Day 26-Planes, Trains and Automobiles

I know that this is the day that everybody is going to wish they got
to do with us. It is currently 4am Utah time and we have been up for 6
1/2 hours already. We left our apartment at 5:30 am in London. We
walked to Victoria station, caught a bus to Paddington Station, took a
train to Heathrow airport where the lady checking us in told me that
there was a problem with 3 of us and then walked off with our
passports for a 1/2 hour.
She did finally come back with our passports and all of our boarding
passes, so I guess she solved the problem. Next we went through
security, and I must say they are much more secure than in Salt Lake.
Then we got to wait for 1 1/2 hours for a plane to Paris.
We were on the ground during this flight longer than we were in the
air. Once at Charles DeGaulle, we got to take a shuttle bus to our
next terminal where we got to go through security again. This time I
was even treated to a pat down!
We had a 2 hour wait for our 9 hour flight to Atlanta.
Our flight went without complications. In Atlanta we had to go through
Customs and security again, but at least we had 4 hours to do it in.
We finally arrived into Salt Lake at 11:30 pm, or 6:30am London time!

Day 25- Last day in the UK!

Today we went to the British Museum. We spent most of our time in the
Egyptian, Greek and Roman areas. They had a large section of Egyptian
Mummies. It was interesting to most of us, but disturbing to Raven.
We also enjoyed the exhibit on money and one on clocks. We spent a few
hours there and only saw a fraction of the museum.
We also did some last minute shopping today that involved retracing
our steps to things we have seen this past week. We are packed now and
have to get up early tomorrow.
The picture for today is the kids showing off the toys they got at
Legoland yesterday. Raven got a Belville Princess set. London got a
tic-tac-toe game and Nathan got Star Wars Figures. It was really
important to them that we record this.
This has been a great trip. If only David were here I think I could
live this way. As it is, we are anxious to get home to him! Only 1
more day!

Day 24 - Legoland Windsor

As you can see, the surprise was Legoland! The kids were very excited.
We said we were going to Windsor and that there is a castle there. You
should have seen them when they found out we were going to Legoland.
Legoland Windsor is very similar to the one in California as far as
the number and types of rides. We saw two shows, one live and one 3D
movie. The favorite part by far was the miniland. We especially liked
the mini London. The gift shops were another favorite.
Unfortunately we had our worst weather of the whole trip today. We
really haven't had much rain, and we have managed to avoid 90% of
that, by today we had a steady drizzle all day. It was a fun day
anyway. We only have one day left! I can't believe how fast this trip
has gone by!

Day 23 - Rooftops of London

We had another busy day in London! We got up early and went to St. Paul's Cathedral in rush hour traffic. We've had some trouble on the underground this trip. Today there was a strike of the drivers on 3 of the lines. Another time they closed our line, and another there were severe delays because of a person on the track.
We managed to make it to St. Paul's quite early. We toured the cathedral, saw the tombs in the crypt, and climbed the 438 stairs to the top of the done. That is where this picture was taken from. We could see a lot of rooftops from here.
Next, we went to Kensington Palace. We saw a royal helicopter land on the lawn. The police guarding said they were picking up someone, but he didn't know who. We waited for a while to see who would come, but we eventually gave up and went inside. Kensington Palace was Princess Diana's home, and they are having a special exhibit since it is the 10th anniversary of her death. There were videos and slides of her, as well as several of her dresses. I didn't realize how old this palace was. This was the home of William & Mary. It was where Queen Victoria was born and grew up. It is still a current residence for the royal family. We had lunch at the Orangery.

 After lunch we went to the Handel House Museum. This is the home where George Fredrick Handel lived for the last 37 years of his life. This was where he wrote "Messiah" and where he died. The kids did another search activity, so we got to know this museum really well.
Our next stop was the London Aquarium. It wasn't my favourite aquarium, but it did have some fish and types of jellyfish I've never seen before. 

We went to Namco Station next door and the kids rode the bumper cars. They were the fastest, most violent, bumper cars I have ever seen. I was glad I didn't go on them. The boys had headaches when they got off.

Our last stop of the day was back to the 'rooftops of London' at the theatre to see "Mary Poppins". The cast, sets, music and everything was fantastic!

Our journey back to the flat was great tonight. We found the right bus by the theatre that took us right to our front door. We had front row seats on the top of the double decker bus for the ride as it went past Trafalgar Square and the Houses of Parliment.  

I have a surprise planned for the kids for tomorrow. It's sort of a reward for their being so great through all the museums, palaces, nature walks and everything we've done for the past month. They think we are going to Windsor Castle, but I think even I am getting bored with audio tours of old buildings, paintings and ghost stories.

I hope they enjoy the surprise!

Day 22 - Hampton Court Palace

We got off to a late start today. Our last couple of days we've been
out from 9am until 11 pm.
We went to Hampton Court Palace today. This was a palace of Henry
VIII. We went on a tour of his state rooms and the kitchens. The
kitchens were facinating. There was a whole wing of the house
dedicated to food preparations. Several kitchens, butchery, roasting
rooms, baking rooms, cold storage rooms and wine cellar. They would
cook for 600 people a day. The king and his court would have to move
to different palaces throughout the year because they would deplete
the local area of their resources.
The kids did an activity where they would go to different locations in
the palace where there have been ghost sightings and read about those
stories. They each got a pack of colored pencils for completing it.
The picture today is of us in the palace hedge maze. I ruined the fun
for Nathan because I happened to be reading in a novel a couple of
days ago where the character mentioned the Hampton Court Maze and the
secret for navigating it. I wanted to see if it was true, and it
turned out that it was, so we were never lost like Raven is trying to
make us out to be. We were able to help a lot of other lost people in
the maze get out.
We got back by 7pm tonight, which is quite early for us, but we need
the night to recoup because we have more busy days planned!

Day 21 - Tower Hill

We had a long and gruesome day today. By gruesome I mean our history
and literature field trips we had today. We spent several hours
exploring the Tower of London. We heard lots of gory stories of its
history. We saw the crown jewels and the ravens. Then we toured the
Tower Bridge. We got to walk across the top and go up and down the
pillars and into the engine room. We were able to see it open for a
boat to pass through as well.
We crossed the river and spent the next couple of hours exploring the
HMS Belfast, a light cruiser from WWII. That was really interesting.
We got to go all over the ship, which involved climbing lots of ladder
like staircases. They had a good audio guide and the different rooms
had manaquin displays depicting what they did in each part of the ship.
We finished out the day by going to see Macbeth, starring Patrick
Stewart in the title role. I read the play aloud to the kids on this
trip and talked about it a lot, so they were able to follow along
really well. Plus they knew when to expect bloody apparitions and
severed heads. This version kept to the script, but they set it in
WWII time for the set and costumes. It was easy to get the kids to
want to see Macbeth when it means getting to see Jean-Luc Picard.
We had quite the trek getting back across town. Everyone in the
theatre district wants on the underground at the same time, then our
connecting line was closed and we had to find a bus and then walk the
rest of the way. Needless to say I am tired and am going to crash now.