My US Adventure: Part 1 – New Haven, Connecticut.

If you follow my twitter account (which, this week, hit 10,000 followers – Yay!) you will have seen a lot of photos and tweets over the past few days about the adventure I am on in the United States. I call it an ‘adventure’ because I have never been on a holiday so busy and varied in my life!

We flew out of London Heathrow at early-o-clock on Wednesday morning (a week ago already?!? wow!) and landed at JFK airport, New York, 7.5 hours later. As we weren’t stopping in New York (we come back for a few days at the end of the trip) we grabbed our rental car and drove to our first stop; New Haven, Connecticut.

By the time we arrived we had been awake more hours than I can even count (we were up at 4am UK time, flight at 9, 7.5 hour flight, 3 hour drive and a 5 hour time difference….) and we just needed to eat and get to bed. We knew we had less than 24 hours in New Haven and we wanted to make the most of the time we had so we had a look in the guide book to see what was recommended food-wise.

We decided to visit “Frank Pepe’s”, one of the oldest Pizza Place in the United States – well, we couldn’t let that opportunity pass us by, could we?!

It did not disappoint – we got a “medium” for the table (american food seems to come in such huge portions and we were so tired we wouldn’t manage much anyway!) and it was incredible, and, as expected, more the  big enough for us! Seriously good pizza – and you could tell the tomatoes were fresh too – soooo good!

After we finished at Pepe’s we went back to the Omni Hotel, where we were staying for the night, and went to bed. It was, however, a bit of a restless night’s sleep as we were waiting anxiously for my youngest sister’s A Level results, which we were getting at 7ish in the morning UK time, so 2am our time. Finally, the results came through and she had got the results she needed for her first choice university (Well done again, Gemma!) so we had 2am congratulatory cuddles and went back to bed!

The next morning we grabbed some breakfast and went for a tour of Yale University which is in New Haven. We were toured around the campus by a current 2nd year student whose name I have forgotten (bad blogger!) but she was fantastic! She had so much enthusiasm and positivity – it made me want to go back to the days of studying & exams and made my sister, who had only had her university confirmed a few hours before, even more excited to get started in September. (Thank you, to the wonderful girl who toured us around – sorry I forget your name – you made the tour brilliant for us!)

Yale is a stunning campus, and the college-living system is very similar to the house-system from Harry Potter – you live in your college, sleep in your college and compete for your college in inter-college competitions – sounds like fun, doesn’t it?! The tour lasted about 2 hours and we were completely enthralled throughout – the libraries, houses, dining halls etc – it was all so huge and so overwhelming, but amazing to see!

After the tour finished, that was our time in New Haven done – I told you it was busy! We hopped in the car and shot off to the next place, stopping in a gorgeous little town called “Deerfield” for lunch on the way.

I would have loved to have spent a bit more time in New Haven – less than 24 hours was just too short a time to take in this gorgeous little town but Yale University was really inspiring and the Omni hotel was gorgeous – it even had pineapple water in the lobby! New haven will always be a special place for us now, after getting the A Level results and university confirmation in the middle of the night – its a story we won’t forget in a hurry!
(I still remember getting my place at drama school whilst sitting in a tent in Africa – I will tell the story one day, I promise!)
🙂

R xx

The Hotel we stayed at was the Omni Hotel, which can be found at http://www.omnihotels.com/hotels/new-haven-yale or on their twitter here.

Pepe’s Pizzeria can be found here or see their twitter here.

Yale University can be found at http://www.yale.edu or on their twitter here.

To follow what I am up to and where I am right now, please see my instagram or my twitter

I will also be posting various posts of some of the crazy things I have been getting up to as they happen (and when I find time in this crazy schedule to write them up!)