The pictures are:
1. Our Hotel
2. The map room within Churchill’s War Room
3. Barb with her grilled cheese sandwich
4. Dinner
We were up and out into the city and into the first subway by 8:00 am and went to Camden Market, a huge area in the city that has just lots and lots of wild stores and stuff.
We were a little early but we had fun seeing everything being set up for the day – it reminded us of some of the festivals that we used to do like Covered Bridge.
Then it was back into the main part of the city to see Churchill’s War Room. This is the underground bunker where Churchill and his main war staff conducted the war effort. It was amazing how they crammed the people in this small space underground. They had a great audio tour that told you what each room was used for. We could not believe some of the charts that we saw on the wall that were actually used in these rooms, including the counts of the bombs and rockets that hit the city be each day.
Then for lunch we went to Borough’s Market, our most favorite food market in any
city we have ever been to. There are literally dozens and dozens of booth with lots of samples and then lots and lots of stands serving lunch. Barb had an amazing grilled cheese sandwich and Ed had a sausage sandwich. Then we ate our way around the grounds with samples and bought 2 Borough’s bags to carry groceries in them at the supermarket. Barb had them a couple of years ago, but they were destroyed by mistake.It was then time to go to the castle section of the city for a 2 hour tour of the city. The
tour started in St. James Park, which is close by the Queen’s residence and proceeded to visit that section of the city with the old homes for the wealthy. We ended the tour at Piccadilly, a very wealthy section with men’s shoes being hand made, hand made to your order hats and everything that the “gentleman” would want to buy. What a place and the money in London is unbelievable. It is amazing to look into a store window and see ties for $100 and up. There were many shops that you could only get in by being buzzed in.Then we continued walking through the city until it was time to go to the hotel and change clothes for the evening.
We went to a really neat English Pub called the Marlborough Head for dinner. Our dinner was called Ploughman’s Sharer which was sliced ham, mature cheddar cheese, pickled onions and pickled apple crusty with bread
Then it was back on the tube to go to the Tower of London for the 9:30 pm closing of the Tower.
This is a by ticket only event were the Beefeaters perform a ceremony to lock the Tower down for the night. It took about ½ hour and was lots of fun. There are no pictures because photos were not allowed.
We made it back via the tube to the room by 11:00pm to pack for the cruise and catch a few hours sleep.
Sent last night -
This is just a short note to tell everyone that we had a wonderful day. Up at 7:00 am and on a run all day. It is 11:33 am and we are getting up at 6:00 am to go to a great Saturday market for a few hours before meeting our car and driver back at the hotel at 10:00 am for the drive to Southhampton and the ship.
So, what that means is that I will write everything and show you all pictures, but I won't do todays until tomorrow when we have some extra time on the ship.
Night for now -
ps - Jeff and Kris - you are in our prayers - hope today went great - Love Mom and Ed
