There's no place like London

Emily is pointing to the Golden Gallery at the top of St. Paul's Cathedral. It is hard to believe we were all the way up there!A picture through a "peep hole" right before we got to the Golden Gallery. The white rectangle on the brown surface at the top is the altar (about 10 feet long). If you enlarge it, you can see tiny people down there.

Happy Fourth George (Cornwallis) - also at St. Paul's.

Looking across the River Thames (from the top of St. Paul's). You can see the Millennium Bridge and the Tate Modern (Art Museum)

Emily reading under a tree in Hyde Park

Here we are outside the V&A.

Here is our TINY bedroom. I'm literally in the hall, and Emily's right hand is about 3 inches from the other wall that you can't see. We do have a matching TINY bathroom in the room.

Emily enjoying our scrumptious meal at Jenny Lo's Teahouse.

Our homage to all the Japanese (and other Asian) tourists. They do the peace sign in all their pictures. Emily is standing at the gate where you meet for the Ceremony of the Keys.

Our Yeoman Warder (or YeoWOman) at the Tower of London. This is during the day, not during the Ceremony of the Keys.

London. Wow. I knew that it would be different, but…wow. It is strangely huge and small all at the same time. In case you weren’t aware, we are now in our final days of the trip and we have arrived in the capital city of the British Empire – London. We got here yesterday around noon at Kings Cross Station (North London) and took a ride in authentic London Black Cab to our lovely little hotel, The Cherry Court Hotel, near Victoria Station (South London). As you can see from the picture, our room is not small – it is TINY. But it is very comfortable and it a great location, so we are enjoying it. We aren’t here to spend time in our room anyway!

After checking in, we then went to Victoria Station and stood in a 30 minute queue to buy our Seven-day Oyster Cards (don’t know why they are called that) which enables us to use the Tube and Bus systems as many times as we want for a week. They cost £24 each, but considering a single, one time ticket costs £4, it is a great deal. By the end of day one, we had already used £12 if we had been using single tickets, so it will definitely be worth the investment. After getting our tickets and some baguettes for lunch, we took the District Line on the Tube to The Victoria & Albert Museum in South Kensington. Like most things in London, it was pretty awesome. We saw some Raphael paintings, plaster casts of almost every famous sculpture, English Royal Tomb, and famous monument from across Europe (including Michelangelo’s David), and Emily’s favorite part – a fashion exhibit. There were dresses from the 1700s to today. It was really interesting to see the evolution. There looked to be a really cool exhibit on the Supremes as well, but it cost extra so we “gave it a miss” as Graeme (our host in Chipping Campden) would say.

After a couple of hours at the V&A, we found Holy Trinity Brompton where we are going to church on Sunday, and then walked down the street to Harrods. Let me just say that Are You Being Served? is not at all a representation of this store. It is unfathomable how many square feet it occupies. You walk in and continue to go from room to room, to room, and then you go up a flight and start over. They have everything from an Armani room to modern furniture to a pizzeria and ice cream counter. You can even buy your groceries there – though I can’t really imagine doing so. The term overwhelming springs to mind – and it takes a lot to overwhelm me. We did go all the way up and then back down the famous Egyptian escalator and suitably rolled our eyes at the groups of tourists mobbing and taking pictures of the Dodi and Diana memorial.

After leaving Harrods, we made our way back to the Cherry Court and rested for a little bit before heading for Jenny Lo’s Teahouse. It was absolutely wonderful. It will probably be one of the only restaurants we visit twice. Fortunately it is located about a five minute walk from our front door. After dinner, we got back on the District Line and went all the way to Tower Hill for the Ceremony of the Keys. By taking the Tube, it makes you feel like you are right there by your hotel, even though 200 years ago we be considered to be in a different city entirely! We got there a little early and walked across the Tower Bridge and took some pictures. The Ceremony itself was impressive to say the least. We waited at the gate for the Yeoman Warder to come and collect us (we estimated about 40 or so had tickets). He called out our names and then we were let in (we were second on the list and had to make the rest of them move to let us through – kind felt like we were important). It was also neat to think that here we were across an ocean from home and this gentleman has our name on his paper, waiting for us – pretty neat. Anyway, once inside, he walked us through the ceremony before taking his leave to take part in it. According to the officials, it has been happening every night at 10 o’clock for around 700 years! Wow again! Like all things British it had a lot of Pomp – but not too much circumstance. The guards were all in the traditional red and black uniforms with the black fuzzy hat and they did the traditional marching. We watched them close and lock the outer two gates before watching a solemn marking of the occasion with marching and a bugler (who was really a drummer – and it showed). Since you can’t take pictures, it is really hard to describe how cool it was – especially since there were only 40 of us that got to be there. Part of the mystique is that you can tell that they were doing the ceremony for its own sake (not ours) and we just happened to be allowed to watch. Supposedly the only time that the ceremony was late was during WWII when a bomb dropped in the middle of the tower. According to our host, they cleared away the debris and performed the ceremony six minutes late and then telegraphed the King to apologize for their tardiness. Not sure if that is true, but I wouldn’t put it past the Brits!

