London

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Sooo. After my glorious visit in Paris, Bevin and I decided that we would go to London because we both wanted to and we don't have many more free weekends. We scrounged together a good trip less than a week before leaving- thank goodness for budget flights that fly to and from really obscure airports (Luton anyone?) So once we got all settled in our less than classy hostel, we hopped on the tube and went walking around near Trafalgar Square. We got to see Big Ben and the houses of parliament all lit up, walked across a bridge and went and saw the London Eye ferris wheel. We spent entirely too long being baffled by how the enclosures are attached to the wheel and why they don't flip over or seem to move even when the wheel rotates up. Oh physics! or something like that. After that we walked back to Trafalgar square and went back near our hostel to find some dinner. We ended up eating some delicious Indian food. Out first night at the hostel was awful. It all started with out room which faced the street. We also had the luxury or a window that wouldn't close, therefor allowing all street noise ( blaring horns, drunk people shouting, etc) to go straight through to our room. The curtain didn't quite close, so I had a street light shining on my face, and to top it all off, we had an accidental fire alarm go off at 3am. But, it was really quite amusing- all part of the hostel experience. The next day (Friday) we ate breakfast at the hostel and go to hear lots of eastern European languages- I can't ever distinguish them. We got an early start and tried to see the changing of the gaurd at Buckingham palace, but it wasn't taking place that day. We saw a procession of horses and men in uniform going toward the palace, probably to pick up a member of the royal family of course. And London is really on top of things because they had the street cleaning crew following closely behind to sweep away all the horse poop! how thoughtful!. We wandered through another one of the sprawling parks and saw lots of jolly daffodils and a pond with swans and ducks. We were taking pictures and this man was sitting reflecting on life by the pond and he took our picture and told us nice places to go in London, then gave up a brochure about some kind of meditation center that he discovered long ago. He was definitely one of those peaceful meditating type of guys. Next we went and played at the science museum (mostly in the gift shop, throwing little frisbee things and bouncing bouncy balls). Then we went to Camden town which has a bunch of markets with cheap clothes- all my favorite goth type stores with black and heavy chains. It was great. We got some take out chinese and ate at a park, then went back in the center of town to see Saint Pauls's Cathedrale. We went to the evensong service and got to sit in the quire near the altar in the cool massive wooden seats and heard the angelic voices of little english boys. After that we went to Tate Modern museum which was really cool. Besides the pop art, etc, the best part was the slide! they had several slides from the different floors. They were twirly and really high and really fast and I am a wimp so I only went on the second floor one which was enough thrill for me. After that we went grocery shopping and cooked at the hostel. Saturday we walked around near Oxford street ( I resisted the shopping) then toward Charring cross which is kind of a bookstore district. We hopped around bookstores and ended up at borders to use the bathroom and stumbled upon a harry potter podcast with some list celebs in the harry potter world- Bevin knew who they were- I think one of them created one of the biggest fansite for harry potter and they were talking about the books and theories- it was pretty cool. After that we found Chinatown, then went to the National portrait gallery (another free one!) we didn't end up seeing the most well known portraits but oh well. next we went to HArrods and got lost. It is a pretty ridiculous place. By then our feet really hurt so we hopped on the tube and went to the Soho area and ate at an authentic English pub. It was one of the old historic ones. Went back, went to bed early and got up the next day to fly back to Montpellier. But, right before we left we went to King's cross train station ( right near our hostel) and went to platform 9 3/4 where harry potter runs through the wall to get to the Hogwart's express train and they even put up a sign and had a luggage trolley set up like it was halfway through the wall just like in Harry potter!. it was awesome. OK, i'm tired of writing. Love to all

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Comments

[Bevin]

You forgot to mention that while talking to the meditating guy we saw the QUEEN (or someone else...).