08.03.10 - London: Day 6

Can I first just say that WOW I'm sorry it has taken so long for me to finish my London blogs! The last few days were jam-packed with activities and I didn't feel much like blogging after all the flights home. And then, I just plain forgot! But here is the next installment of my London posts:


I got up at 8:10am this morning and left the hotel half an hour later. We had breakfast at the Café Spread Deli. I had a sesame seed bagel with cream cheese and freshly squeezed orange juice. We got to the Westminster Abbey at 9:45am and toured it for two hours. There was an audio tour here as well. Westminster Abbey has been here since 960AD (at which point it was a Benedictine monastery) and the building that stands there now was built in the 13th century. Every coronation since 1661 has been held here, as well as a number of weddings and funerals. There are many many MANY tombs here of royalty, poets, and other famous/important people. There is a memorial for Franklin Roosevelt, and it is the only memorial in the place for a non-Brit.

Among the royal tombs I saw were King Henry III (died 1272), King Edward I (1307), King Edward III (1377), King Richard II (1400), King Henry V (1422), Elizabeth of York (wife of King Henry VII – 1503), King Henry VII (1509), Queen Elizabeth I, Queen Mary I, and Mary Queen of Scots. Geoffrey Chaucer was the first literary figure to be buried of memorialized at the Abbey. He was later joined by William Shakespeare, George Frederick Handel, and others of the like. There is a memorial for Winston Churchill, the Unknown Warrier, and Sir Isaac Newton.

After we finished the tour of the Abbey, we walked towards Big Ben/Parliament and started looking for a place to eat. We ate lunch at Pizza Express at noon. I got the “American” pizza – pepperoni and onions! After lunch, we did some shopping on Oxford St. Hello H&M and Urban Outfitters :) We also went in the HUGE Nike store and heard Party in the USA playing! That was a highlight of my day :) After shopping, we went to Costa Coffee to get off our feet for a bit, then my dad and I headed back to the hotel while my mom and sister finished shopping. We had several hours at the hotel to relax before dinner at 7:00pm.

Dinner was at a seafood restaurant called Bentleys. It was VERY posh. My dad wore a suit and the girls all wore fancy (cocktail length) dresses with wraps/shawls (aka our scarves stretched out to their full width.. who knew they could be so versatile?) My mom, sister, and I all got steamed lobster, which was DELISH! Seriously, it was awesome. That’s probably the best meal so far. I had a brownie and ice cream for dessert. Our sommelier was French, but he knew all about American football (he lived in Florida for a bit a few years ago) so we had great conversation with him about the Cowboys :) He gave us a bottle of champagne on the house down in the bar after dinner where we continued our convo with him about the Cowboys and the Dolphins (his fav team). All in all, dinner lasted 3 ½ hours! We got back to the hotel at about 10:45pm! I skyped with Joel (for the 3rd night in a row!) and typed up my journal before bed at 12:45pm.

Tomorrow: St. Paul’s cathedral and the Tate Modern Museum!

08.02.10 - London: Day 5

CAUTION: LONG POST AHEAD!

I woke up at 7:15am and left the hotel about an hour later. We had breakfast at a place called “Eat”, which is a chain all over town. We have seen so many of these restaurants, but today was the first time we actually ate at one. It was good. I had a cinnamon roll and the first GOOD coffee of the trip! 

We went to Leicester Square (pronounced “Lester” square) to get Oliver! tickets from TKTS (half price day-of theatre tickets) but they didn’t open until 10:00 so we headed to the Tower of London. As we were walking to the tube station, we saw the London version of Hollywood Blvd. Of course, I had to take my picture with Jude Law's handprints!

 

The Tower of London also didn’t open until 10:00 so we waited in line (“the queue”) for half an hour until they opened. It was a good thing we did, because we only beat the crowd by like 10 minutes. By the time we went in, the queue was probably about 75 people deep.While we were waiting, we took pictures :)

                                     Tower of London in the background >>

 

 the building that houses the Crown Jewels (left) and the guard in front (right)

We headed straight for the Crown Jewels exhibit, which turned out to be another good move. We went straight in, but by the time we came out, the queue was a solid 2 hours long! I’m about to give you a ton of information on this exhibit, so if you aren’t interested in the history, skip on down a few paragraphs :)

There were no photos allowed in this particular exhibit, but I bought post cards of two of my favorite (and also most famous) artifacts. There was a small room with random things in it (I can’t even remember now what was there) that we walked through before entering the Treasury Vault. It is the most secure area in the Tower of London. The doors weighed TONS, literally, but I don’t recall how many tons exactly. The first crown we saw was St. Edward’s Crown, the one used for all coronations since 1661. It is the purple one most of you will probably recognize. There are two cross arches over the top with all kinds of precious stones in the metal part of the crown. It weighs about 5 pounds, and that’s AFTER it was made lighter a few centuries ago! This crown is used only for coronations. When the next man/woman is crowned King/Queen, this is the crown placed upon their head. It is worn for a very short time, and it not worn in the procession out of Westminster Abbey (there is another crown for the processional, which I’ll discuss later).

