May 28, 2010

May 28, 2010

London. Today was probably the busiest day I have had in a long while or possibly so far in my life!  My sister, Kelsey and I traveled all over London just the three of us today and I may have just seen some of the most beautiful pieces of history I will ever see.  I will explain exactly the places we went today in the crazy chronological order- and I apologize if you cannot keep up... I barely can after I read these places on a map and see how far we actually walked!  I kind of want one of those step tracker things they make now so I could have seen just how much we had to trek all over the place, but now that I think about it- I might just want to save my knees the trouble of knowing just how far I made them go without falling off.  Anyways, we woke up after one of the greatest night sleeps I've ever had (because I had failed to sleep a whole 36 hours) and went downstairs to our lovely Holiday Inn complimentary breakfast.  It was funny because the restaurant had a hostess but no servers... or they had servers who only walked around. However, it was nice getting to get up and get as much yummy eggs and orange juice I could without bursting.  After breakfast and waiting on the obnoxious few late comers of our group we headed again to the Underground Station to buy a one day, zones 1 and 2 pass to take us basically everywhere we needed to go!  I must admit that those trains were a life saver and are definitely worth the usage when you are trying to go across central London in a matter of 10 hours and would rather not drive on the wrong side of the road. Which by the way, Kelsey almost died from stepping off a ledge and looking the wrong way immediately after we exited the Heathrow airport!  You could say she scared us all to death...  We bought our tickets and jumped on the Piccadilly Line towards Westminister to view the historically beautiful Westminister Abbey.  Before we made it to the palace, we passed a few neat places such as the White Palace where Charles 1 was actually beheaded on the front balcony for all to see.  We also saw the prime ministers house and of course, Big Ben!  That remarkable tower was deinfitely just as big and great as I hoped and stood beautifully independent from the hustle and bustle of the London circles below.  What I learned from a Samantha Brown video is that Big Ben itself is not the clock, but the bell inside behind the clock!  How crazy?  I just assumed it was the clock tower all this time, now I feel like I know a big secret.  Upon viewing this wonderful place I am overwhelmed with the history behind it.  There were so many royal tombs that I began to feel unworthy walking around.  We got to use a free audio tour which consisted of a cell phone looking device that we pressed numbers in to listen to the tour around the Cathederal, which I highly recommend because I was enable to enjoy each part on my own time.  I could not comprehend the abilities of the painters and builders of that place because it was just so marvelous.  The sculptures in poets corner and the statues above the tombs seemed to look you right in the face as if they knew your every thought.  Tears were brought to the corners of my eyes as I walked past the tomb of Queen Elizabeth just because I am such an admirer.  It was unreal looking down and seeing that I was stepping on someone's grave and that there is probably a whole nother world underneath that church! (Yes, I love the DaVinci Code and Angels and Demons)  But really, the majestic sense of it all is too great to pass up and I know that may be the closest I'll be in the presence of a Royal Family!  Despite my every desire to stay in that Cathedral all day, a huge list of places waited ahead of us and we were on our own from there on out to discover London for ourselves.  That has been a great part of this trip; we got lots of free time and were able to do what we wanted rather than waiting through a huge group all day.
We traveled to Buckingham Palace next and unlike Big Ben, was a little less than we all expected.  I even looked like a fool because I asked a lawn worker in front which direction were we to go to find the palace and he chuckled with the response, "That's it right there! Not the greatest thing, eh?"  I kind of laughed and basically ran away because I unintentionally probably just insulted the man.  How was I to know that the palace of their Queen was not covered in gold and lined with wonderful monuments?  Although it was not the most guady of places, it was large and impressionable.  Mainly because I knew there has to be the most beautiful rooms inside that palace and the Queen of all England whose blood is filled with historic royalty lives there from time to time.  To view the gates that people everyday travel millions of miles just to stand in front of was something I treasure.  I was, however, hoping to see those red guards with fluffy hats that never smile and take a picture but I never saw any in front of the palace?  The changing of the guard would have been neat to watch, but we made it a little too late.  This place was well worth walking a while for and the line of flags going down the street across leading to the palace was remarkable as well!  I was so excited to finally add to the ratio of Buckingham palace visitors.  
As we rummaged through our tube and street maps, we finally located our next destination, which was St. Paul's Cathedral.  So, we booked it through the smooth and pleasant St. James Park to find ourselves a little bit hungry.  We did not plan on spending a lot of money on food or taking a long while, so we located a concession stand type building and bought ourselves an "American" style hotdog and a coke with no ice.  The hotdog was just huge, and I guess that is why it is "American" style.  Hotdog and cokes with no ice in hand we walked towards St. Paul's, stopping only to find one of the rare trash bins along the sidewalk.  As we walked up the steps of St. Paul's I could already tell that this would probably be my favorite part.  The admission was great with our student ID's because everything became almost half off!  As the doors opened and I looked up, my mind with blank.  I was just dumbfounded by the beauty and in awe of the architecture.  Never before had I seen such large paintings on the very top of the 2nd largest dome in the world!  I don't even understand how they were able to do that!?  I would have loved to see the technological devies used to get those painters up there and the faces of those working on that place after they found out how high they were going to have to be put.  That place can be compared to nothing I have seen previously and will most likely stand out for the rest of my life.  My neck even began to hurt after looking up for such a long time and of course, we three just had to climb to the very tip top of the entire building.  Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you that you have never walked so many stairs that are in so many shapes and sizes until you have walked to the top of St. Paul's. And you have also never seen such a view of London until you have climbed to the top of St. Paul's Cathedral.  You can see EVERYTHING!  It was just amazing, the view, and to know that I was standing on top of basically an ancient old church?  My nerves left me about 5 flights of stairs ago and by that time I would have lived in that top little balcony if I could look at that view all day!  I highly, highly, HIGHLY recommend doing that, no matter how badly you do not want to climb stairs.  However, it does get quite snug at a few points so you may want to just dream about it if you are claustrophobic in tight spaces.  I have learned to cope with the crowds here, by the way, and almost accept the fact that I will never be able to have a whole historic building or monument all to myself despite my most frequent wishes.
After we exited the Catherdral, we decided that to last as long as we needed to, we must load up on coffee, so we went right across the street to a common coffee shop around here known as Costa Coffee.  I enjoyed a wonderful iced caramel latte and sat facing the window, in which I could practice one of my favorite creepy hobbies, people watching.  We sipped on our liquid hopes for energy and moved right along to our next destination, Abbey Road.
We left the area and started making our way to the GREAT ABBEY ROAD!!!! i actually think this may have been my favorite today, in an obsessive sense just because my loves, Paul, John, Ringo and George once walked upon it.  This was quite frustrating because a worker in St.Paul's had told us after I asked him where Abbey Road was, that it was right next to Big Ben and after many steps back to that area, we run into a school boy (who went to the coolest looking strict school right next to Westminister) that we were basically idiots and that man led us to Westminister ABBEY not Abbey Road, which was on the other side of Central London.  AHH was all I wanted to say and the boys around us with their middle school uniform coats snickering was not helping!  I guess we give our lost tourist look away with the London maps all in our hands and cameras hanging from our necks.  A lovely worker in the Westminister gift shop finally led us to the right place and off to the tube station we were yet again.  I got a few pictures walking across and I immediately felt bad for the drivers who have to pass through there everyday because it is a road that you have to stop at if there is a pedestrian crossing and I have a feeling that a lot of people make a scene crossing the road a few times.  We asked a lady to take our picture because we wanted all three of us and I think we chose the not so smart one out of the bunch because on the first try, she pressed the ON/OFF button instead of the right one and tried to explain how the camera "just went black for no reason".  On our next try. she moved without telling us to the opposite side of the road in which we were left smiling and waving to the other side looking for my camera that was not there.  So, needless to say it was not the easiest thing in the world to take that picture!! But, just knowing we were there really made it all worth while and seeing the recording studio where so many great bands recorded their music made the world a littler smaller.  It is crazy how normal these insanely talked about places look when you get right up on them!  And as I was taking a picture of the studio, I assume she was an aspiring celebrity, was posing outside the door messing up my pictures- so I politely pointed and asked her to move aside.  I have a fetish with strange people in my scenic pictures if you know what I mean.  I had to buy a bag from the Beatles coffee shop and restrain myself from buying every single item!  It was so awesome and I am so pathetic, but feel relieved to have been there and seen that street!

