London (Day Three)

Day three began with a journey to the Tower of London. The Tower of London is actually a large castle with 13 different towers. There is a lot of history inside. We had an awesome yeoman guide. He explained to us that when they made the moat for the castle, they made it too deep so that the sewage wasn't being swept away by the water and that the place stunk! haha What engineering! The castle contains White Palace, which is the original palace of the King and Queen. It also holds the place where private beheading took place, including the famous wife of Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn. The chapel inside has 1,500 bodies buried underneath. We also saw carvings from all the prisoners awaiting their executions.

One of the coolest towers inside is the one that houses the crown jewels! I got to see the largest diamond in the world on one of the scepters. Also, I saw the golden spoon for the royalty. It brings new meaning to the expression, "Born with a silver spoon in his mouth." The jewels on most of the crowns were so big that they looked fake. For the room with all of the crowns, the floor was a conveyor belt which moved you along, so you couldn't stay and stare. Needless to say, I road it multiple times... No pictures inside, but I took a picture of the outside- definitely not as cool!

We also went into the tower called Fit for Kings and saw tons and tons of old armor, shield and swords. That was pretty neat to see since I love that era. The odd thing was to see suits made for little princes around age eight. Why in the world would they have to wear armor at that age? I also enjoyed the huge decorative swords that are so large they couldn't possibly be used and the hand gun they had on display that was made by Tiffanys.

Biggest and smallest armor

There is a rumor about the Tower of London. They have always kept falcons there. The story says that if the falcons leave, then London will fall into ruin. They almost got rid of them once, but the King was a superstitious person, so they stayed and have remained there since. Right now there are seven of them. They have cages, but they fly around as they please.

They had some actors hanging around in the castle. I got to watch them play the oldest board game in the world, of which I still don't know the name, but it was like a mash of tic-tac-toe and checkers. I want to find it and buy it! Apparently, the Germans play it very well!

From the caslte we had a great view of the very grand and impressive tower bridge. It's very blue. Also, I'm noticing how creative the English are with their titles. London Tower, Tower Bridge, Clock Tower, London Bridge...

Next we crossed London Bridge (I had to try and resist the urge to sing "London bridge is falling down..." while we walked) and went to Shakespeare's Globe. This is a theater which is designed after the theaters of Shakespeare's time. It has no roof so as to utilize the natural light. The marble pillars are really painted trees. The theater is the only building in London to have a thatched roof still. They had to receive special permission since the law that passed after the great fire of London (another creative name). We took a tour of the theater. There were some people rehearsing inside, for the plays here they don't use very detailed costumes or props. In it's time, the best seats were actually the seats behind the stage because Shakespeare's plays were made to be heard, not watched. Also, if they came late, everyone would see them and see their "high status" as they would interrupt to enter.

We also hopped over to the Tate Modern Art museum next door just simply to see the Andy Warhol room. Let's just say it was colorful as expected. Also his self portrait is a man choking?

Our last sight in London was Saint Pauls Cathedral. When I saw it, I kind of felt like I was transported by to Rome... haha Unfortunately we didn't get to go inside since the churches close at night here.

A couple random things to add:

London is super confusing to navigate. The metro is the oldest in Europe! Certain lines were down for maintenance so, we had to walk a lot. BUT I did take a double decker red bus!

One random moment I enjoyed, was when we were leaving a building, a guy that I had heard speaking French opened the door for me, so I said, "Merci." In response he said "merci? MERCI? Vous êtes français?" I love surprising people :)