The next item was my other favorite: the Sceptre used at coronations. It holds a 530.2ct diamond of perfect clarity. The scepter was made in 1661, but the diamond was not added until 1910. It is called the “First Star of Africa” and is one of nine stones cut from the Cullinan Diamond (named for the man who owned the mine it is from). It is the largest cut diamond of perfect clarity in the world. Something else I learned is that there CAN be a King and Queen at the same time, but the Queen is actually called a Queen Consort. This occurs is the King (or Prince, at the time) is married before his coronation. In these cases, both the King and his wife are crowned and the lady is crowned as a Queen Consort. If there is a lady being crown Queen (royal by birth) who is married before her coronation, her husband is still only a Prince. A Queen Consort gets her own crown and scepter.

The Imperial State Crown is the crown worn after coronation for the procession out of Westminster Abbey. It is also worn every year at the state opening of Parliament. There are 2868 diamonds in this crown, including the Second Star of Africa, which is a mere 317.4 ct diamond (ha!). It was also cut from the Cullinan Diamond. Another interesting fact is that the crowns of Kings and Queens have 2 arches that cross over each other (one arch going sideways across the head, and the other crosses over it going from front to back), but the Princes’ and Princesses’ crowns only have one arch (sideways) to distinguish them from the King/Queen.

The next exhibit was of banquetware (plates, serving bowls, salt holders, etc.) that was used in coronation banquets before the tradition of ending coronations with a banquet was changed to the current practice of ending with Holy Communion. There was a “punch bowl” that was self standing (about 30” tall from the ground) made of pure gold, and large enough to hold 144 bottles of wine!

In the next room was the Imperial Crown of India. In 1911, George V visited India. As coronation regalia never leave the UK, this crown was made for him to wear while in India. It has never been worn since.

After leaving the building that housed the Crown Jewels, we walked past a set of Tudor style homes with a large lawn/terrace in the middle. The homes lines two sides of the park-like grassy area, and the entrances to these homes were guarded. These are the homes of Tower officials and their families. On a side note, I LOVE the Tudor-style look! The houses were adorable!

<< Tudor house compound

                         below: Traitor's Gate

We walked back to where we entered, where we picked up our audio guides. Seriously, any city with large amounts of tourism should invest in audio guides. I love them! We started at Traitor’s Gate, which is located under St. Thomas’ Tower (more about the tower later). It was originally called Water Gate because the Thames River was right up against the walls of the fortress. This gate was an entrance from the river into the compound. It became known as Traitor’s Gate because this was the entrance used to bring in those on trial for treason. Four queens entered through these gates, and all were later found guilty of treason. Included in these four was Anne Boleyn. Traitors were put into a boat with the executioner and taken down the river for all to see. They were met by a jailer at Traitor’s Gate and taken to a cell within the Tower of London.

Just inside the compound behind Traitor’s Gate is the Bloody Tower. Many murders occurred here, including those of two young princes. I can’t remember who their father was, but he was a King living at the Tower of London. He died while his sons were still very young. One day, they disappeared and were never again seen alive. Apparently, someone thought they were much too young to become King, so they were murdered. Once their bodies were found (some 2 years later), they were moved to Westminster Abbey in caskets. The 700 year old drop gate to the Bloody Tower still works today. It weighs 2.5 tons!

Next, we entered the Lower Wakefield Tower. This is where prisoners were tortured until they confessed to the crimes brought against them. The three main types of torture were Scavenger’s Daughter, The Rack, and Manacles. In the Scavenger’s Body, prisoners were folded into thirds (calves to hamstrings, thighs to chest) and pinned down. This was the quickest way of getting results, even more so than The Rack. In The Rack, the prisoner was stretched out on a flat surface. His hands and feet were tied into the machine and were pulled in opposite directions until the bones popped out of socket. The last type of torture is manacles. Prisoners were hung 5-6 ft off the ground, suspended by their hands. It was not uncommon for fingers to fall off. Prisoners would often hang there for 5 or 6 hours at a time and were unable to use their hands for some time afterwards.

