Back Home Again

 Breakfast was at Mimo's again and we enjoyed it as always.

We walked back to the hotel, cleaned up and did our final room checks before leaving for the tube station. From Paddington station we went to Oxford Circus where we switched lines to go to Victoria train station. With the final use of our Oyster cards we were on our way via regular train to Gatwick Airport.

Our arrival time was three hours ahead of departure (as requested by Westjet) and while  Caro used her free time purchasing duty free items I used the free wi-fi to watch Utube videos etc.

We left 30 minutes late as Westjet had to remove the luggage of some checked-in people who somehow didn't make it to the plane. The flight itself was smooth and Westjet had wonderful service. I was very impressed.

Upon arrival at Toronto the Canada Customs people requested that only connecting passengers  get off immediately (due to insufficient staffing in Customs and Immigration) and the others would have to wait. Great for us!

We  cleared immigration quickly and because we had carry-on baggage only there was no waiting at the carousel so customs was the last remaining thing to do....except we had to go through security again.😒

We made it to our gate about 10 minutes before boarding started. I wonder how many people got stranded because of the delay in London?

The flight home was smooth and Vanessa picked us up at the airport and we were asleep not long afterwards.

A visit to the home of Henry and Anne

 We had a slightly later start than normal as we recovered from our walking yesterday however after a breakfast at Mimo's (our "go to" restaurant) we headed in the tube to Waterloo station. Here we got a train to Hampton Court.

In the center of the photo is the Palace of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn as seen from across the river Thames at the nearby town.

We spent four hours seeing  Tudor,William and Mary, and Georgian styles all in one palace. I was there particularly to see the Tudor things but all of it was super interesting.

Below are photo's of Henry VIII's Great Hall building and ceiling.

The workmanship is amazing.

The stained glass windows in the chapel were stunning.

The grounds are wonderful too as befitting a palace used for over 250 years.

We decided to walk a bit in the nearby town and chose to stop at a pub for a beer and cider. It was a beautiful hot day so it was nice to sit outside and enjoy our drinks while the world drove by.

We took the train back to Waterloo ( ten stops on the way!) And then got our tube from Waterloo to Paddington. It was rush hour so the train was packed with many unmasked people (including us). Time will tell if we made an error in judgement or not in regards to covid.

We have checked in for tomorrow afternoon's flight and tonight we are going out for one last supper and that will be that!

Only 14,500 steps (9.2km) today

Tubeless Tuesday

 All of our sightseeing was relatively close to us so we decided to walk everywhere, however 26,893 steps and 18.3 kms walked did tire us out a bit! The upshot is that we didn't use the tube today and wouldn't you know it, but Queen Elizabeth made a visit to "our" station this morning. Oh well we would have already used it earlier in the day anyway to head off somewhere.

We started by walking directly south through Hyde Park/Kensington Park. We stopped half way through the park at the Princess Diana Memorial fountain park. It was actually pretty neat and is not a fountain in the traditional sense.

At the far end of the park is the Prince Albert Memorial. It is beautiful.

Straight across the street is the Royal Albert Hall and we lucked out and got a tour. It lasted one hour and was really interesting to hear all about its history and to see photos of the performances ( including the Beatles).

From there we walked to Harrods Department store. Holy Batman but it is big,and HUGELY expensive!

Below is a photo of Caro at a piano worth $128,000 Canadian.

The store employee said there was no problem if Caro wanted to play it, so she did!

We walked the streets of the Chelsea district on our way to the next stop. It is a beautiful area and is very expensive going by the cars parked outside!

We got to the Victoria and Albert Museum about 4 and spent an hour there. It is a tremendous museum (and is huge) but truth be told, museum burnout is starting to occur.

Next stop was across the street at the Natural History Museum. It has some really interesting displays but time and ambition were in short supply so we saw  just saw a bit.

That is a blue whale in the photo. 

It was about 5 PM by now and Caro wanted to head back to the previous museum (the V and A) to soak her feet in the courtyard pool so that is where we headed next. The photo below is a panorama shot. That courtyard is a little bit of heaven! Wonderful!

Caro wanted to walk to the west side of Kensington Palace and we ended up walking down a street full of Embassies. We noted initially that there were signs saying No Photos Allowed which we thought was odd but it soon became apparent with all the Embassies. Of the numerous Embassies there only the Israeli and the Russian had protection (there was a cop car outside the Russian one).

We were getting pretty warn out at this point but we were soon back in our neighbourhood where we ate Italian again!

As I was about to upload this blogpost a helicopter came in very low and looked to be going to the Palace. I imagine Will and/or Kate are home now!

