We were back in London again, this time for about 5 days.
The first couple of days were basically down days. We did a lot of laundry and just chilled, mostly because it was raining. Our WiFi was terrible so we visited Costa coffee and McDonalds to use their WiFi. I needed to print some of our train tickets so I visited an internet cafe. Didn’t realize those were still so prevalent but they are.
We took a “Classic London” bus tour. It was a great way to get an overview of not only the city but of the history. Our tour guide was so funny. We’ve had really great luck with tour guides. But, I guess you have to have a good personality to do that job. Big Ben is under construction so we really didn’t get to see it but we got a good overview.
Of course we walked through Picadilly Circus, where the highlight was seeing a Shawn Mendez billboard. Then to Trafalgar square. Buckingham Palace was definitely a must do but Prince Charles’s voice was so funny. He is definitely very English and very hoity toity. I didn’t realize he was so charitable. He’s really done a lot for young artists in his country and around the world. No pictures were allowed inside so we just took a quicky outside.
Westminster Abbey was definitely a highlight. The concept of having all those people buried inside was definitely weird to me. Royalty is crowned there and people are married there and then people are buried there. Hmmmm, just strange to me but that’s just me. We did see Stephen Hawking’s placque there. He was the last person to be buried there right next to Issac Newton – or right below, I guess. Obviously, we couldn’t take pictures there either. We saw a Chinese guy try to take a picture and the priest told him not to. Then once we walked up to it Justin pulled out his phone. I had to not so gently remind him of the rules. We just saw that Chinese guy get scolded!!! He totally forgot.
The kids and I took a trip up the London Eye. It was just one of those things we had to do. It was really cool experience but I wished it had gone a little faster.
Last night in London and we had to try Nando’s. It’s all over the UK and apparently some YouTubers talk about it a lot so Jayden really wanted to eat there. It’s basically Chicken seasoned with peri- peri, a type of pepper that some South African’s brought from Mozambique back to Johannesburg. I thought it was pretty good but I really like spicy stuff so it satisfied my appetite. Of course we ate more Indian food and finally had some Thai, which we had been seeing all over our travels, even in Greenland.
Trafalgar Square:
Tower Bridge. Most people mistake this for London Bridge.
Ruins of old Roman walls and London Tower. The Beefeaters and their families live in London Tower. The first woman Beefeater was installed in 2007 and the second was installed last year in 2017.
Buckingham Palace, changing of the guards, ice cream @ Buckingham Palace, and a unicorn!
Westminster Abbey
Picadilly Circus…Jayden’s highlight. Then we discovered that Shawn Mendez was actually at that exact spot two days later. Missed him by “that” much! Of course, we had to get M&Ms.
London Eye and the views from it. There is a lot of construction going on all over the UK.
Sites from around London – a mix of the old and the new.
What is the deal with the trash?! They really do need to have dumpsters! We were told to just put our trash out on the sidewalk the evening before trash collection. I didn’t like that but what else do we do with the trash????
There were also homeless – or roughsleepers — but, coming from San Diego, it was really nothing.
Well, we will see you in Croatia next time!!!
Higman Travels 