Our Trip to Europe

Day 2 – London


After a breakfast at the Hotel, we started bright and early for the Tower of London. As soon as they opened, we headed for the Crown Jewels – no pictures allowed!! They were amazing. They included the largest cut diamond in the world. We thought we would then join a Beefeater’s tour but there were about 100 people gathered around him and we couldn’t hear what he was saying so decided to do the audio tour instead. It was very interesting. Part of the tour was through the Bloody Tower where there were torture devices on display. The armoury in the White Tower was very interesting and again, we saw all kinds of weapons used to kill and maime.

After we finished up at the Tower of London we had a bite to eat in their outdoor café. I had homemade yoghurt which was very good. We then walked across the Tower Bridge and took several pictures. Most people think this is the London Bridge but the London Bridge is a very plain, boring bridge that isn’t worth taking a picture of. We actually walked across it also. I am posting a picture of their City Hall. London is interesting as you look at their skyline and there are buildings that are absolutely ancient standing right next to an extremely modern structure. The City Hall is one of the very modern structures we saw.

Our next stop was the British Library. They have on display writings by Galileo, Shakespeare, music written by Motzart, Chopin and lyrics written by the Beatles on napkins. We also saw the Magna Carter, and several beautiful illuminated bibles, Guttenberg.

We then took the tube over to Victoria Station and walked to a British Pub, the Jugged Hare, that we had read about in our Rick Steves guidebook. Paul had a British brand beer and I stuck with a glass of wine. We decided to eat there and try British fare. We ordered the meat pie platter. I ate my first hare, rabbit, and a gammon, which I think is a type of bird. They were all good but very different.

All in all, it was a good day. No rain today but partly cloudy and sometimes windy. Our luggage that was to have arrived while we were out today, had not gotten here by the time we returned to the hotel at 9pm. Called to check on it and nobody seemed to know where it was or when we would get it which was very frustrating. They were to call us very early in the morning to give us an update, however, we got a message from the front desk at about 10pm that it had finally arrived. Thank goodness.

Well, need to turn in and try to finish catching up on my sleep. We will travel to Harwich tomorrow morning by train to get on the ship to start the cruise. We are really looking forward to it.