Day 3

We started the day by accidentally sleeping in for 2.5 hours.  Apparently Craig’s alarm on his watch didn’t go off, or we didn’t hear it.  We must have needed the sleep!  Rylee has been struggling more than the rest of us with jet lag.  She’s been very tired, and just hasn’t felt very well.  But tomorrow we go to the Harry Potter Studio Tour, so maybe that will perk her up a bit!

Our first venture was riding the tube to the Tower of London and taking a tour. We have been lucky so far in that we really haven’t been bothered too much by the crowds.  There are a lot of people, but the lines into places have been reasonable.  We followed a tour guide for the first part, then went off on our own.  The Tower of London is just so incredible to see.  Is it possible to “feel” history?  I think we did today.  You can see the carvings into the stone walls by the prisoners hundreds of years ago.  And seeing the Crown Jewels was so impressive.  All the crowns of the kings and queens dating back to the 1600’s, plus scepters, gold plates and challis’s were all displayed, and in such pristine condition. 

We also had tickets for the Ceremony of the Keys.  You have to get tickets far in advance; I think we got ours 6-8 months ago.  This takes place every night at 9:30pm (9:53 to be exact), and has since the 1300’s!  It was a 40 minute presentation, very serious and traditional.  There is an exchange of the keys, soldiers marching, precise words spoken, bugles playing, and a little audience participation.  Afterward, we walked a bit and took a spectacular picture of the Tower Bridge, all lit up with the Olympic rings.

Between the Tower of London tour and the Ceremony of the Keys, we rested at the hotel and rehydrated.  We walked through Green Park and St. James Park on our way to catch the tube again for the key ceremony.  St. James Park is right near Buckingham Palace.  There’s a lake in it with weeping willow trees and lots of ducks and pigeons that reminded us of Manito Park.

By the way, I think we have crossing the street figured out: It really doesn’t matter if it’s a marked crossing or not, people generally just run for it.  On most streets there’s an island or landing in the middle of the street.  You run really fast to the island, gather your wits, then run again to the other side, thereby completing your journey.  I can’t believe more people don’t get hit.  The streets are narrow, and the cars drive fast.  A lot of streets do have walk/don’t walk signs, but a lot don’t.  Also, on most streets if you look down, “look right” or “look left” is printed on the street (no doubt for the ignorant tourists who still look the opposite direction for oncoming traffic).

On our bus tour yesterday we learned what the cute little children’s song “Ring Around the Rosie” really means.  Do you know?  It has to do with the plague and people dying.  I was silently referencing the book “World Without End”, the sequel to “The Pillars of the Earth” (for those who have read it).

We are all really loving London.  It’s a huge city with so much to do.  It’s so rooted in history, we just don’t have that kind of history where we live!  I was thinking before we got here that we’ll probably be here just long enough to feel like it wasn’t long enough, and it’s starting to feel that way. It’s a good sign when I have to keep asking what day it is. 

Tower of London Pics

The White Tower

Another tower

Cool Elephant

Where the Crown Jewels are kept

Yes, it's a little crooked but that's how we roll!

Inside the White Tower

Through the window toward the Tower Bridge

Jarret as a Beefeater

Photo Bombed!

Lots of small winding staircases

To help keep the bad people out

What do you do when part of your white fork is missing in your fish and chips?

A walk through St. James Park

In St James Park looking back at Buckingham Palace

Another park picture

The Tower of London at night

The Tower Bridge at night

A group shot

The Tower Bridge

Jarret in the subway

Some pictures from yesterday

Taking a rest before heading off to the Ceremony of the Keys tonight at the Tower of London. Here are some pictures from yesterday.

Rylee and Jarret on the tour bus...what angels...

A street in the older part of London

The London Eye from the tour bus

The happy couple... as the kids took the picture Rylee stated "Only time can come between you!"

Kids mugging for the camera

Picture of Big Ben and Parliament. Did you know Big Ben is actually the name of the bell in the tower?

The Tower Bridge with the Olympic rings on it.

Close up of the Olympic rings

Big Ben

The Whole Fam Damily

Nice picture with the London Eye and Big Ben in the background

Just a neat building

Part of the Parliament building

Night shot of Piccadilly Circus

Monument by Christopher Wren commemorating the fire in 1666

Big Ben

Picture of Big Ben through the London Eye

Art on the wall

Driving down the Tower Bridge. It does open for big ships.