Next, we walked around the inner wall, which was dotted with other towers. Among these towers were: St. Thomas’s Tower (built by King Henry III and his son King Edward 1 in the 1200s), the main part of the Wakefield Tower (which served as a fortress), the Lanthorn Tower (pronounced “lan-torn”; it was built in the early 1200s, demolished in 1777, and rebuilt in the 19^th century), the Salt Tower, the Broad Arrow Tower (soldiers would fight and defend from this tower), and the Martin Tower (used as the Jewel House; the Crown Jewels were almost stolen from here – the only time theft was ever attempted of them; however, the King gave the perpetrator, Colonel Thomas Blood, a full pardon upon return of the jewels).

We then proceeded to the oldest and largest tower, the White Tower, located in the middle of the square. The White Tower was built in 1080 and is now home to the Royal Armoury. There is armour housed here on display from the time of King Henry VIII.

<< King Henry VIII's armour (and that of his horse)

After this, we were done with the Tower of London tour. We had spent almost 3 hours exploring it! It is one of my favorite stops so far (maybe my very favorite!), especially the Crown Jewels exhibit. I bought a few souvenirs from the gift shop, then we headed to lunch at a French restaurant, Café Rouge, where I had steak on a baguette. 

On the way there, we took pictures by the Tower Bridge, but we didn't get to go over it :(

        my dad and I in front of the Tower Bridge >>

 Next, we went back to TKTS to get tickets for Oliver! We had a bit of a rest at the hotel before heading out at 5:30 to get dinner before the show. We ate at a Crepe place (“Crème de la Crepe”) in Covent Garden, the walked to the theatre for the 7:30pm production of Oliver! It was FABULOUS! Absolutely brilliant. We even met some of the cast after the show and got them to sign a movie poster for our game room back in Midland! We got home around 11:45pm.

 

<< Steph and I in the room before heading to dinner and the theatre

           

           the parents with tonight's "Oliver" >>

08.01.10 - London: Day 4

We left the hotel at 9:00am to go eat breakfast at Costa Coffee. I split a strawberry yoghurt with granola with my dad, and I also had a blueberry muffin and raspberry iced tea. After that, we headed to Hillsong Church! It was very cool. It was HUGE! It’s held in a theatre and it’s set up like a concert every week. It was a neat experience, but not a church I would attend regularly. It let out around 12:15pm.

<< you can see the advertisement for the next theatrical production held at this theatre..

We jumped back on the underground and headed to.. KING’S CROSS!! My dad didn’t want to go here at all (he thought it was dumb) but I was DYING to go, obviously. I found Platform 9 ¾, took my picture with it, and was a happy camper.

                                              heck yeah I took a picture with the trolley! I have to admit I was a bit disappointed in how plain it was.. but it was still worth the trip to this station :)  >>

After that, we went to the Sunday Markets in East London. We first went to the Petticoat Market where I bought some scarves on the cheap (3 for 5#) as well as a pressie for Joel. After that, we went to Old Spitalfields Market where we stopped for lunch. Stephanie and I split a calzone that was pretty good, while the parentals had meat pies. Then we shopped! This market has been here in the mid-1600s! And it is still going strong.

<< the building that houses Old Spitalfield Market

I don’t think I actually bought anything here, but there was a whole lot of cool jewelry and headbands that I wish I would have gotten. My parents bought a poster for our house in Lubbock that is pretty neat. We also got 10 minute much needed chair massages for 8# a piece :)

After the Old Spitalfields Market, we went to the Brick Lane Market, which was pretty much a garage sale on a road. It was huge! All the “shops” were people with things on blankets. Seriously, the items for sale were so eclectic; it actually felt like being at a giant garage sale. It was a neat experience, but we didn’t buy anything there either.






<< Brick Lane Market





We took the tube to St. Paul’s Cathedral, but it was closed since it was Sunday. It was only open for mass and prayer, but there were no tours. We’re going to go back for the tour on Tuesday. We walked across the river to the park in front of the Tate Modern museum and sat down.

looking back across the bridge (Millennium Bridge, maybe?) at St. Paul's Cathedral >>

We were super tired! My dad was looking through the guide book and the rest of us took a quick nap. After 30 minutes, we woke up and decided to walk through the museum, as it was free. However, it closed right as we were walking in! We’re also going to revisit here on Tuesday.

By this point, it was after 6:00pm and we were hungry again. We ate at the Gourmet Pizza Company near the river, then headed back to the hotel for an early night. I skyped with Joel, and then went to bed around 10:00pm.

<< the sister and I after a yummy meal of pizza :)