LONDON 28th Dec 2012 – 2nd Jan 2013

What a way to end a year.................

And start anew!

It was with not a little sadness that we left family in Grimsby for 5 nights in ‘the big smoke’!

We had an interesting interaction with a couple of the local wild-life on the train from Grimsby. We had left our bags and coats on the seat but whilst saying bye to Susan and Darryl some ignorant b*&^% decided she wanted those seats and threw our gear on different seats. As our luggage was on the racks above Julie had words with them. They took offence and started being abusive with fists swinging and Julie getting punched in the face. The outcome was the police being called, the women getting kicked off the train and the train leaving 40 minutes late! But Julie won the round!

GO JULIE GO

We arrived in our hotel late in the evening and checked in to the opulence of The Ruben at the Palace, Buckingham Palace Road. I’m sure most of the readers of this blog will sympathise with us having to ‘slum it’ for a few days but hey, we’re survivors!

After ditching our bags we hit the town and went sight-seeing (in the rain) around Oxford Street. Near the hotel we found an interesting Cockney ATM. Whether it’s just a tourist machine I have no idea; all I do know is that it never had any cash in it!

On the 29^th we took the mandatory trip to Buckingham palace which was just round the corner. In fact, the hotel room overlooked the Palace Mews we were that near. There was a changing of the guard at 11.30 am but the crowds were massive so we gave it a miss. We can live without it so we took a stroll round St James’s Park instead.

From there we took the tube to Westminster Embankment and took a walk along the river Thames. Julie loved it; being able to see all the places she had read about and until recently only dreamed of visiting.

We had planned to take a ride on the London Eye but decided against it because of the rain, hoping that the weather would improve in following days. No such luck but thems the breaks. In the end we gave up waiting and took the ride anyway. The views were great despite the weather; I can only imagine what it would have been like on a clear sunny day.

We did manage one dry day and took advantage of the weather to just walk around and take in the sights. One could spend days just wandering through the streets of London taking in the wealth of history available. Its years since I was last in the big city and much has changed in this changing world.

I actually remember being able to walk down Downing Street – these days it is all railed off and heavily guarded. One can only view it through steel railings along with all the other tourists. And who says the terrorists ain’t winning!

No trip to London is complete without a close up look and Parliament house and Big Ben. Every time I see it, it amazes me. One of my favourite photos of this visit to London is this one:-

Parliament/Big Ben on the river.

Being a Sunday we only got a chance to see the outside of Westminster Abbey. We had every intention of going back during the week but time restraints beat us and we never got to sticky-beak inside. We really must do a longer visit to London, preferably in the Summer months when the days are longer. Then again we’d have the crowds to contend with!

We did manage to squeeze in a visit to Harrods and spoiled ourselves with a lunch there. As for shopping, we gave that a miss! Even with the sales on and ‘40% off’, there was no way we were paying $3,400 for a dress. I know, I’m just a tight-wad!

On New Years Eve we had big plans for the evening (separate post coming for that event – mainly photos of the fireworks) so we took a trip up the Thames on a river cruise and stopped off at Tower Bridge. It was a great visit but I’m not so sure that it was worth queuing 20 mins for tickets and then a further 50 mins in the rain to get in to see the Crown Jewels. We were not sorry we went and, being in London we felt it was an opportunity not to be missed. And it cost us 20 quid each! Like I said, I’m glad we went but I wouldn’t go again.

It’s a big evening for us tonight so we’re off to the hotel for a nanna nap and to get ready for our big night out!

Watch this space.

Another visit well worth making was to St Paul’s Cathedral. I managed to get up to the Whispering Gallery (356 steps) but never got up to the Golden Gallery due to time constraints. The views from the dome are fantastic and one gets to see London from a whole different angle. Understandably we weren’t allowed to take photos of video inside the cathedral. This was a shame (although I fully understand why) because the choir was rehearsing and it was beautiful.