A Look into my Life

Before I get into anything else there have been several changes in the UK over the past week or so. The most import is the dollar to pound ratio. Its now $1.50:£1. Things are becoming affordable! Fall has also moved into the area. The temperature has fallen over the past week (ask Jamie!) and the days are becoming much shorter. The island has also left British Summer Time after last Saturday. For this week we are only 4 hours ahead of Eastern Time. With the time change the evenings end very early. This hit hard today while sitting in class. The sun had set by 4:30pm!! By the time I got back to my tube stop it was dark. Plus I had to go food shopping. What a depressing place! We have been warned that it will begin to get dark as soon as 3:30pm while we are here.

Without further distraction, back to break week! Wednesday was a London day. We went around to all the important attractions in the city. First off was Buckingham Palace. We were there EARLY and were the only tourists in the area. Made for some excellent pictures and stress free enjoyment of the royal residence. Sadly the queen wasn’t at home this morning.

Next we headed to Tower Hill for a walk across Tower Bridge and spent a few hours within Tower of London. Look back for details on the tower. Not much changed since my last entry, other than a much lamer tour guide. Pictures will be posted however!

We swung back to check out St. Paul’s Cathedral. The size still amazes me. We had lunch next to it at a Pizza Express. We then headed to Harrod’s for some shopping. This is a department store spread out into a building that could house a medium size mall. It is owned by Mohamed Al Fayed, the father of Dodi Al Fayed. On the bottom floor is a memorial dedicated to Diana and Dodi. 

After that we walked down Oxford Street and picked up a few nick knacks a long the way. Of course stopping by the Apple Store!! We then snagged some dinner and proceeded to relocate our luggage to my flat for storage and preparation for our early departure for Amsterdam. It will take me some time to type that up. Look for it tomorrow since it’s my day off!

Until then, enjoy the snow Western Pennsylvania!!

Today was a big day! One of the items to my to-see list was Buckingham Palace. Unfortunately it is only open until the 28th of September so I thought I should get that out of the way as soon as possible. I seemed to be the only one interested so I got up this morning and off I went. The tour took me through the state rooms used for guests at the palace. This is also included seeing the Ballroom. This year, and this year only I guess the Ballroom was set for a state banquet. It was quite extraordinary seeing the tableware set exactly. There was a short film on how everything was prepared and measured for perfection. The ceilings in Buckingham are fantastic. The detail and design in each is outstanding. Unfortunately photography was not allowed inside. I did get a couple snaps of the rear of the palace and the gardens in the rear. Be sure to check them out!

I moved on from Buckingham Palace to the Regent Street Apple Store. This was another item on my to-do list. Its amazing the size of the store and the number of people in there. There’s a picture of the outside and one of the inside in the Buckingham Palace album.

I forgot the mention that the sun had come out at this point in the day. It was very nice to see it’s lovely rays once again. I missed it!

Next was the Mayor’s Thames Festival. It stretched quite a distance down the river from London. There were many little stands set up selling everything you could imagine. I did snag a £4 hamburger (a bargain!) and quite a few sights.

After that I headed back north to my flat for some R & R! My feet are hurting!