Nottingham, Sheffield and Lincoln

I was present in three British cities today: Nottingham, Sheffield and Lincoln. I have pictures from two of them:

 Here is Sheffield's city centre from a distance while the vehicle was in motion.

Here is Lincoln Cathedral from a distance while the vehicle was stationary.

I was travelling with my East of England uncle and cousins; my uncle was taking my cousins/his children back to their respective universities.

Back but one

All of my East of England relatives except for one have returned home - my Lincoln cousin. She is staying overnight and will accompany me on the bus to college tomorrow, as she will be taking the bus to the train station for her trip back to Lincoln.

Tomorrow is my first mathematics lesson of the new term. It might not be a subject in which I am proficient but I'll enjoy the lesson, regardless. I usually do!

East of England...again!

My East of England relatives are back! As I wrote yesterday, my Lincoln cousin is here and she - plus her immediate family - are staying for the weekend. I'm happy for them to visit; I enjoy having extra company at weekends given that those days are when I'm not at college!

End of the Christmas break

Yesterday, my college's Christmas break came to an end; as the 7th of January was a Wednesday, the first class of the year and new term was Employability. I highly enjoyed seeing my friends again after the three-week-long break.

My cousin at university in Lincoln will be arriving shortly; she's coming to stay here for a couple of days before her own break concludes.

Lincoln visit December 2014 (2)

As promised, some pictures from yesterday's Lincoln trip:

This is the view of Lincoln as we were driving in. The camera on my phone gave the landscape a far bluer appearance for this photograph than the vicinity was as seen through my eyes.

After the light level increased, the blueness disappeared. This is an early-to-mid-morning picture of the cathedral, taken from where my uncle parked his car.

This is an image of the cathedral, taken close to the mid-afternoon. I cropped the picture to cut out the car plates, which were obviously visible.

This was taken slightly over an hour after the previous picture. I cropped this one, too, for the same reason as the previous image and because there were faces present. Note how occupied the parking area is in the third and fourth pictures compared to the second!

The only negative aspect to this Lincoln visit was my throat and coughing. On more than one occasion, when I stepped into a building from the cold or vice versa, I would start coughing; same if I talked for long periods and yes, my voice has yet to fully return to me. Otherwise, it was a fun trip.

Lincoln visit December 2014

I spent most of today in Lincoln. While much of it was spent in either shops or my cousin's university accommodation, I photographed the cathedral a few times and I'll be sure to post the pictures tomorrow. It snowed last night and the snow drastically altered the Lincoln landscape.

Cousin and clocks

Today has been mostly quiet. My Lincoln cousin returned to her city this afternoon, and my aunt and uncle will return to the East of England tomorrow. We'll be a few people short here and will be another person short when my brother heads back home next Sunday.

The clocks changed last night: they were set back by one hour. While it'll be nice to have lighter mornings for the next few months, it does, as always, come at the expense of the Sun setting earlier, which will lead to darker evenings. Today, it was starting to become dark at around 5:00pm.

First half-term break

Today's Sociology lesson was both the last class of this week and our last lesson until 3rd November. We don't have English tomorrow because it's a teacher training day. As a result, today officially began our first half-term break.

One would think that I would be looking forward to some time off from college but to be honest, I'm actually not. I enjoy going to college four days a week; I love the lessons and I love meeting up with my friends. It will be unusual not going in tomorrow or next week.

There are three mitigating factors, fortunately. My cousin at university in Lincoln is here for tonight and tomorrow, my English teacher will be running a two-hour workshop next Wednesday (which I will attend!) and my brother will be coming up on Saturday to stay for the week. It'll be the first time in almost months that I've seen him and my parents.

As for today's lesson, our usual Sociology teacher was out sick today, which meant that a substitute teacher was present for us. The substitute performed well and I had a lengthy conversation with her after I had finished my work; I was the last to leave college and then I went to the train station to meet up with my cousin.

Lincoln moving

My East of England family arrived here last night. This afternoon, I went with them to Lincoln to help my cousin who attends university there move from student accommodation into a proper house. The job changed from moving only my cousin's belongings to moving the belongings of half of her roommates, but it didn't bother us because we were there and we had the means to transport all of their items. In fact, I enjoyed the work; it was great exercise and then we got to see my cousin's house, followed by seeing some more of Lincoln.

I might have a picture or two to post later, but most of them are of my cousin's house and I'm not going to post them.

Lincoln Cathedral images

On the 27th of August, I accompanied my relatives from the East of England to the city of Lincoln. My uncle invited me and I'm delighted that he made the offer: Lincoln is one of the finest places I've been to in the United Kingdom.

Why, exactly, am I so pleased about Lincoln? Well, besides being a beautiful city, it's easy for drivers and pedestrians alike: my uncle appeared to have no trouble whatsoever navigating the place and he confirmed this when I asked him after we had returned to Nottingham that evening. In regards to walkers, there are several pedestrianised roads and the footpaths are spacious; it wasn't difficult to walk to the city centre from wherever we were parked.

Which brings me onto my next point: Parking. The abundance of parking spaces in Lincoln stunned me; they are located all over the city and are free as long as you stay within the time limit. Most of the spaces we encountered provided free parking for an hour, although others only gave half an hour and some as long as two. It made a pleasant change from a driver having to search for a (likely crowded) parking garage.

I'm happy for my cousin, too. Her accommodation's location, combined with all the access for pedestrians, gives her less than a ten-minute walk to her university and the shops. She also has somewhat of a waterfront view and her building appears to be in a relatively decent part of the city. I think she was satisfied with it.

Obviously, I'm not going to post pictures of my cousin's accommodation; instead, here are some pictures of Lincoln Cathedral:

This is Lincoln Cathedral from a distance. My cousin doesn't have to walk far to get this view, as the cathedral is the most prominent building in the Lincoln skyline.

I took this picture when we were walking up to the cathedral. These two towers used to hold a spire each, but they were removed in 1807 over safety concerns.

The cathedral was undergoing some maintenance, which pleased me: The building is several centuries old and without this work it would deteriorate. My uncle remarked about the pollution damage on the other side of the cathedral.

This is the cathedral's central tower. It also once held a spire, which brought the cathedral to the height of 525 feet; however, the spire was destroyed in the mid-16th century.

A picture taken at the west front of the cathedral, where some additional maintenance was ongoing.

I love this image. I know that I shouldn't aim a camera towards the Sun but in this case it was acceptable: the cathedral's tower was obscuring the Sun enough for me to make this capture.

This is the last picture that I took of the cathedral and in Lincoln itself. I thought our visit was excellent and I'm glad that we had a quick lunch so that we had more time to explore and enjoy the place; the weather was perfect...too good to waste sitting indoors. To reiterate, I am happy for my cousin and I think she'll have a wonderful time living in this beautiful city during her years attending university.

Lincoln

My East of England relatives (they're the relatives who were staying here in Nottingham for a few days, although they returned home tonight), my cousin's boyfriend and I travelled to the city of Lincoln, which is located in Lincolnshire. We were there to both check out my cousin's university accommodation and to see Lincoln itself.

Lincoln is one of the most beautiful places I've visited since I've been back in the United Kingdom, and Lincoln Cathedral is the most impressive and prominent building in the city. I have an abundance of pictures from the afternoon; I'll post them in a later piece.