Arrival in London

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We had an uneventful flight to London, the kids watched lots of movies. Steve was excited to see the large selection of movies, so he ended up watching 4! We loaded into two cabs to get to our hotel. Luckily Deb and Diana were not in the cab that featured a foul mouthed old English driver who swore at all the other cabbies.

We are very happy with the Marriott County Hall Hotel and its location. We opened the blinds in our room to see the River Thames and Big Ben guarded by stormtroopers. As an explanation, County Hall (similar to Chicago's Navy Pier) has a Star Wars Exhibition currently and as part of that has Star Wars stormtroopers along the riverwalk.

The hotel is in a building that goes back to the 1700's. The hotel rooms are very large, which is not typical for Europe. Our two rooms are probably the size of four standard hotel rooms. Thank you Marriott Reward Points!

We then boarded the Tube and headed off to the Tower of London. We saw the the Crown Jewels, the White Tower and the Bloody Tower. The foggy weather added to the medieval atmosphere. Will was interested in all the weaponry on display in the Tower, especially the heading axe and chopping block, yuck!

We had a wonderful Italian dinner near the hotel that was great. We were prepared for the high prices of everything here, we're just pretending the pound prices are dollars (really 2:1)! After a brief walk around St Paul's Cathedral, we returned to the Tower that night for the Ceremony of the Keys. Deb ordered tickets 6 months ago as only a small number of people are allowed to attend. The ceremony, in which the Tower gates are locked for the night, has happened every night for almost 400 years, only disrupted once during the bombing of London during World War II. We had a close-up view of the uniformed guards as they went through a series of marches and salutations capped with a trumpet flourish. Everyone enjoyed the ceremony. We headed back to the hotel, with now sleepy kids on the Tube.

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Photos

Marriott County Hall
Located next to the London Eye. This is a very large enclosed ferris wheel with 25 person pods that was built for the Millennium Celebration.

Tower of London
The family in front of the White Tower. Rather foggy!

The boys napping
Anxious for a day of sightseeing, the boys are ready to roll!

Diana crashed
Diana has fallen and can't get up! Her snoring was a tip-off that she wasn't faking it.

Dinner at Ristorante Locale
Enjoying pasta and pizza a wonderful restaurant near the hotel.

View from hotel room
Big Ben and the River Thames guarded by the stormtroopers (note in the lower right of the photo).

Comments

[Mark May]

Ceremony of the Keys
Among the things I have done in London, the Ceremony of the Keys is one of my favorite tourist experiences. Glad you enjoyed it too!