Full Day in London

Summary:
Rode the largest cantilever ferris wheel in the world, the London Eye. 40km view in every direction
Walked along riverfront and saw lots of street performers in CRAZY getups
Saw a cute little vending truck and had to take a picture. Also had to make a strategic angle shot of the truck, which features two topless old guys. Very European!
Popped into an art gallery that featured all the album art of... the guy who did Pink Floyd's art. AWESOME stuff!
Sat on giant furniture of an outdoor theatre
Took pictures of the rebuilt Globe theatre (exact replica of Shakespeare's Globe, which burned down)
Walked to St. Peter's Cathedral, but stayed outside.
Walked Fleet Street and saw nothing that looked like Sweeny Todd or Mrs. Lovett's Consortium and Parlor
Ate baguettes at Cafe Rouge
Took "The Tube" (subway) to Green Park to look at Buckingham Palace. Chatted with the cop who had an H&K MP5. Felt grateful to be in a country that allows its citizens to have semi auto firearms!
Went to Green Park to look at something the kids were playing on. I wanted to play, too. Got closer and realized that the thing was a monument, and decided not to disrespect the piece. Wonder who lets their kids play on monuments???? Left monument and took a slight nap in the park.
Got itchy from the grass and went back to the hotel for a nap.
Got up to watch Lion King at the Lyceum Theatre. Even though the musical followed the Disney script to a T, I enjoyed this stage production much more. I definitely encourage anyone to see it!
End of day. Ordered dinner from 24hr room service.

Flat Gary on a cruise

Mini-trip in London

Took a two hour nap as soon as we got into our room.
Pouted when I found out that the hotel was going to charge the equivallent of $30 to use their internet for 24hrs. Got over it two minutes later.
Went walking to find something interesting. Found the Museum of Natural History. Spent some time looking at systems of human body. Lots of kids :op
Left museumt to find a place to eat. Found Hard Rock Cafe.
Settled in to sleep at 20:00. Slept like the dead until 07:30.

Transportation to England

I wanted to make a special post for the plane trip. I don't know why, exactly. The plane/car/train ride is always part of the trip, and the dynamic of emotions is interesting. You're excited and releived to start out, and then you make it past checkins and hunker down for a couple hours at your gate, waiting for your plane. You're mad that the TSA clerk made you throw out your bottle of water, and then you're even madder that you paid stadium pricing for your little snacks. But then you're happy to have something in your tummy, and even slightly entertained with the tiny activity of eating and keeping your area clean. You worry about sudden terminal changes or about your luggage being lost, but that is the only thing that keeps you awake since you're so tired from being up early. But then you arrive to your vacation area, and you are reenergized and have renewed excitement. So, excited, relieved, mad, madder, happy, entertained, worried and tired, reenergized and renewed... the transit time can be sort of a mini-venture of it's own!
I took some pictures of the progress of our travel. I am grateful for Corey's forethought in this part of the vacation. He bought us little neck pillows, eye covers, and ear plugs for the Washington DC to London flight!

British Isles Cruise Itinerary

May 29-31 London, England
June 01 La Havre, France
June 02 Falmouth, England
June 03 Cobh (Cork), Ireland
June 04 Dublin, Ireland
June 05 Belfast, N. Ireland
June 06 Glasgow, Scotland
June 07 at sea
June 08 Innvergordon (Iverness), Scotland
June 09 Edinburgh, Scotland
June 10 at sea
June 11 Amsterdam, Netherlands
June 12 Brugges (Brussels), Belgium
June 13 Debark and head home!

DESTINATION EUROPE

After nearly 2 years of planning and saving $$$ (yes, saving, we are not charging a darn thing), DESTINATION EUROPE has arrived. We are leaving at O'Dark Thirty on Thursday morning, bound for London, England. We will head out on our cruise on Sunday afternoon bound for our first stop in Le Havre, France. This is close to where the soldiers stormed the beach at Normandy during WWII.

As we continue our journey, enjoy our blog as we will try to update it every night or close to every night so you can follow our journey. If you have a Gmail account, you can log in and post comments on each of our posts.

Oh, for you PLNU staff and faculty, "Flat Gary" will be accompanying us during our trek around the British Isles.

We are leaving the 'kids' at home with their grandfather and enjoying some quiet time with each other. Woo Hoo. This trip, of course, is practice for us when we apply for the Amazing Race next year.

It is almost here...

In one month, Corey and Jen embark on a 17-day trip to Europe that includes a 13-day cruise of the British Isles. We will keep you posted as the time gets closer.