England Pilgrimage Day Three

Day three of our England trip - our first full tourist day.  Today we took the Tube to the British Museum and before we went in - we stopped at a Starbucks.  A Starbucks with seating downstairs!  Pretty cool.  Today is also the day that Kris, Jan and I wore our Hawaiian shirt uniforms - nothing screams American more than matching Hawaiian shirts - the only thing that would have been better is if we all had been wearing our white sneakers!

So the British Museum - we’d heard about waiting in the Great Court before the museum opened and how cool it was and when we first got there and were standing outside - I thought - yeah - what’s so cool about this - and then we went in to where the Great Court really was and it truly was cool!  The picture of me in the side bar was taken by Jan as I’m just looking around - it was fascinating!  We had the morning to take in the British Museum and saw the Rosetta Stone, Mummy’s and a cool exhibit on the number of prescription and non prescription pills we take over our lifetime.  We then had to get lunch before we headed over to the Tower of London.

After looking around the British Museum - we went looking for a place to eat - we heard about this really good pub - but when we went by - it wasn’t open yet - which ended up being a blessing - some of our group ended up there and said it was terrible.  We ended up at a different pub - where the owner had just gotten back from America and attending the Kentucky Derby.  We had good food - good drink and some good conversation.  We then met back up with the group to take the Tube over to the Tower of London.

I was really looking forward to this - but it seemed very touristy to me - maybe because it was a Bank Holiday and it was very crowded.  I was a bit disappointed by the whole place - again - maybe because it was so crowded and we got stuck wandering around the White Tower with a group of Italian tourists.  It was fascinating though to be in a place that has such history and it certainly has history!  So we saw the Tower of Torture (the display wasn't very impressive) - we saw the place where the scaffold stood to chop off the heads of Henry the VIII’s wives and other folks - we saw the crown jewels and walked down a ton of narrow winding stairs to get out of the White Tower - but best of all - we saw people hanging their laundry out to dry (first of the fluff and folds).  Apparently, there are people that live on the Tower grounds and hang their laundry out on clotheslines (we saw a lot of that over there).

After dinner this evening - we took an excursion out to Piccadilly Circus - very cool - our first stop - a Pub for drinks.  We then ended up wandering through Leicester Square and over to Trafalgar Square - very different from the day before when it was packed with people.  We tried getting another drink - but it was just before the time that they stopped serving and wouldn’t serve us - so we found a donut shop that was open - mistake - lousy donuts!  But a great day - check out pictures here.

Stay Tuned for Day Four - a day on our own in London.