Last Day in London

Our visit to London has gone quite well.  We had a quiet morning today before heading to our Afternoon Tea on the Thames River.   We had sandwiches, scones, and some sweets, along with plenty of tea as we took a  1 1/2 hour cruise up the Thames River, well past the Parliament buildings, before returning to our dock.  It was neat to see London from the river as you get a different perspective on the buildings than you do riding a bus or walking. The upper pictures are of our boat and our tray of goodies.  Below are two of the MANY pictures we took while sailing on the river, namely the London Eye and the Parliament Buildings. But we also took pictures of the Big Ben's tower, The Tower Bridge, The Shard, and Battersea Power plant among others.
Remember you can click any picture to see a larger version. 

This evening we are getting ready for the start of the cruise tomorrow.  We have a car coming in the morning to drive us to Southhampton to head out on the Sapphire Princess.  If you want to see where we are you can always check out the Bridge Cams link.   

Day 3 in Sightseeing in London

We had a nice visit to Kensington Palace this morning.  Rain was forecast for all day, but we missed most of the showers, and only had a little light rain.  Since we arrived before it opened we enjoyed a nice walk through the gardens.  Inside the Palace was a special exhibit honoring Queen Victoria, since she was born 200 years ago. 

This was our second visit here, and we enjoyed it as much as the first time.  The Victoria exhibits kept reminding us of scenes from the PBS special we've been watching for 3 seasons now.  It was amazing to see how many of Victoria's actual garments and accessories they had on display.  The tv program really did a good job of casting her husband, Alfred, and the young Victoria.

Our next stop was Harrod's.  We like going there to be amazed by the size and breadth of a mainline department store.  Who knew there were that many lines of perfume, purses, etc even existed!  We also have a tradition of buying lunch there which we kept alive again on this visit. There is nowhere to eat the lunch there (only take away) so we brought our sandwiches back to our hotel (it was very nice to have a bus that dropped us off near to our hotel. No long walk back from a tube station!).

This evening we went to a concert of Haydn and Mozart music at St Martins of the Fields church on Trafalgar Square.  They have a great restaurant called The Cafe in the Crypt, located under the church where burials took place a long time ago.  We have eaten there before and could not wait to try it again.  We both had Fish and Chips with mushy peas (Mary gave me hers), which was excellent.  The concert was a string ensemble with a flute and they played beautifully.

Tomorrow we can sleep in before enjoying Afternoon Tea on the Thames. After that it's time to pack up and get ready for our cruise.  

Windsor Castle

Today we had one objective - Visit Windsor Castle - which we accomplished and had a very good time.  We enjoyed the tube and train ride to Windsor and were VERY glad we had pre-booked and printed tickets which took us right to the security entrance, bypassing some very long lines. 

Unfortunately no photos are allowed inside the castle nor inside St George's chapel (where the Harry/Meghan wedding was held) so I only have a few outside pictures to post.   After visiting the castle we walked around town and enjoyed a traditional Cornwall Pasty for lunch. YUM!
After lunch and some shopping we caught the train back to London and to our hotel.  After 15,000 steps yesterday and another 9,000 today, we are looking forward to a quiet evening and a couple of less strenuous days.

Tomorrow is Kensington Palace in the morning and a Haydn concert at St Martin of the Fields in the evening. 

First Day in London

Well, today we had  good plan, but then reality set in.  The one event I did not pre-book tickets for was the Winston Churchill War Rooms.  Big Mistake.  We arrived there just after 10:00 and were told there was a long wait.  Well by 11:30 the line was still quite long and we feared missing our scheduled time at The Shard so we decided to leave and pre-book tickets for later in the week  So we walked around St James Park for a while where we observed the pelicans, then headed for The Shard.

On our way, we passed Big Ben.  You may have heard that it is being renovated.  We hoped we could still see it, but no way, as you can tell from this picture.  There is no part of this famous clock that remains visible.

After a ride on the Tube we bought lunch from a street vendor then took a picture of The Shard from the London Bridge. The Shard is the highest  observation platform in London.  We rode to the top and spent quite a while taking in the view from over 800 feet high.  This was a great alternative to riding The London Eye for a third time.  Here you can see The Eye and Buckingham palace from atop The Shard.

Since we finished earlier than expected, we headed back to our room for a bit before going to Westminster Abbey for Evensong.  We love going to Evensong -- beautiful liturgy in a gorgeous setting makes for a special worship experience.  After a stop in the gift shop we had supper at a Chinese restaurant, then back to our hotel for the night.  We determined that we could do the War Room early Thursday afternoon but when I checked on pre buying tickets, only 1 ticket at 1:30 was available and none for Friday morning.   So we can scratch that activity from our plans.
After walking over 15,000 steps today we are hoping for a few less as we head to Windsor Castle tomorrow!

