number one question I received before leaving the United States was: “Are you traveling alone or with a group?” Upon responding with, “alone,” the look of shock and amount of “good lucks” I received was not at all reassuring.

This past summer forty Tickle College of Engineering students took University of Tennessee engineering courses as part of four faculty-led programs. The faculty–led programs are designed to combine technical courses with international experiences in a way that provides course credit while minimizing schedule concerns for engineering students.

It sounds lame but I feel I got to see a more personal side of London by frequenting these places. The variety and quality of the food at some of these markets is hard to beat, especially for the prices. Borrough Market (shown at right), just south of the Thames, blew me away the first Saturday I went. So much food.

Even with all the fun classes and thrilling group activities, there was plenty of time to explore other areas outside of London. One weekend I took a relaxing trip to the Isle of Wight, famous for its natural beauty and nicknamed “England in Miniature”.

During our time in London, the faculty leaders decided to give us a long weekend to travel by taking Monday off of class. This year we decided to head to Dublin, Ireland.

We left Friday, June 14, after class. We took a train to Holyhead, Wales. From Holyhead, we got on a ferry that took us to Dublin. The trip was very tiresome, because we were traveling during the middle of the night. We arrived in Dublin around 6 a.m. on Saturday.