London Sights

We spent three days doing the "tourist" thing with our girls (bought a 3-day London Pass for each of us). We took the hop-on, hop-off bus around the city to get an idea of the layout..this is always confusing because the buses double back on their route..but it does give an overview of things. Our experience in London was a little less enjoyable than in other cities because of the traffic. London is huge, full of traffic, and full of construction with closed lanes and detours. It would have been quicker just to walk the whole thing and, because of the many construction sites around the city, the bus routes don't actually go right by the sights in many cases. We'd purchased two days for the hop-on-hop-off, but at the end of one trip around, we had had enough.

We started our journey by the Tower of London, which isn't actually a tower, but rather a fortress castle built on the banks of the Thames in ancient times. We took a tour of the Tower later in the day, and I'll write more on that later. We hopped off at the London Eye and Ellie and I took a spin, while Chris and Kat chilled at Starbucks with a sweet treat. Kat and Chris both have a fear of heights and the Eye is high, so they passed on it. The Eye is like a giant bicycle wheel with pods attached that will hold up to 25 people each. The floor of each pod is always level and the pod rotates as the wheel slowly makes its way around. The views are pretty spectacular, and you will see several pictures in the slide show that follows.

At the end of the bus tour we departed, once again, at the Tower of London, and we got a free tour of the fortress from one of the "Beefeaters." The Beefeaters are retired military personnel..ours was a retired warrant officer who specialized as a crew chief of an RAF helicopter company. After 30 years in service, these men may apply for a position as a Beefeater and, if selected, are allowed to actually move into the Tower with their families and they receive free housing for the rest of their lives. Our guide said no one actually knows how they got the name Beefeaters, but they surmise that it was a reference to their diet improving upon being accepted into this elite Royal Guard unit which has been in existence since the middle ages. The tower actually houses the Royal family at times, especially when a coronation is about to take place, and there are apartments that are reserved for them. The guards that are stationed there also are housed there.

We got to see the part of the tower that was used as a prison, and you can see some of the graffiti that has been carved in the walls..some dating back to the 1500's. Lot's of famous prisoners have been housed here, including Mary Queen of Scots, Queen Anne Boleyn, and Sir Thomas Moore..who all lost their heads in the courtyard. There used to be a scaffold outside the prison that was capable of hanging dozens of prisoners at the same time, and it used to be quite a public spectacle. We learned the origin of a couple of sayings on this trip, as the prisoners used to be transported down the same road to their execution. The people along the road used to ply them with liquor as they made their way to the gallows, and this is where the term "one for the road" came from. The drivers, of course, were not allowed to drink alcohol, as they were "on the wagon." The gallows were reserved for the common criminals, while the more notable ones were usually executed via a block and axe in the more private setting of the castle courtyard. We did not stand in the very long line to see the crown jewels. If you want to see pictures of that, you can probably Google it!

Ellie and I also did the tour of the Tower Bridge which has been in it's current location for centuries. This is the iconic bridge which some enterprising investor thought he was buying when the "London Bridge" was purchased and relocated to Arizona. The London Bridge is a bit further down the river, and has had to be rebuilt many, many times, as it was made of wood and burned several times. The London Bridge used to have houses and shops built along its margins, and because of the traffic constantly bogging down on the bridge, the mayor of London decreed that all traffic should keep left. That is why the English drive on the left to this day. Anyway, the Tower Bridge has a glass floor on the upper part, and we took some pictures of us standing hundreds of feet above the traffic. Of course, Chris and Kat opted out of this experience, too. Too high!

Next, we visited Shakespeare's Globe Theater, which has been rebuilt on about the same site as the original and is as near to the original as they could make it. It is an "outdoor" theater, having no roof over the central courtyard. The stage and the audience seats are covered by a thatched roof, which had to be especially approved as thatch has been outlawed since all the massive fires that have devastated London over the years. These fires are why you don't see many Tudor style buildings still standing..not that they weren't sturdy, but that they are prone to be destroyed by fires. There was a new play in rehearsal while we were on our tour, and they didn't allow any photographing, but you can see what the inside looks like if you Google it. It only holds 1500 people, but they all get pretty good views, and it is a great way to see a play.

On our walk along the river, we came across a young man who was offering to write a poem for "whatever you feel it is worth," so Chris hired him to write a poem to Ellie (who had elected to stay home with a queasy stomach), which he did, as follows:

Ellie Rose

Each life

lived

is eccentric--

Ruminations

on singular

excellence.

At first, I thought it was worth about the one pound we paid for it. On reflection, however, it is a pretty fitting poem for our dear Ellie, and may be priceless one day. Who knows?

I got in to see three art museums this week. The first was the Tate Modern. This is really filled with contemporary art, which is not my favorite, but I included a couple of shots of some of the ones that made a little sense to me. Then we happened into a small watercolor and etching gallery where I saw a few things that I really liked. Then we went to the Queens Gallery Collection which featured some classical Scottish painters. My favorite of all of them was an oil of some haystacks. The light is so perfect in that painting, it really moved me..not the subject so much as the skill to capture the mood, so look out for that one.

On the last day of our 3-day Pass, we visited Windsor Castle, which is the home of the Royals and another "working castle." We got to tour through rooms full of ancient furnishings (called the Queen's State Rooms), but we were restricted for security reasons from taking any photos because the royal family actually lives there now. My overall impression, having seen the Louvre and Versailles, and the Spanish Royal quarters in Madrid, is that the English court had a much more "lived in" feel, and was a little less ostentatious than the French. The Spanish had the feel of faded fortune..not quite as well taken care of as either the French or British.

Here is a slide show to chronicle our visit: