Thursday after school Todd and I took the train from Linares to Madrid (for the 71st time), caught a flight in Madrid and landed at the London Gatwick airport early, only to wait in a slooooow Customs line. There was only 1 desk open for all of the non-EU citizens entering the country. Once it was finally our turn, Todd and I went to up to the counter together to answer a few simple questions from the officer about our time in London. We stumbled over the first one: "How many days will you be visiting?" I blurt out "4 days" at the exact time Todd correctly says "3 days"... luckily we didn't look too suspicious and they let us through. We rushed to catch the last train into the center of London, finally arriving in downtown London a little before 1am.
Almost there ... once we got our bearings it was a quick 30 minute walk to the hostel. Todd was too stingy to try to flag down a taxi. Matt and Evan were nice enough to wait up for us and we exchanged big hugs and promptly ordered a pint. It's always a surreal moment when we get to see our friends and family on this side of the ocean. We did some catching up, take advantage of the 7 pound pizza special (the British currency, not the weight) before going to bed... at 4:00am. A 'brilliant 'start to the trip!
London Day #1
The next morning we were late to bed, early to rise (doesn't work out that well) for our first day in the city and there was lots to see. 'Los hermanos' headed to the Tower of London and since Todd and I have both been to London before, and seen the Tower we decided to save the hefty 18£ admission fee, and we walked along the South Bank heading to the Tate Modern, which was FREE -- much closer to our budget.
London is an expensive city, the sights that charge an admission (Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, St.Paul's Cathedral, London Eye) cost a pretty penny, or pence, as they say in the UK. But luckily the majority of the museums are FREE!
1:00pm at the London Bridge was our meeting point, which happened to be in the middle of a typically London downpour, so we hovered under umbrellas and marched to the Burroughs Market for lunch. It was a great experience! The market consists of stall after stall selling meats, cheeses, fresh produce, pastries, and warm prepared, international dishes. It is a foodies heaven! After sampling a little bit of everything - cheeses, salamis, olive oils, duck sandwiches, chicken curry, and sweets we were off to our next stop - the British Museum.
Tower Bridge
Posing for a picture in front of the British Museum.
The funny thing about the British Museum is that there are actually few very (if any at all) authentic British artifacts. It is more of a holding place for all of the things they have stolen, ah hem, acquired, over the course of their history. We focused on Egypt and Ancient Greece with the highlights being the Rosetta Stone and the Parthenon artifacts, especially since Todd and I had just visited Athens, Greece, back in February. We could have easily spent daysssss looking around if our feet weren't so tired from all the walking we had done.
The Rosetta Stone
Artifacts from the Pantheon.
We left the British Museum finding the closest pub to the exit, never mind that it was touristy and overpriced, but it felt so good to get off our feet! We made it to another part of town for dinner later that night at The Old Bank of London, an old bank converted into a restaurant, as the name would imply :) where our meal consisted of nachos and a meat pie assortment platter, along with some Fullers beer tasting.
With some newly purchased Prince William & Kate playing cards, we decided to call it an early night and headed back to the hostel. Todd and I taught Matt and Evan an "authentic" Spanish card game called bullshit. It's still under debate whether Todd or Matt won the second to last game... but I think it's safe to say it didn't keep any of us from falling asleep later that night.
A great quote on the wall at our hostel.
London Day #2
Pissing rain. Bloody Hell! It rained our ENTIRE second day in London, :( With no other option, we trudged through the puddles (some of us with smiles), umbrellas in hand and made the most of it.
We took the long walking route from our hostel to St. Paul's Cathedral - passing the London Eye, walking over Millennium Bridge on our way.
Evan and Todd on the Millenium Bridge.
Now it´s our turn! Nancy and Matt
St. Paul´s Cathedral
I sat out the visit to St. Paul´s visit today, because I had seen it on my earlier trip, so the boys left me at a Starbucks on the corner while they went on the tour and walked the 259 steps to the top of the dome. After they returned to rescue me from my caffeine buzz, we chowed down on a typical London lunch, let me rephrase that, a typical London tourist lunch - bangers and mash, fish and chips & Texas chili cheese fries (we had to give America a little food hug).
Despite our carb/fried food induced food-coma, we decided to fight through it and took the tube to check out Camden Town. It was a cool part of town with a very alternative feel and unique, decorative store fronts (check out the pics below). We found a covered market and hung out there for a bit to escape from the rain. I could have looked around for hours, but shopping with 3 boys was a different experience... within 5 minutes of being back out in the rain we decided we were sick of it. Where do you turn, when you're cold, wet and don't feel like doing any more sightseeing?? The closest pub!
Some examples of the decorative store fronts.
Over a few pints we pondered the biggest question on all of our minds: WHY do people actually chose to live here? With so much sun and warm weather both in Georgia and Andalucia, Spain, it seems so bizarre to me that someone would actually choose to live somewhere where it rains and is dreary so much of the time. Aren´t they miserable all of the time? Personally, I´ve come to realize that weather directly influences my mood... when it´s sunny and warm, I´m happy. When it´s cloudy and rainy, if I have to do anything other that lay around in bed and watch movies, I´m not my usual cheery self. So... what do typical London-ers do to deal with the rain?? How do they keep up their spirits?
It was about this time that we stumbled across the answer of how London-ers actually deal with the rain. They drink. A lot. When we deicded to take a break from the rain around 5, we had trouble finding a bar where there was even standing room inside. We finally stumbled across one with a lone, empty table empty in the back corner of the pub, where we squeezed in and ordered drinks as quickly as possible. Once we stopped and looked around we realized there must be some unwritten rule in London that when it rains it's socially acceptable to start drinking at any time of the day. The place was packed and it was pretty apparent that most people were not slowly sipping on their first beverages of the day. So, I came to my own conclusion, in London people drink to happily deal with the weather. I suppose there are worse solutions.
Later in the evening we headed to Kensal Green, a more authentic part of London, a bit outside of the normal tourist perimeter to meet up with Lucy, a book-friend of Todd's and her friend, upcoming singer- songwriter, Paul Freeman -- he's opening for The Who this Fall, buy your tickets. We wandered around for 15 minutes trying to find the pub where we were supposed to meet them, getting drenched in the process. We ended up giving up, turning around to a pub we saw a few blocks back, Henry IV. The place was a bust, but thank goodness Lucy and Paul came to our rescue leaving their friends at the last bar, and came to meet us for a quick pint, before bringing us to another, much cooler bar in the same area where we shared another pint before dashing (literally running) across the street to the Underground to catch the last train back into the city.
What do you do when you´re alone on the tube???
Sunday
Goodbye London. ¡Hola Málaga!
Last memory of London: Security. I walk through the body scanner, it goes off and I get a full pat down. Matt set off the alarms by 'forgetting' he was carrying a pocket knife. He was quickly 'invited' to a cross-examination by some serious-looking Policemen and their machine guns. Todd went on a last minute adventure backtracking through security (actually checking himself out of security, so he would be allowed back in) in order to find a container smaller than 100mL to transfer his fancy hair gel into a proper carry-on sized container... 30 minutes before our gate closed. It turns out the European first-timer, Evan, was the only one to make it through without a problem! With only 15 minutes to go before our flight closed we rush to find the nearest screen telling us where to go, only to find out it has been delayed.
Once we had time to decompress after the security experience we all realized they've probably tightened security in order to prepare for the upcoming Olympic Games. Yes, officers, you are doing a wonderful job.
A sneak peek at the medals for the 2012 Olympic Games this summer in London.
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