Great use of our Visitors Pass today

 Today was a "full" day of wonderful activities.

We started with buying breakfast at "our" breakfast restaurant and were soon on the tube to the Tower of London. Now that was a great visit. There was no line ups anywhere!

The first thing we did was get a tour with a Beefeater. He was really great and made the 45 minute tour fly by.

After the tour was completed we spent another 2 hours seeing the Crown jewels,and military equipment.

I would have taken photos of the Crown jewels but that is a BIG NO-NO.

We checked out the prison cells, torture chambers, the Ravens, and anything else that caught our attention.

After that it was the Tower Bridge which we toured as well. Below is a photo of me laying on plexi-glass with the bridge and river WAY DOWN below. I am actually taking the photograph while looking into a mirror above me.Caro was too freaked out to walk on the plexi-glass.

From there we starting walking to St.Pauls cathedral

It was getting to be mid afternoon so we sat down for a coke just to catch our breath.

About 30 minutes later we were at St.Paul's Cathedral and WOW it is pretty cool. We each had our own audio guide (free with entry ticket) so wandered around for half an hour. Once we had that completed  we decided to walk to the top of the dome. It was 528 steps to get there but it was worth it for the view of the city.

In the center of the photo above you can see the London Eye ferris wheel. That was near our next stop, so naturally we walked over!

At 6 PM we used our hop-on hop-off pass again for another 60 minutes of sightseeing ( we had pretty much seen everything by then anyway but it was a pleasant way to spend an hour).

We caught the tube up to Paddington station then went to a local restaurant for fish and chips. Yummy!

My cell shows we did 24,000 steps,walked 17.3 kilometres, and climbed the equivalent of 66 flights of stairs! Caro's Garmin says we actually climbed 77 flights if stairs- anyway it was a lot!!

Southampton

As we headed out the door today Caro asked if we should take our umbrellas but I didn't think we would need them so "no" leave them at the hotel..........Oops😁

We went to Waterloo station and purchased train tickets for Southampton.

Upon arrival there we got off the train for our five minute walk to the SeaCity Museum.......like I said before "Oops".  Yup, got quite wet.

The Titanic exhibit was really good and well worth going to.

After completion we called Phillip and he came down to pick us up. We spent all afternoon with Lorraine,Phillip and their kids meeting a daughter in law and grandchild for the first time.

 

Prim also came for awhile and said I really looked like Dad.LOL

Phillip dropped us off at the train station at about 6:50 and by 8:30 we were back at Waterloo station with a 15-20 minute tube ride to our area. 

A BUSY day

 As we anticipated it was a busy day, both for us, and for the millions of Londoners as it was a hot, blue sky perfect day.

We started off by getting a breakfast in a nearby cafe. It was just right.

We started our tourist activities by going to Covent Garden to meet up with our walking tour guide. The Covent Garden area is really neat and there was a market being set up in, what appears to be, an old train station.

The walking tour was very nice and even though it covered much of the same area that we have already been to, the guide was full of interesting facts.

The photo below was taken in St.James Park with Buckingham Palace on the background.

The tour ended about 12:30 and we knew by then that going to the Tower of London was going to be a zoo so we changed our plans and instead took the river ferry to Greenwich. It still took some waiting however we were on the water maybe 45 minutes later for a delightful ride down the  Thames. The photo below was taken on the ferry boat.

After a wonderful ride we got off at Greenwich village. Our first stop was the Cutty Shark sailing vessel. This was just a walk through for us as we have seen ships like that before.

The village there was packed with people ( like Banff in July) and really was beautiful ( and touristy). The Royal Park ( where the old Observatory is located) was really busy with many families enjoying an exceptional day weather wise. The location is breathtaking. The photo below is a panoramic shot taken there. Canary wharf is straight ahead, the historical Center is to the far left and the O2 stadium is to the right.

The main reason I wanted to go there was to take a photo. In the photo below I am straddling the 0 meridian line. Now all I have to do is take a photo at the equator !

We did a relatively quick look at the Observatory museum items. The clocks were particularly interesting. We also saw some neat telescopes (photo below)

With lots of walking still to do today we headed back on the ferry about 4:30. The ride back was just as interesting as the ride out with the opportunity this time to view the south bank ( where as the north side was our view when  heading out).

Once back at Big Ben we walked some back streets up to Buckingham Palace where we had the following photo taken.

We continued our walking/sightseeing by going around Green Park and then to the  Piccadilly area, and "my goodness" it was hopping with crowds of Saturday night revellers. WOW!

Supper tonight was at the same  place we had breakfast this morning. It was Italian food for us and we watched the final few minutes of the FA Cup.

