We stayed in a small one-bedroom 'serviced apartment' that got new towels and light housekeeping every day. Ellie slept on a cot in the living room. With the kitchen, we were able to save money on breakfast and some suppers--besides just having a very relaxing, home-like place to return every night.This photo, taken from our balcony, shows how close the South Kensington tube stop was; there was a grocery two short blocks away.
The road construction at the crosswalk only occasionally made it scary to cross. London helpfully paints "Look left" or "Look right" instructions on the pavement at every crosswalk, so all the foreigners know which way to look for oncoming traffic.
Ellie got to the apartment first, and we showed up about half-hour later.
We were astounded by the number of chimneys on the rooftops of London. The tower is the top of the Victoria & Albert museum. |
| Gardening is done in the smallest of places, like this window across the street, with the most extravagant results. We were impressed with London horticulture. |
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| We went first to the Tower of London. This photo is in front of the Tower Bridge. I was surprised by the baby-blue paint. |
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| We did not take as many pictures as we might have. Much of the structure was covered with scaffolding, plastic sheeting, and a big poster advertising the armor exhibit for the 500th anniversary of Henry VIII's ascension. That got to be an irritant--Henry VIII was all over everywhere, and I think he is over-rated. In my opinion, both his father and his younger daughter were better monarchs. The filled-in moat is now used for shows. |
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| For a six-day trip, we experienced remarkably few irritants. English maps were the exception. Ellie was relentless is trying to figure them out, as you can see from her face, as we tried to figure out which way to go when we entered the Tower of London. |
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| The Yeomen Warders show you around the Tower. It's apparently a highly select profession, but involves much more theater than history or security, as far as I could tell. |
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| The Tower was the only place where the crowd really got in the way of seeing the sights. Of course, this was also when our jet lag was at its worst. Still, we quickly learned the English reflexive "Sorry." "Sorry." "Sorry." when you bump into someone. |
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| Prisoners arrived by boat from the Thames through'Traitors' Gate.' |
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| The guide and all the material stressed the Tower's bloody past, but within there were peaceful gardens, a nice chapel, and ruins of Roman walls. |
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| Buy an Oyster card, and you can go anywhere by tube, bus, or light
rail--unless you use a wheelchair. There is clearly no ADA in Britain:
we were taken aback by how inaccessible everything was, from all the
stairs to the uneven sidewalks. But if you do not use a wheelchair, the tube is great. Fast, goes everywhere, easy to figure out (especially with Ellie's help to know how to know which lines are down.) |
No pictures from our next stop, the Treasures of the British Library, but we got to see * Captain Scott's Diary
* Handel's Messiah
* the Magna Carta
* Shakespeare's First Folio;
* the Codex Sinaiticus;
* and more.
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| Here is Platform 9 3/4 at Kings Cross station. I think this is so clever. I need to ask Ellie how she found it; it's appropriately tucked away with no signs pointing the way there. |
Speaking of Harry Potter, we arrived at rain-soaked Leicester Square just in time to catch the the end of the ceremonies for the World Premiere of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Apparently, there had been some torrential rains while we were in the library.
Big lights, banners, red carpet, jumbotron. It was glitzy and exciting even in the rain.
We got glimpses of Rupert Grint (Ron Weasly) and Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) but did not snap our cameras fast enough.
The photo of the soggy stars is from the internet; it's the picture that we did not get. But then again, they did not get our picture, either.On to Day Two...
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