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Published: December 30th 2006
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On this trip I am travelling with my parents (John and Adele), which is different. I'm used to, well, travelling alone and not having to think about working with others. But I like travelling with them better.
We made our way from St. Louis through Raleigh (NC) and then on to London. The flight from Raleigh to London was only about 6.5 hours.
We landed at 6:30 AM, went through customs, and then picked up a rental car. Of course, they drive on the left hand side of the road here and the driver's side is on the right side of the car. That, combined with the roundabouts, small roads, and the way Brits drive (not bad compared to most countries, but different) made for an adventurous 2.5 hour search for the hotel.
London is what I would call a case-study for why city-planning is critical. The streets here just evolved over the last nearly 2,000 years such that it is a zig-zagging mess. There is nothing resembling order to it at all. Frequently, street names change three or more times on the same street. After the Great Fire of London in 1666, Christopher Wren, the architect of
St. Paul's
One of the clock towers St. Pauls, proposed that the streets be re-designed with broad avenues radiating out... and it was rejected. In the U.S. we can still see similar road systems in Boston, downtown NYC, and Philadelphia.
Eventually, though, we reached the hotel at Buckhurst Hill and took a long nap. We then had dinner at Toby Carvery (very healthy old-fashioned food -- http://www.toby-carvery.co.uk/) and I had a pint (not a U.S. "glass") of Guinness. 😊
I then read some Harry Potter before sleeping some more.
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In the morning, we took the tube to the Tower Hill station and had some fish and chips by the Tower of London. We then walked across the Tower Bridge and along the Queen's Walk for a bit (passing City Hall and the HMS Belfast). After that we walked across the London Bridge we went to St. Paul's Cathedral (http://www.stpauls.co.uk/).
St. Pauls Cathedral (as it stands now) was completed in 1710. A cathedral has been on the spot since 604 AD and services have been held continually there since then. The current cathedral was built following the Great Fire of London.
It is an awesome building and well worth the visit.
Eye of London and St. Paul's
This was taken on top of the dome of St. Paul's. One of the little clock towers is on the right. The church is still very active (ahem, unlike some cathedrals in Europe) and is involved in missionary work to other countries and in their own diocese. Among many other notable services, the funeral of Sir Winston Churchill and the wedding of Charles and Diana were held there.
St. Paul's is part of the Church of England (and the Anglican Communion) which split away from the Roman Catholic Church in 1534 when they refused King Henry VIII's request to have his marriage to to Catharine of Aragon annulled (so he could marry Anne Boleyn, whom he later had beheaded). Henry VIII then declared himself the Supreme Head of the Church of England. Interestingly, I didn't see this mentioned anywhere in St. Paul's (not exactly as pious as a Martin Luther or a John Calvin).
The Cathedral itself is massive, highly detailed and decorated, and very grandly beautiful. It has a huge dome in the middle where you can whisper on one side and hear on the other (I think 50 meters or so away). I also went up to the very top of the dome which overlooks London (which took over 400 spiralling steps to reach the top). It
is probably one of the better views of the London.
We then went and toured around the Crypt and had a snack at the Crypt Cafe. The Crypt was really interesting as many historic figures had been buried there, including Christopher Wren himself. Interestingly, too, was that the most revered in the Crypt were soldiers. Britain really did have a superiority complex, and with that was the belief that the war-mongering was with Providence's blessing and support. Granted, though, the British Empire did some wonderful things in "civilizing" the world. The results cannot be denied... from Hong Kong to the U.S. to India to Australia and many other places. Many countries went and made war and just left devastation. Britian built up the area. Right or wrong, relative to how other countries managed their emprires, I think Britain did some really good things.
After St. Paul's we walked along the Thames to the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. We then walked around Westminster Abbey and then went on to Buckingham Palace. After that we took the tube back to Buckhurst Hill.
We were a little hungry so we got some snacks at a Waitrose (http://www.waitrose.com/) grocery
store and then headed back to the hotel for the evening.
All in all, despite us being jet-lagged and a little exhausted, it was a very good day.
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Andy Horsman
Andrew Horsman
Great blog
Hi - just wanted to say I really enjoyed reading your blog about London. I used to live there so I'm glad that you had fun exploring the city. Made me feel homesick! :-) Looking forward to the next update. Cheers, Andy