Last Stop London

We spent five days in London and there was plenty to keep us occupied! On the first couple of days we walked kilometres and learned how to use the Tube, and we saw:

Tower Bridge
Trafalgar Square
Royal Horse Guards (including a changing of the Guard)
No. 10 Downing Street
Big Ben
Houses of Parliament
Westminster Abbey
St James's Park
Buckingham Palace

We then explored further...
  • Spent time in Harrods where we covered most floors and marvelled at the expensive displays. In the jewellery department we were told 'no photos' and in the handbag department we were amazed at the ancient Egyptian decorations, complete with sphinx heads and cartouche writing. Exhausted, we sat down for  'tea' at a French Café in the sumptuous food hall.
  • Walked across the Tower Bridge to the Tower of London where we took a fascinating tour through the buildings and grounds and learned about the violent history of the Tower from a Yeoman Guard (Beefeater). 
  • Toured the British Museum which is full of ancient statuary, but the real highlight for me was the  Rosetta Stone. The Stone features two translations of the same decree in the three scripts that were common in ancient Egypt at the time; hieroglyphic, Greek and Demotic. It dates back to 196BC and was discovered in 1799. Nobody had ever been able to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphs but in 1822 Frenchman Jean Francois Champollion, who could read both Greek and Coptic, finally did it and the rest, as they say, is history.
  • Visited the Sherlock Holmes Museum at 221B Baker Street which is full of Holmes memorabilia. It has the famously furnished upstairs room where Holmes and Watson spent their days mulling over mysteries, and next door there is even a café called Mrs Hudson’s Restaurant. Drank coffee in the café at Marks & Spencer, walked through Selfridges and then did the length of The Strand (now just called Strand) to the wonderful Twining's Tea shop.
Then it was off to Hong Kong for a night before flying home. Our hotel room was on the 27th floor and had floor to ceiling windows overlooking the Harbour. Thankfully the room's air conditioning was effective as it was in the mid 30s outside and very humid which, after London, was quite a shock to the system. We ate delicious local food at Under Bridge Spicy Crab - located under an overpass - and spent time in the new and extremely modern Times Square building which has eight floors of designer shops and cafes, four floors of restaurants and then even more office floors.

Now we're home, wading through the photographs and trying to remember everything we saw and did. What a fantastic experience!

Tower Bridge

 

Tower of London
 
 
Trafalgar Square - Nelson's Column


Royal Horse Guard


Big Ben
 
 
Westminster Abbey


Buckingham Palace

 
Harrods

 
The Mad Hatter - outside Harrods


Inside Harrods




At the Tower of London






 
At the British Museum




 
The Rosetta Stone
 
 
221B Baker Street


 
View of Hong Kong Harbour from our hotel room



Dinner at Under Bridge Spicy Crab

 
Inside Times Square shopping centre, Hong Kong



Comments

  1. I've loved following your trip via these posts Penny. Welcome home :)

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  2. Thanks - glad you enjoyed the posts! Now I just need to get organised as I have stacks of article ideas and can't wait to get started. But it will have to wait until next week... still catching up.

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  3. Fantastic blog, my friend. Glad you are home, and safe. Thank you for sharing your wonderful travels!

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  4. I get exhausted just looking at them...

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