Travel Day

Today was our travel day to London. It was a nice relaxing day since our flight was not until 10:30 pm so we had some down time in the afternoon to make sure we had everything in order.   Our flight to London was smooth and uneventful. Being an overnight flight, we tried to sleep and both of us slept a bit, but not a lot.   Once there we cleared customs, picked up our luggage and caught a cab to our hotel.  Unfortunately we had to wait nearly 2 hours for our room, but we did get checked in and took a nap to make up for the lack of sleep on the plane.

After that we walked to the 3 Kings Pub for dinner. I had loaded Mac and Cheese with a London Pride beer while Mary had a chicken wrap. There is a lot of rain in this area today but fortunately we were able to get back to our hotel before it started raining hard.
Nothing much planned for tonight, just getting oriented to the time change and preparing for tomorrow when we are planning to visit the Churchill War rooms, followed by viewing London from the top of The Shard.   

A Fabulous Friday in London

We had a super day today, saw and did a lot, yet had plenty of time between events so we were not rushed.

The day started with a Buckingham Palace tour. We arrived early where we saw a small changing of the guard activity. They let us into the palace ahead of our scheduled time which helped us take our time and enjoy the self guided tour.  We enjoyed it more this time than the first, especially the new State Dinner display. It was fascinating to learn what it takes to prepare for and put on such an event.  Afterwards we had lunch on the Palace's terrace before visiting the gift shop and heading back to our hotel.

Next up was a very enjoyable afternoon tea on the Thames.  We each had our own pot of tea and were served a dozen finger sandwiches, followed by a tray of scones and sweets. It was very well paced as we traveled past the Houses of Parliament downriver, the London Eye, and the Tower Bridge on this 1 1/2 hour cruise before returning to our starting point.  It was very elegant and we felt very special to have experienced it.

Our last activity for the day - and in London - was a string ensemble concert at St Martin of the Fields, a church near Trafalgar Square.  They played 2 Brandenburg concertos, a Bach violin concerto, 2 Vivaldi numbers, and an intriguing Recorder Concerto.  What a great way to wrap up our visit.
Tomorrow is packing up and heading for the ship shortly after 10:00 am.  Sail away is at 4pm as we head to Norway on Monday. 

  

Our Favorite London Pub

Mary and I have come to enjoy this pub very much.  We eat here at least twice each time we visit London, after discovering it on our first visit.  It has great pub food and a lively atmosphere, as many locals frequent it.

Our Long Travel Day

The good news is we made it to London, a bit tired, but none the worse for wear.  We had 3 flights and it took close to 17 hours from our house to our London hotel.

Our first leg from Detroit to Toronto went well, We did get a big surprise in Toronto.  Our Economy Comfort tickets granted us access to the Iceland Air premium lounge!  We headed there and enjoyed a nice, free beef teriyaki supper with free beverages to boot! After eating we relaxed there until time for our 5+ hour flight to Reykjavik.   During this flight Mary got this cool  picture of the supermoon from the air.  Neither of us slept well on that flight in spite of the large seats but upon arrival is where the trip got interesting.

We had a scheduled 35 minutes between arrival and the start of boarding for the last leg to London. The plane arrived about 10 minutes late and there was no gate available so we had to be bussed to the terminal.  Once there we had to clear security again and the line was HUGE.  Fortunately we were at the head of our planeload of people. We finally cleared  that step and headed to our gate after boarding for our plane had begun. It was a bit stressful, but we made it OK.

Arrival in London was 1/2 hour late, but all we had to do was head to our hotel and we enjoyed the new Queen's terminal with typical lines for Customs.  We had  a great cabbie and virtually no traffic to get to our hotel.

Buckingham Palace

Today was our Buckingham Palace day and I am happy to report that it was better than expected. Not many pictures today since none are allowed within the palace.

It was raining this morning and there is no public transportation that gets you very close so I opted for a taxi and that was well worth it as he dropped us off right at the ticket booth. We arrived as it was opening so the lines were minimal. We toured many of the public areas of the castle: entrance ways, receiving rooms, dining rooms, a fabulous 50 meter long room containing Charles I art collection
featuring various Dutch and other masters including several paintings by Rembrandt. There was also an extensive exhibit about the 1952 Coronation. After some souvenir shopping at the gift shop we headed on to Harrod's.

Harrod's was fascinating! This one huge department store sells anything and everything. We visited the Christmas and Toy departments. The Toy department had several large Lego figures like this Santa Claus. They were demonstrating fake snow (add water to the powder and it turns into snow; after a few days it turns back to being a powder).  We were very tempted to buy some for our nephew's children, but knew the parents would probably not appreciate it.

We bought a sandwich for lunch there before catching the Tube back to our hotel. Fortunately the predicted heavy rain never materialized and we were able to walk back to our hotel from the subway stop without getting wet.
Tonight we're headed back to the Zetland Arms for supper, then packing up for our 10:30 pick-up for the ride to Dover and the Ocean Princess.

