I had the rather fortunate circumstance of getting my first DOW (Day off work) on a Saturday. This only happens every month or so because our day off rotates. Anyway, my day off was also my sponsor's (Vicky) day off, so we decided to go see London together. Vicky coerced two other CMs (community members) to go with us, Pedro and Yeon Bin (mentioned previously as Young Bean - I just recently saw his name in print :). Yeon Bin is a great tour guide, and we left Lee Abbey at about 10am to be tourists (You can also check out the pictures I took as you read - if you are really interested, check again in a couple days because I'm going to add some from Vicky's camera too).
Portabello
First, we took the tube to Notting Hill and spent two hours meandering through Portabello Road Market. On Saturdays, the street is closed and everyone moves their little cart shops out. I couldn't help but sing the song about Portabello Rd from "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" in my head the whole time, but no one here has seen the movie. I picked up some London postcards as well as some dried fruit while my friends bought some fresh produce. I snatched a crepe from one of the street vendors for lunch, much to the amusement of my campanions - they waited until later to grab a meal at Burger King, but I found my meal very satisfying. The highlights of Portabello Rd were: the living statue at the entrance that only moved to tip his head at anyone who put change in his bucket; Pedro's great deal for cherries, "One pound for one pound"; the little hidden vendors that sold antique books (first editions Dickens and early publications of my favorite Austens, Eliots, and lots of poetry); the produce-selling husband and wife that tried to outshout the other "6 peaches for a pound"; and the French-Caribbean artist that we chatted with for about 15 minutes on whether the two blue elephants in his picture were fighting or dancing.
Buckingham Palace and Picadilly Circus
Because we were so late in leaving Portabello, we didn't get to Buckingham Palace until quarter past 2, so we missed changing of the guard. But we did get several pictures and I'm sure I'll make it back there later. We walked down the "pink" road (according to Yeon Bin - Vicky still argues that it's red) to Picadilly Circus. I found that there are several places named "Circus" and I think they really mean Circle. Picadilly Circus is where 5 roads intersect with a fountain in the middle. But it is certainly like a circus in that everywhere you look is motion, people, and advertisements. On one of the street landings (London streets are very organized - there are little landings in the middle so that you can cross half the street when the flow of traffic has stopped on one side, then wait until the other direction clears) a man had strapped a speaker/microphone to his stomach and was sitting in a chair preaching to the intersection. We stopped here at Burger King to eat lunch. I know my friends only ate there because they had coupons for it, but I wouldn't recommend it - the place was hot and dirty, which has not been by experience in most other places in London.
Trafalgar Square
After eating, we walking 10 min to the National Gallery and Trafalgar Square. I figured that the National Gallery needed its own day, so I just took pictures of the building and the square. I unfortunately met the Square pigeons in a rather unpleasant way when one dropped a present on my shoulder. But I have wonderful friends who helped me clean up :) A street landing off of Trafalgar Square gave a beautiful distance view of Big Ben.
Embankment
From Trafalgar Square we journey down to the Thames and walked along the river. From the bank, we could see the London Eye (basically a gigantic, slow Ferris wheel from which you can see all London. Was built for the Millenium) and several of the bridges. As we walked along the bank, we stopped at Embankment Gardens and rested a bit, then saw a WW2 memorial. Finally we ended at Westminster and Big Ben, where I had visited two nights before. Since it was dinner time, we decided to head back to Lee Abbey and come back in the evening to see Tower Bridge at night.
Tower Bridge and St. Paul's
Tower Bridge is really quite spectacular at night, a fact that the souvenir shops have caught on to because almost every postcard with Tower Bridge on it shows it at night. Yeon Bin, Vicky, and I walked along the river and saw London Bridge (which is not the bridge in the song - Tower Bridge is. London Bridge is a very modern, simple bridge that only looks special at night because it is lit up with pink/red lights) as well as Shakespeare's Globe Theater from across the Thames. We then visited St. Paul's, which was really quite breathtaking with an almost full moon over it. Finally, we walked across Millenium Bridge, which is a pedestrian only bridge across the Thames, and saw the Globe Theater up close. I've already made a mental note to go see a performance before the season ends in October.
I slept very well last night :) It was really wonderful to get out and be a tourist for a day and start aquainting myself with London. And it paid off today - while waiting at a bus stop after church, a lady approached me and said in a very thick Latino accent, "Portabello?" and I just so happened to know exactly where I was and where to point to Portabello because I had been there yesterday! I felt like a true Londoner . . .
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