London...3 weeks late

From inside the Tower of London. You can see the immense crowds lining up to see the Bloody Tower in the background. We didn't get to see it. The line was too long.

The iconic Tower Bridge stretching over the Thames River.
Wes and Kevin waiting in line to get tickets to see the Tower of London. I am in another line, hoping to beat them to the ticket counter. It didn't happen. They totally beat me.

The Yeoman Warder tour at the Tower of London. He told us all the gruesome details of the beheadings and other bloody parts of the history of this place.

Guard at the gates of the Crown Jewels. Apparently, their costumes cost 10,000 pounds. Yikes!

This Tudor apartment was a gift to Anne Bolyne from Henry VIII. The lovely part was that she spent her house arrest here when she lost favor with Henry and was beheaded on the front lawn you see here...just about where the Christmas tree is standing.

Entrance to view the crown jewels and the largest cut diamond on earth...located in the royal scepter.

I love this picture of Shakespeare, standing in the center of Leister Square, amidst all of the theatre houses and movie theatres (and in this case, a New Year's carnival), looking unbearably bored.

Double decker night life.

Teri in the Tube.

OK...so, I've been way to busy preparing to travel, that I haven't recorded the travels we've already been on. I'll try and recap:

The day before New Year's found us in London. Our first trip to the big city since moving to England. We went mainly to attend the temple. We caught the last few sessions before the temple closed for it's bi-annual cleaning. While there, we stayed in the temple patron's housing (because it was WAY cheaper than getting a hotel in the area) and we ate at an AWESOME pub called the Peacock. Even now, I crave their chicken and bacon burger. Haven't found anything that compares at our local pubs. The deal at the temple patron housing is that for every day you stay there, you have to do a session. So, we toured London during the day and did our temple sessions at night. It was a win-win situation. We got to see the city and get a spiritual boost, all in the same trip.

Our trip to London could have been better planned. We forgot about the crowds that would gather to ring in the New Year in London. Silly us. But, after the train ride into London, we had time to walk beside the dirty (seriously, it was disgustingly muddy, murky and polluted) river Thames, and tour the Tower of London. Touring the Tower took the remainder of our day for several reasons. First, the crowds. The lines to get tickets were SO LONG. People of all nationalities lined up to see the crown jewels and the places where Anne Bolyne and other famous British politicians were beheaded. (Seriously, Europe and in particular, England, has such a bloody history). Second, it's winter here and daylight doesn't last long. With the sun setting around 4 pm, we had very limited daylight to see everything in. By the time we got through the 1 hour line to see the crown jewels, the sun was quickly setting. We headed to Leister Square to check out theatre tickets (which we didn't buy) and to grab a bite to eat at a very nasty Chinese buffet. If there is one thing I've learned from experience here, it's that the British DON'T know how to make Chinese food. The pub grub is delicious (if not artery clogging), the Indian food is superb...but don't ever eat the Chinese food. Nasty-licious.

We ended our tour of London catching the Underground ("the Tube") to the train station and heading back towards the temple. We were grateful that the train was heated, because it was SO COLD outside in the city.