England Day 1: Punting, Church Rooftops, Napping!

Today was the first official day in England. I got into the airport at 6:55 a.m. London time. Yeah. No sleep the night before, fitful sleep on the plane, noisy Sri Lankan lady next to me. I was a little cranky. And to help matters, I had a minor panic attack in the London airport when Lindz wasn't there to pick me up. I had very little American money, no contact info for Lindz, the ATM wouldn't take my card and give me cash, and the internet wouldn't let me on because I didn't know the LAST FOUR DIGITS OF MY ZIP CODE (after the 84604 that is)! I looked it up- it's 6520. I don't think I'll ever forget that. Anyway, it turns out Lindz was just a little lost, so I was in the airport for about 30 mins hyperventilating. Thanks, Lindz. :) Here we are at the airport. Keep in mind I hadn't had any sleep or shower for the last 36 hours. And I was on a plane.
Yeah. I look great. (ROLLING EYES!!!!) Well, we headed to Oxford, and the countryside was so beautiful! I pretty much just gaped out the window the whole drive and barely answered Lindz or her friend Roo when they asked me questions. I'm so rude! I was just so distracted by how gorgeous it was outside.
So we got to Oxford, showered, chatted, and then headed to Lindz's college to rent some boats to go punting. Punting is similar to what they do in gondola's in Italy. It's a long boat that someone steers from the back with a long pole. They push off the bottom of the river with the pole. Here is Lindz bailing out our boat with Roo. It had a lot of water in the bottom . . . which eventually gravitated to my end of the boat and was soaked up by my bottom. Nice.
Dave took over most of the punting, but Austin, Roo, and Lindz also took turns. It was a lot of fun to be steered down the river, hitting the banks a lot, rocking the boat, getting turned around, watching people crash into each other and us, and getting water poured on my head from a paddle by Dave. Yeah, and I had just barely met him! Here are some fun pics from the little river excursion:

Austin and Roo had a fun time posing for the camera. They are complete goofs and I love them! Check out the model faces. Fantastic.
So after we went punting we met up with another friend, Ruth, who was able to get us VIP access to the top of the tower in University Church. We stopped by the church library and fooled around on the thrones that were left in there. Check out how huge they were!After this we headed up to the very top of the tower and had a gorgeous bird's-eye-view of Oxford. Check it out!




Well, as you can guess, I was pretty exhausted after all this! We sat in the Church and listened to Ruth play the two-story organ for a little bit, and then walked home. We had planned to play some games and eat some food, but I laid down on Lindz's bed for a "quick" 5 minute nap . . . . and woke up over seven hours later! Talk about jet lag! Lindz woke me up when she came in the room at 1 a.m., and I fell back asleep for another 6 hours. Wow. But I needed it for the next day that was ahead of me!