Shot of a building at night.

Day 2

We had a good but tiring day today. We started with a hearty Starbuck breakfast since it’s right across the street. Jill did enjoy a nice cup of coffee as we got the morning started. The nice advantage was that Starbucks also has free wifi, which is now a necessity. After breakfast we boarded a sightseeing bus that takes you to all of the sites. They provide live commentary on some of the buses and you can get off the bus and then later get back on a different one. We drove by Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park, Baker Street, Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, Westminster Abbey and Big Ben before we finally decided to walk a little bit. As part of the package, we were able to take a boat down the River Thames. The views from the river were very spectacular, especially the ones of the Tower Bridge and Parliament. There were only a few people when we started but the crowds grew throughout the day. The boat ride down and back took about an hour. 

After the ride on the boat, we got out and walked around the Parliament building and Westminster Abbey a little bit. It just boggles the mind to think of how many of these buildings were built hundreds of years ago. We did learn that the city of London is only 1 square mile and maintains its independence from the neighboring cities. The city of Westminster houses most of the big areas like Buckingham Palace but the city of London is where the oldest buildings are.  A fire in 1666 wiped out 4/5ths of the city in 4 days. The first place that burned down was memorialized by a structure created by Christopher Wren who built St. Paul’s Cathedral. We did walk into St Paul’s but they were having Sunday services so we only got a quick glimpse of the church. It is one amazing place. You can’t take pictures there but it was spectacular.

After having lunch (at the Earl of Sandwich no less!) and walking around St Paul’s Cathedral, we got back on the bus and continued on the journey through the rest of the sites.  It’s just amazing that there are so many old buildings. We decided to come back to the hotel, rest for a little bit and then head out to dinner. For dinner, we just walked down to Piccadilly Circus and looked for someplace that we could all agree on. We found a nice Italian restaurant that looked good. We all had a good meal and it was nice to sit down for a while and enjoy it. We met a nice waitress from Romania that had recently lived in Chicago. We ended up giving her a pen that I made, took six to give away when we wanted, and she even gave us her phone number and email address.  One thing that amazes me is the number of people from different countries. There are so many languages that you hear as you walk down the street.

Jarret is enthralled with the number of nice cars that we’ve seen. There were 10 Mercedes, he counted, parked on the street of our hotel. In the same mix was a Ferrari and we saw a convertible Rolls Royce driving down the road. As for the rest of the drivers, I’m surprised I haven’t seen a tourist run over by a car. The cars are going every which way and people just cross the street at random. I think there is a method to keep from getting run over but I still haven’t figured it out for sure. For now I’m trying to rely on waiting for the walk sign. However, at one small park with a Winston Churchill statue in it by Westminser Abbey, it turns out that all the crosswalks were out of order, we just had to brave the traffic on that one. It would be one thing if all the streets were straight and traffic was coming from only two directions but there are some crosswalks where I don’t even see where the cars are coming from.

One thing that happened yesterday that I forgot about was that I was dive bombed by a pigeon. We were walking down a busy street and all of a sudden a pigeon flies right by my head, so close that I actually felt his feathers on my forehead. I duck and everyone else laughs…

Today the weather was great, it’s a little humid but the sun was out the whole day and it was just about perfect. It looks like we’ll be lucky and the weather will hold up through the rest of this week.

Tomorrow we’re headed to the Tower of London and the British Museum. I’m still dealing with internet issues….too cheap to pay 16 pounds for internet for a day….so I’ll have to post some pictures later. 

WE MADE IT!

We got in to London today after the plane was delayed about 1/2 an hour. The flight was good even though we had a bumpy stretch about 2 hours before landing. The food wasn't that great however. Neither of the kids really liked the pasta and the chicken curry wasn't that great either. The good side was that you didn't have to pay for the drinks, whether is was pop, wine or hard liquor. There were a couple people that we noticed took advantage of that. We found our way through the various checkpoints and customs agents and found all of our bags.

One problem we did have was with the personal wifi device that I was going to use to hook up all our internet devices. They didn't have mine ready and it looks like I won't get it until Monday or Tuesday since they don't do anything on Sunday. So now I'm stuck either paying 16 pounds per day or trying to use the internet hotspot from Starbucks across the street.

