London

We started our visit to London the evening of 11/16 by wandering around lost (forgot to find our hostel on the map or get directions to it), but a quick visit to an internet cafe and 2.3 miles of walking later, we were checking into our hostel.

The next morning, we ventured onto the London subway (The Tube) and made our way to the city center. We walked out of the subway exit to a spectacular view of Big Ben and the British Parliament building. We walked around Westminster Abbey, but it was closed due to the Queen and the Duke´s 60th wedding anniversary party to be held the coming Monday. We wandered to Buckingham Palace, where we caught about 1/2 of the Changing of the Guard. All I know is that for 2 short people, even in the tourist off-season of winter, it was hard as hell to see anything. But, we watched and listened as best we could without me climbing up on Emily´s back to see (my idea!).

That afternoon, we took a flight on the London Eye. The London Eye is a huge, canti-levered ferris wheel rising some crazy amount of meters (135?) above the ground and providing spectacular views of the city (some examples in the London photo album). It lasted about 1/2 an hour, and was worth the touristy-price and long queue.

The next day, we went to the Tate Modern art museum, which was a lot of fun and a learning experience for both of us, as we do not know a great deal about art. There were Andy Warhol pieces, and I´ve at least heard a thing or two about him, so I felt good.

The Tower of London, the home of the Crown Jewels, was up next. This castle has a fantastic history of executions. When the floor of the cathedral was being refurbished in the 1800´s, they noticed that there were many uneven parts. This was due to unmarked graves collapsing/compacting. They dug them all up, and estimated that that were 1500 bodies worth! These were put into 2 big lead boxes, and put into the rebuilt brick wall, still unmarked. The jewels were interesting, but so overdone that it was hard to see them as real jewels, as they looked like childrens´playthings. There was a 530 carat diamond in the Queen´s sceptor, and that was nice.

We went through the National Gallery, looking at paintings from 1250 to 1900. There were many, many famous paintings, some of which we´ve seen copies of before. All in all, it was about 4 hours long, and Emily and I agreed that if we never see another version of "Rest on the Flight Into Egypt" again, it will be too soon!

We were able to tour the Westminster Abbey on Tuesday, the 20th. English Kings´ tombs from as early as the 1400´s, Britian´s oldest door (from 1050, and looking pretty solid still), and a Roman sarcophogus dug from under the Abbey which was dated to sometime in the 4th century were a couple of the many interesting parts.

One of the nights (they are all starting to blur together already), we stumbled in to a free Flamenco guitar show. Flamenco guitar, for those who don´t know, is played with all five fingers instead of the thumb or a pick.