Sightseeing in London

Today we had a simple plan. See Kensington Castle, then ride the HoHo (hop on, hope off bus) around London and see what we wanted to do. Not many words today, but lots of pictures.

We really enjoyed Kensington castle. We were both amazed by the design and quality of the displays.  It was like taking 3 mini-tours to see the Kings quarters, Queen's quarters, and then the modern dresses.  The first picture from the King's quarters shows the formal dining room.

 The next is a sample of dresses worn by Princess Di. They also had several cases of dresses worn by the Queen as well as Princess Margaret.

After that we decided to ride The Eye once again on our way around the HoHo route. These three pictures were taken from The Eye. The first is Buckingham Palace followed by St Paul's and Big Ben with Westminster Abbey in the background.

After the Eye, we rode the rest of the route on a very hot and humid, but sunny London day. We enjoyed seeing places like 10 Downing Street, Trafalgar Square, St Paul's Cathedral, and many more London fixtures. We made it back to our hotel by 5, with ample time to cool off before heading out for dinner at our favorite pub, the Zetland Arms. We took The Tube (subway) to St Martin of the Fields for a baroque music concert featuring Vivaldi's Four Seasons and several other numbers like Pachabel's Canon in D. The string ensemble (accompanied by a harpsichord) was excellent! Walking back at 10:00 at night through a vibrant neighborhood with very busy restaurants was an unusual experience.

Rain is expected tomorrow but our only planned activity is Buckingham Palace and lunch at Harrod's, then getting ready to head to the Ocean Princess Saturday morning.

Bill Schott

Traveling to London

The good news is we had a smooth travel day today, all travel aspects worked out as planned.

 This picture is of our in flight monitor on the back of the seat in front of us so we could track our progress.
The plane was on time, we cleared British customs in under 20 minutes, and we were met by our driver at the airport for a nice drive through  the city to our hotel where our room was ready.
Since our biological clocks are a bit off, we skipped the pub and just had a burger for lunch at a nearby restaurant we ate at our last time here in 2011.

After a short nap to make up for lost sleep last night we headed to Westminster Abbey for Evensong, a nice 30 minute liturgical service. The service was a bit light on chanting and music since the Lay Vicars have Wednesday off so we sang a hymn instead.
After that we saw The Eye, a large Ferris wheel on the Thames river. Before heading back to the Tube (subway) and not being very hungry yet we spotted a pancake vendor. I had Nutella and bananas while Mary had cheese and mushrooms. The thin pancake was about 18" in diameter and was served folded and rolled up in a paper cup. It was the strangest way we ever ate a pancake!
We're now back in the hotel, resting up for our day of sightseeing tomorrow.

London Picture Album

I've prepared an album with some of our London pictures. Still working on the cruise pictures.
Click "Slideshow" in the top left to see all.

Bye-Bye, London

Just had to post one last picture from London. We had a great time and enjoyed the great transportation system (even if some trains and busses were pretty packed) and fortunately had great weather. So now its on to phase II of our trip - a 12 day cruise around the British Isles on the Crown Princess. Due to internet connectivity, I won't be posting as many pictures (upload speed is notoriously bad), but still plan a daily entry. So stay tuned for more updates as we visit Normandy, Scotland, Irelend, Liverpool, and Gurnsey Island.

Our Third day in London

Today was a beautiful day in London! Sunny, warm and we accomplished everything we wanted - and more!
Our day started with heading to the London Eye with Gail, Kathy and Judy (the three John Denver friends we are cruising with).
The Eye was very cool! A nice smooth ride up and over London. We purchased Flexi Fast Passes so we could arrive at any time and get priority boarding - that worked out very well. We got some great pictures from The Eye like this one with Parliament and Big Ben in the background. We also got pictures of St Paul's, Buckingham Palace, and other London attractions.

After that we took a boat ride on the Themes to the Tower of London. The Tower was very impressive with some very ancient parts and quite the history. We started out on the Beefeater tour, but it was going rather slow and the main attraction was the Crown Jewels so we cut out on our own with Rick Steves' Pocket London tour notes.
The Tower is famous for it's torture and executions and we saw some of the torture equipment and many tales of famous executions before heading to the Crown Jewels. There was quite a line, but it moved fast. The Jewels were very impressive, including the Coronation Crown (that is only worn for 20 minutes) and many other crowns, scepters, orbs, challices, patens, and regal paraphernalia.
Next on our list was Buckingham Palace. It was very impressive to see the balcony where William and Kate stood for their famous kisses.
We noticed the Royal Mews was nearby and we had free admission so we stopped in. The Mews contained the Royal coaches that were used for various purposes including the Australia Coach and the Coronation Coach.
That wrapped up our day and our London sightseeing. Tomorrow we head to the Crown Princess to begin our cruise!