We boarded the tube and headed towards our hotel. It was pretty easy to get there but at one point, Jill, Rylee and Jarret all had their eyes closed on the tube. Jarret even had some pretty serious head bobs. I was worried if I fell asleep too, who know where we would have ended up. When we got to our hotel, our room wasn't ready so we went to the lounge and had a light meal. Once our room was done, we headed up and a few of us took a little nap.

We finally had enough energy to venture out into the big city. We walked through along the edge of Green Park and got our first sight of Buckingham Palace. It's a really majestic building, especially with the ornate fences and memorial honoring Queen Victoria. I think the thing that's really impressed us is all of the old buildings you see.

Here is our first view of Buckingham Palace.

And the guard

The royal kids

One other thing that was really surprising was the number of buses that are everywhere. Below is picture from the street where they were just all lined up in traffic. By the way, I have no idea how they drive down here. Besides the wheel being on the wrong side of the car, people are going in lanes that I didn't think existed.

We ran across this odd shaped thing, we finally figured out what it was, do you have any ideas?

After we walked to Buckingham Palace, we headed off towards Picadilly Circus. It was very interesting to see the mixture of modern led signs with the old style of buildings. This place was packed with people going to different shows or restaurants. I think it would be really interesting to see it at night. We might just have to make a trip after dark, especially since it's not that far away.

This is one of the Olympic mascots that's right out in front of our hotel. So naturally we had to bribe Rylee and Jarret to strike a pose.

View of Green Park from our hotel window

Well, it's 9:03 PM London Time, which puts it at 1:03 PM Spokane time which means I've been up pretty much for 30 hours straight. I did get a few brief naps on the plane but not very much. Can't wait for a little sleep and to wake up tomorrow ready to tackle the day. I think we're going to go on one of the hop-on hop-off buses so that we can see as many sights as we can. One last note. We found a little grocery store right across the street from our hotel so our dinner was pre-done sandwiches, chips, water and some chocolate. Probably turned out to be the best meal of the day.

5 days to go

We're trying to get all of our ducks in a row before we take off. Today we all got together and started making some lists of things we need to do.  It's going to be a busy few days and we don't want to forget anything. Last week, we did get our Olympic tickets for the events that we'll be attending.

We're still short two Swimming tickets but I think we'll do without them. Our plan is for me to take one of the kids to the event. Jill and the other one will just stay in the Olympic Park. There are things that they can do and it looks like they might be able to watch the event on one of the big screens that they'll have there. I did try and get two tickets last night on Ebay but was unsuccessful. After thinking about it and watching this video, we just decided that we didn't want to spend so much money for tickets that would end up being so far from the actual pool. Our seats are going to be on the far side by diving boards, way up towards the top. The only way we'll try and get a couple more tickets would be if we could purchase them at about the face value.

We're going to leave Friday morning and drive to Seattle, leave our car at a park and ride lot, and then head to the airport. Our flight leaves about 6:45 PM.

10 Days to go

Can't believe we're leaving in 10 days. Today I converted some US currency to British Pounds and Euro. The exchange rate is really bad. They say London is one of the most expensive cities in the world and I'm starting to understand why. Hopefully we can get through it without spending too much.

We still only have 2 tickets to swimming. There have been a few tickets that have sold through Ebay for the same event. It's outrageous that they are going for 5 times the face value. It makes me mad that people buy them just so that they can resell them for a profit. I understand the free market system but I wish someone could develop a way to prevent that from happening. I'm still not sure what we're going to do. It may be that we'll have to wait until the last minute...which is totally opposite from my comfort zone.

The picture above is of the Lee Valley Whitewater Centre where the Canoe Slalom event will take place. It's a manmade whitewater course that should be fun to see.

By the way, I've had some panic dreams about the trip recently. In one of the dreams, Jill got sidetracked by a perfume store at the airport and I couldn't find her. The plane ended up driving down a neighborhood street with cars on the shoulder as we were waiting for her. It's so odd to wake up mad at someone even though they didn't do anything. It's totally doesn't make any sense but if we happen to go by a perfume store at one of the airports, I may need to get between Jill and the perfume.....