After a few tube misreads and studies of our maps, we found our way through the romantic Kensington Gardens and right up to the Kensington Palace.  We mainly wanted to see this place because Princess Diana lived there, but after seeing it, I was almost led to a more morbid and sad feeling thanks to the overgrown grass and withered plants all around.  Even the pond next to it was taken over by cardboard and ducks...  To once be such a royal place, it sure looked rugged now.  We walked through a gate that looked like it was closed off and kept trying to see if we were going to get yelled at, but thankfully we did not and kept right along.  We were also bombarded by this deaf, maybe drunk or slightly retarded man asking us to take him back to his house?  I was just about to say, "Hey, why don't you just come back and stay with us old creepy stranger!", when a woman walked next to him and explained to him that she was indeed taking him home.  It looked as if she was not with him either and I thought to myself what a good idea for a pick up line, or actually what a bad idea for that girl, but I guess here there is not as much prejudice stereotypes as I am used to and a man such as he might just be helpless and in need of his home.  

Our final major sight seeing place ended up being the British Museum.  We wanted to see the Roseeeta Stone, mainly and managed to walk quite a while and barely on time for the museum.  We were s tired by that time that regretfully, the Rosetta Stone was the key thing we studied and then we moved on to head back to the hotel.  I cannot believe that museum was free. especially being as nice and kept up as it was after so many visitors every day!  That is something that is crazy to me, that there are so many people touring this big place every single day every single year.  I wonder what the local people think about all the tourists? Americans?  I want to just one day be able to be a non-American and see what they act/talk/look like compared to myself.  I have loved hearing all the English accents and feel like the American accent does not sound as intelligent or cool. But, what do I know? I am just a "stupid Americanp" right? ;) You know, I have never been more proud than after we figured out on our own all those places. just from read on maps! And I cannot believe we covered so much history in the short time of 10 hours.  My knees have never shacked so bad as when I finished the steps in St. Paul's and my stomach has never growled than when I ate dinner at 21:45 or 9:45 p.m.  And by the way, kelsey and I ate at this great little Italian place (there are so many around here!) and sat in close quarters with two Italian men who seenmed to not speak a lick of English but enjoyed themselves quite nicely.  We kept awkwardly making eye contact between them and the mixed ethnic couple who appeared to be meeting secretly, discussing their love life troubles with each other and their significant others in a noter country.  Kelsey and I spoke probably a total of 10 words each at that dinner because we were freaks and just wanted to eaves drop on either conversations, which I mostly tried to listen to the Italian men and although I could not understand their conversation, I enjoyed it just the same.  I love that laughter is the same in evry country!  We can always share that.  I went and mailed some postcards and after searching through 3 different locations for the right stamps, finally brought them to the front desk to mail out to my friends!  I cannot believe it has only been 3 days of traveling, it feels like it has been at least a week already!! I am anxious to go to sleep now, but just could not let myself go without recording some of my experiences that I had today,  Tomorrow we are headed to Oxford, and C.S.S Lewis's home... what a treat that will be!