London Weekend

I started this blog right after we got back from London, but I haven't been able to finish it until tonight and for some reason I can't get any pictures to download, but I'll keep trying. Sorry about the long wait between posts.

This past weekend, we made it to London. We left Saturday morning and caught the 9:30 train into town. It didn't turn out exactly how we had planned. I had at least 7-8 things that I had wanted to see over the weekend and I think we only saw 4-5. Transportation was kind of a pain, plus trying to sight see with kids made it a little difficult, too. We got a hotel right next to the Paddington Train station, so we just dropped our luggage off and headed out to find our bus. Garrett had gotten tickets to one of those sight-seeing buses that you could hop off and on, on the internet. We thought the paper we had printed off was our actual tickets, but it turned out we had to find an office to get our real tickets. So, we headed off to find those and after about an hour later, we finally had those and got on the bus and headed to Westminster Abbey. We walked across Westminster Bridge and saw Parliament and Big Ben and the London Eye and then went in the Abbey. It was really neat inside--we got the audio tour which was really interesting. The girls liked listening to it, too.


In front of Parliament and Big Ben and the London Eye

Westminster Abbey

We liked riding on the double decker buses, especially the ones with no tops. Our tickets lasted for 24 hrs. so we were able to ride them a little more on Saturday. After the abbey we rode the bus over to Tower of London. After feeding Bella and having some yummy fish and chips ourselves, we went into the Tower of London. I guess I got the times mixed up because it was closing earlier than I had thought. So, we only had 45 minutes inside which was a bummer. After reading some books about King Henry XVIII and his wives it was really interesting to me so see where these events actually took place. To see the entrance where they brought traitors into the tower (by boat) was kind of interesting and to see the place where Anne Boleyn (wife #2) and Catherine Howard (wife #5) were executed was interesting and kind of freaky. I wanted to see the rooms where they also stayed (not as prisoners), but they closed things down before we could. We were able to see the crown jewels which was neat, but I kept thinking about what a waste it was to have gold salt and pepper shakers when there were people starving. I guess that applies to today as well.

Riding on the sightseeing bus

Bella's lunch

London Tower

London Tower Entrance

White Tower

Prisoner Entrance

This is the place where they held the
executions (including Anne Boleyn's)

Lydia with one of the "Beefeaters".
(Still haven't figured out who they are yet)

So after we left Tower, we had a free boat ride on the Thames with our bus tickets. So we rode from Tower of London back down to Westminster Abbey.

Shakespeare's Globe (One we didn't get to see, but wanted to.)

Top of St. Paul's Cathedral (I think)

Tower Bridge

By the time that was over it was about 8pm and we tried to get a bus back to our hotel, but apparently they had stopped running by then so we had to catch a cab which was fun. We stayed at the Hilton and it was really nice place. We were all pretty exhausted from all the walking around and from the heat. It was actually 80 something all day which was really warm! We brought two umbrella strollers with us for Paige and Bella. But sometimes Lydia would get tired of walking so I had to put Bella in the baby Bjorn and let Lydia have a rest in the "pushcart". Getting on and off the buses was a pain with two strollers, but we were definitely glad we had them.

Saturday we had good intentions of getting up super early and getting to our first tourist place by 9 am. But things don't always work out like we plan them. After getting to bed about midnight, Bella was up at 5 wanting to eat and it usually takes an hour to feed her, so instead of getting up early, Garrett thought I might like to sleep in a little more, which was really nice. So, we got to breakfast by about 9 and had a good English breakfast in the hotel and then we were off by 10:30 or so by the time we checked out and stuff. We took the double decker bus out to Kensington Palace hoping to see the place where Princess Diana lived. The bus ride was great--it was so crowded all the time that sometimes we didn't get to sit on top, but this time we did and we rode around for awhile up top enjoying the weather and the sights.

So, at Kensington Palace all we were able to see were the State Apartments, which were okay, but I guess there are people living in the place where Diana lived, so that wasn't part of the tour. Bummer. After that we hopped back on the bus and headed to Trafalgar Square and had lunch and went inside the National Gallery for a little while to get into some air conditioning. :) It was actually really neat being in there because I don't think I had ever been to an art gallery before. The paintings we saw were beautiful. Next we decided to go see Buckingham Palace even though it wasn't open to the public until August and September (I guess we should have waited one more week). Our time on the bus had expired and we didn't want to spend more money on a cab so we walked to Buckingham and let me tell you that it was definitley farther than we thought it was. We were pretty hot and tired by the time we got there. I'm glad we made it there though and at least got to see the outside of the palace and see the guards. You can't go to London and not see Buckingham Palace. After feeding Bella and letting the girls play for a little while (Paige was passed out in the stroller) we hailed a taxi and headed for the train station for our train home. There was still more I wanted to see, but I'm not sure we'll make it back or not. It was a fun trip and the girls did a really good job with all the walking and the "boring places" as Maggie refers to them.

Gardens at Kensington Palace

Statue of Queen Victoria in front of part of Kensington Palace

Me in a phone booth (Boy did it stink in there!!!)


Buckingham Palace

Bella's snack

Bella and Paige at the train station

Eating Krispy Kremes on the train ride home