So – that was day one. I’ll be more succinct about our adventures today. Originally we were going to go to the British Museum, but the weather said today was going to be great weather, but the rest of the weekend calls for rain. So we decided to do our most “outdoor” day today and move the museums for rainy days. So we found ourselves BACK on the District Line on our way back to Tower Hill this morning to see the rest of the Tower of London (we pretty much have the District Line figured out). We took the Yeoman Warder tour and it was fantastic; lots of fun and gory stories describing the history of the fortress. I was again struck with a complete sense of awe, however, when thinking about the fact that you are standing in the same place were Anne Boleyn walked into the Tower – or Henry VIII – or Elizabeth I – take your pick. When you grow up around Disney World where everything is recreated, it is just mind-boggling to be standing there where it really happened. She walked through that door – right there – on those stones! We also went through the Bloody Tower where Edward V and his brother (both boys – Edward 12, his brother 10 I think) were murdered by their uncle, who eventually became Richard III. We were standing in the room where it happened – amazing and creepy all at once. Of course, no trip to the tower is complete without a trip to see the Crown Jewels. I’ve used amazing, awesome, mind-boggling all too much – but they all apply. To look at the size of the stones and know – THEY ARE REAL! What can you say? Wow. That is about it.

After the Tower we took the District Line two stops back to St. Paul’s Cathedral. Guess what? Get ready. Prepare yourself. Here it comes……. WOW! What an ENORMOUS building! Compared to other churches in Britain, there haven’t really been that many hugely historical events take place here – but the shear immensity of the place is overpowering enough. Add to that its presence after the bombing in WWII and it stands as symbol of British resilience. However, considering that the only two royal marriages to take place here were Catherine of Aragon to Arthur (Henry’s older brother who died), and Charles to Diana, I’m not thinking it is that great a venue for future occasions of the like. The organist was practicing – making you feel the presence of God. We walked around in wonderment, then walked all the way to the Golden Gallery at the very top of the Dome. Emily is pointing to it in one of the pictures I uploaded. We have now climbed our last tower – but it was worth it. Once we made it back to ground level, we sat for about 30 minutes and just took it all in and rested. We happened to be sitting between the statues of Admiral Nelson and General Cornwallis. We couldn’t help sneaking a picture of Cornwallis (who lost the Battle of Yorktown to Washington and in effect lost the Colonies), since were in the Cathedral on July 4. We thought it was interesting that they memorialized him considering that defeat, but apparently, he won most of the rest of his battles.

After St. Paul’s, we went across the Millennium Bridge to the Tate Modern (Art Museum). We didn’t stay too long, but there were some interesting exhibits. I enjoyed several pieces that had to do with the use of space (i.e. architecture) - are you surprised? I thought not. We then took the – you got it – District Line – back home and went to dinner at a pub. We’ve become real fans of Cider and Perry (Pear Cider). I hope we can find it at home. After dinner, we took the District Line two stops down and the changed to the Piccadilly Line (gotcha – didn’t see that coming!) to Hyde Park (no there were no blue plate specials). We then relaxed in the park for about an hour. Emily read while I went around taking pictures and listening to my iPod. We also took this journey to familiarize ourselves with the District/Piccadilly exchange since we’ll be doing it in the morning during rush hour to go to Leicester Square to buy some half price tickets to a show on the West End tomorrow night. Emily will let you know tomorrow how that goes.

For now, I think it is time for bed. After writing this all out, I can see now why I’m so tired. I didn’t realize we had done so much already! Anna, I hope you’re ready for two very tired people to meet you at the airport Tuesday, because at this rate we will be sleeping for two days when we get back. But it will be worth it. Sorry this one is so long – but there is so much to see and do!

Only three days left! :) :(

Cheers for now!

-Cary

PS The title of this entry comes from a line from a song in Sweeney Todd.