London Calling Emily and Colin!

London Calling Emily and Colin!

We traveled by train underneath La Manche, aka the English Channel, for a little stay in London.  It gave us a chance to see the beautiful countryside in both England and France.  There passed many scenic swaths of farmland and we even saw a large natural energy wind-farm aka lots of windmills in France!  We landed in London after only 2.5 hours.  The ride was fantastically smooth and wonderful!  Then we changed to the underground subway and made it to our hotel in central London Town, not to be confused with the City of London.  Yes, they are different...but they are side by side, I suspect it to be a plot to confuse the tourists.  

Anyway...let the GAUGING begin...

Yes, London is extremely expensive!  Their dollar is only .66 American cents.  Ugh.  Our Undergound subway passes for the day cost about $19!  Yikes!  

First up, Doctor WHO!!!!!  The Experience.

We hopped in a cab from our hotel and got there with just minutes to spare before our reserved ticket time!  On a map, it looked like a pretty short trip.  But driving the wibbly-wobble-windy-wurvy London roads, it took about 30 minutes!  The roads were packed and it wasn't even rush hour!  

Cab cost = $35 US.  

The  experience was totally worth it and AWESOME!  We were completely surrounded by Whovians of all sizes!  It was phenomenal!  Go nerds!  

Check out some nerd photos!

 

 The above video is the inside of the 10th Doctor's Tardis.

We took the underground back near our hotel and started wandering around in search of beer and/or food.  After going in one place and being ignored for quite a while, we high tailed it out of there.  We happened upon a grungy little place near an alley near a train station called "A Hole in the Wall."  The beer and the atmosphere were awesome!  Every ten minutes a train rode over the ceiling and shook the whole place making a thumping sound.  We LOVED it and went back several times during our stay!  We made friends with the barman, Nick, who makes an AWESOME Hot Toddy!  We cured Emily's cold with Whiskey!  We discussed the cultural diversity of London with him and exchanged contacts as he might be visiting Seattle one day in the future.  We also met a nice composer named Simon who was working on music for JJ Abrams.  WOW!  He will be moving to CA soon and wanted advice about the region.  Lots of musicians like to get wasted in this joint!  (The late Keith Moon and still living Boy George to name a couple)! 

The beers were amazing and the only thing that was reasonably priced in London!

During our stay we bought tickets to ride those touristy double decker buses.  It was actually a lot of fun because the buses in London have very drammatic commentators!  Our tickets also came with a free ride on the river Thames.  Yeah!  

The river tour guide was very funny and referred to the House of Parliament as the House of Parasites!  Ha!  We saw the UK HMS Belfast Warship docked in the middle of the River Thames.  It was the fastest ship in the fleet during WWII and was part of the D Day invasion.  For a smaller ship, by today's standards, it had two giant smoke-stack engines, and a total of at least 18 canons! 

Check some other sights along the river:

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre

When we went under one bridge, our guide showed us a very high-end spa built under a bridge where they had accidentally put one-way glass in the wrong way and you could see the naked people inside!  Wow!  

Here are some photos from the bus tour:

London Skyline

Tower of London

Entrance into Buckingham Palace

Iron Crosses Memorial

  

Westminster Abbey

Scars left by Nazi bombs on the side of this church were intentionally left as a reminder of the horrors of war.

Throughout the tours, the buildings of London were absolutely amazing and incomparable!  The city is also under major renovations as it is only 160 days away from hosting the Summer Olympics!

On Friday night, we also took a trip to the local aquarium, which runs alongside the River Thames, now one of the cleanest rivers in the world.  It was very cool!  They don't allow flash photography, so sorry about the grainy photos!

The above video is of a baby ray trying to break out of it's egg sack!  If this one doesn't play, I'll add it to my facebook...perhaps I'll just got ahead and add them all...don't know why I didn't think of that earlier!

The only thing left to tell you about is our crazy hotel room!  We had reserved a room for a disabled person, because it was half the rate and they didn't require that you actually be disabled!  It was extra big, which was nice.  But it had some weird amenities!  Everything was operable by buttons on the side of the super big bed!  

The oddest thing was the mural/photo on the side of the wall.   She starred at you...all day...all night...yikes.  Colin calls her The Vampire Queen.

Now, we are back in Paris.  Oh, how I missed it!  We had a lovely time in England, but spent WAY too much money!  I'm ready for some cheap wine and baguette! 

We'll leave you with a couple of gorgeous nighttime shots of London taken late last night.

On to the next adventure...