Like at the Tower of London, Dalton semi-listened and these two were bored:
The tour took us along "The Mall" (it's a road, not shopping) where we passed some guards on horseback:
The road is kind of reddish to be like a giant red carpet leading up to Buckingham Palace. The other side of the road is St. James Park. Our tour continued over to St. James's Palace to what felt like the back of it, perhaps. We were looking at Friary Court with the Proclamation Gallery balcony there above. I guess if the monarch dies then someone comes out and
Then some guards came and shuffled about and some shouted things here and there and they moved their guns around and tried to look fancy and important, I guess.
Some more joined them and then they played a marching band song:
It was happy.
Then the guide told us that we were going to start walking up towards St. James's Park again and that the guard would begin marching the same way as us and so, we sort of marched along the street next to the marching royal guard playing their songs which was fun, I suppose.
The guard was on their way to the palace for the changing of the guard and I guess that's something people like to see even though pretty much everyone I've talked to is like, "Meh" about it. So we got into position:
And they marched around and played more music and indeed it was all pretty "meh" but, hey, at least now all of us can say we've seen it and check that off the bucket list, right?
With that big event complete, the walking tour was over and our guide pointed us in the direction to walk to go down to the Westminster Pier in order to catch our river cruise. So we headed that way and whaddya know? Another quintessential London photo op:
Elizabeth Tower and Parliament looking fancy as always:
And then we got down to the pier to board our cruise.
We saw all the sights from a different point of view this way, plus a few new ones:
Autumn wanted to take a picture but she was having a hard time balancing on the "rough seas". This is me cracking up at watching her try to attempt the photo and balance:
Easton tried one too:
This is the oldest thing we saw on this tour: Cleopatra's Needle (the big pointy obelisk in front of the trees):
Waterloo Bridge.
I guess it was built by women during WWII while the men were off fighting. I think I'm supposed to be all, "Girl power!" but honestly it just makes me sing ABBA's "Waterloo" however all I know is the part that goes "Waterloo!" and no other lyrics. So we should probably just move on and continue down the Thames.
Oh look: another fairly boring photo of St Paul's.
And the Millennium Bridge...under Death Eater attack:
And the regular ol' way it was the day we saw it:
Shakespeare's [rebuilt] Globe Theater:
Some old replica ship of a really old ship...
London Bridge which is actually super boring looking.
I guess there have been several London Bridges and this current one is only about as old as Jason...which is probably why 70s children know the whole "London Bridge is falling down..." as, well, probably the previous one was falling down.
Hey look, there's the Tower of London again, this time seen from the Thames:
It started to drizzle a bit so we headed below deck. Poor Dalton was starving. He gets like that sometimes where he simply cannot think of anything else. He was studying the menu and counting out his own little coins to see if he had enough to buy himself a lame, soggy sandwich from the ferry's snack bar. :'(
It was breaking my heart so I hopped up and bought a few snacks to try to tide him over till we got to land for lunch. Eventually we made it all the way down the river to Greenwich where we were headed.
Right away we had to find some lunch. Dalton really wanted a sandwich...would a burger work? Sure. So, we popped in to Byron Hamburgers for lunch. The kids' menus were fun and we got a bunch of stickers.
The Cutty Sark next to the pier.
I think Jason only took the picture because it shares the name of a Scotch whisky.
The big destination in Greenwich was the Royal Observatory so that Mr. Mapmaker (and the rest of us) could visit two hemispheres at once at the Prime Meridian. The walk up was a crazy steep hill. So glad I didn't have a stroller or wheelchair! The view was nice on the way:
Eventually we made it!
Look at that: Greenwich 00° 00' W and 00° 00' E.
Berlin! 13° 25' E
Take one of me! Take one of me!
You didn't get the line, take another one!
My eyes are closed, take another one!
Wait...huh?!
The exact second a small child ran into my bum. Ha!
Kid's turns:
The inside part had a museum with some maritime stuff. Establishing the Prime Meridian was important for sailing, obviously. And time. They had some kid area to design your own navigational tool:
This one cracked us up:
The boys (E.D. Industries) came up with theirs:
Checking out some more stuff inside and out:
(I really like that pic of my hubby.)
We finished up and walked through Greenwich Park. The kids were doing this hugging game:
It can be annoying and loud, but I guess I shouldn't really complain about such a game, eh?
While there, we decided to make a quick stop into the National Maritime Museum.
They were only maybe 20-30 minutes away from closing when we showed up but we headed straight for the children's area:
Jason popped over to some more grown-up stuff for the few minutes we were there. Then they closed and we caught the ferry back up towards London. It was getting dark and we stayed below deck. I tried to take some pictures of the sights all lit up through the foggy windows. Terrible.
And then we probably had dinner back at the flat and went to bed. Who knows? That was enough for today.
(That is walking down into our basement flat: treacherous!)
Day 5 is here.
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