27,000 steps today!

What a day!

 We started our day by getting up too late again.LOL

We took the tube to Piccadilly Circus to find our old hotel from 1980 but no luck.I know it has been closed for a while so maybe some of the new construction in the area is the original location. More investigation needed!

Next it was off to the House Guards parade grounds where we watched all the different troops and the full band do a co-ordinated practice. From there we went down the mall to Buckingham Palace and watched the arrival of the new guard to change out with the old. Too many people for us to see the actual changing but it didn't really matter as we had seen MANY more troops marching etc. at the parade grounds.

The photo above shows only a small part of the troops.

We walked to the Churchill War rooms for a super interesting visit. $40 each to get in but really interesting.

I forgot to take any photos there unfortunately 🤔.

By about 1:30 or so we were hungry so started walking, looking for a place to eat when we came upon Trafalgar square again. It is really very close to everything downtown.

A visit to a sandwich shop chain recommended by Susan and Murray was perfect for our immediate relief. 

Onwards to the British Museum!!!! Oh boy, time to see some things I have wanted to see for a while. The first was the Rosetta stone.

Next on the list was a carving of Ramses 2

After checking out many more things we came to the Sutton Hoo area. Here is a photo of the famous head gear.

The final photo is a vase from the Athenian culture (450 B.C.) so gorgeous  (and one of many examples).

We made a point of seeing the Elgin Marbles and Benin bronzes before calling it a day. I think we were in the museum for 90 minutes or so and while there is a tremendous amount to see we had had enough.

On our way back to the tube station  we stopped at a super cool real English pub and had a beer (me) and a fruit cider (Caro)

Tonight we will go out for fish and chips.

First full day

 We slept 13 hours last night and did not get up until 9:30 this morning!

We started out today by catching the On-off bus. We rode it for two hours and saw most of the downtown ( some areas we had seen yesterday).

We got off the bus a little before the end as we wanted to start seeing more of the local sites.

The first stop was the Jewel Tower where the kings of much earlier times kept their important belongings. It is one of the few remaining buildings of the Palace of Westminster.

Two of the views of London we saw today.

Using our London Pass (previously purchased) we next went into Westminster Abbey. OMG it is magnificent.The entrance fee included an audio guide which was perfect for learning about the building and contents. It was very interesting looking at all the royal burial chambers.

The photo below is the location where the coronation of the kings and queens is held.

After spending more than an hour looking at things we noticed the entrance to another part of the Abbey not included in our original entrance fee. This was another section called the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Galleries and so we paid a bit more for an amazing collection of royalty items. And what a view of the cathedral.

This area has just been opened to the public after being closed off for 700 years.

Another amazing thing was an ORIGINAL copy of the Magna Carta .

This was also located in the Queen's Galleries.

By now it was going on 4 P.M. and we had a supper date planned with Susan and Murray who had also flown in yesterday (from Vancouver). We got together for fish and chips  in a very busy pub and it was a wonderful visit. After two hours together we split up with Caro and I  walking about a kilometer back to our hotel. We picked up some fruit and water at a local shop to keep us going tomorrow morning.

It was a great day.

Arrival in London

We flew all night and arrived at 9:30 this morning.Immigration was just a matter of holding the open passport in a machine and at the same time having a photo taken automatically. From there a quick monorail to the other airport terminal,then a train into London.

We managed to buy Oyster cards at Victoria station and then we were on the underground tube lines to go to our hotel.

Our room is tiny but it will work!

Our first adventure about 1 hour later when we hoofed across the big park nearby to Kensington palace. Presently the home of William and Kate , they chose not to greet us at all😂.

The palace is full of royalty history ( being the home of many kings and queens over the last four hundred years).

After about 90 minutes there we were done so in a pouring rainstorm we walked out of the park to an underground station and went to Trafalgar Square. What an awesome area!

I really wanted to see The Blueboy at The National Gallery and it didn't disappoint!

The second photo is a painting by Da Vinci.

There is a tremendous amount of items to see there in this place but we were too tired to spend more than an hour there.

Super was at a little Italian place just off Trafalgar.

Tuesday flight to London

 Lisa dropped us at YEG about 10:45 and as we had no checked baggage and had checked in the night before we just headed to security.

Our flight to Toronto was "OK" I guess except for a yappy carry-on dog who spent a lot of time telling everyone of his displeasure.😜.T

There were also two little kids screaming for much of the flight. Uggh.

Pearson airport was very nice and we shared a pizza there.

Our flight to London Gatwick was on a Dreamliner. What a gorgeous plane