London: Part III

The sun finally came out today in London! It was actually quite a nice day, except for the fact that it was still absolutely freezing and horribly windy. It was our last day in London (minus the short time we'll have there on Saturday before my early flight on Sunday), so I was really happy that I got to see it in nice weather. We're in Bristol now - we arrived here in the dark, so I haven't seen anything yet.

Our first stop today was the Tower of London which is not, in fact, just a tower.

Towers! Walls! Buildings! Moats! It's got everything.

Even fake lions! (Lions used to live in a dry part of the moat - partly as a form of protection, though mostly as part of the royal menagerie.)

The Tower of London was very cool. You buy admission to go across the moat into the main complex which is quite enormous. Inside there are a bunch of museums and areas to walk around, all of which you can access at your leisure. There are buildings that were lived in, buildings for soldiers, torture chambers, prison cells (for people like Sir Walter Raleigh), an old chapel that William the Conqueror commissioned, and more. Some shots of the interior complex:

A part of the castle that used to be living quarters.

 

The White Tower. Originally built under the Normans (the cool cathedral that William and Conqueror built was inside, but I couldn't take a picture of it) and then expanded and changed over the centuries. It served many purposes under the different kings.

Walking between all the towers and buildings along one of the interior walls.

More buildings/towers/walls.

The large castle that houses the crown jewels today.

Another shot of the White Tower.

The "Queen's House." Couldn't find a great description of what that means exactly, but a governor of some sort lives in those buildings now.

There was a lot to see in the Tower of London. As I mentioned, we saw the crown jewels (very fancy, very sparkly, reminded me why it's great that America doesn't have kings and queens and how silly I think it is that the British are obsessed with the monarchs) and lots of exhibits on people who lived/were imprisoned in the Tower. We also saw the ravens, which are a famous part of the Tower of London. There was apparently once a prophecy that told a king - Charles II, I think - that if all the ravens left the Tower of London, he would fall as king. So he had all the ravens' wings clipped so they would stay. They still keep them around today and they're all over the place.

They are also quite enormous.

Here are a few other photos of things we saw/did in the Tower of London:

A very large/intricate/accurate astrology drawing carved into a wall by a prisoner who was imprisoned for sorcery. It was one of a ton of graffiti that had been left by prisoners in the Tower over the centuries. (Pretty cool to see Medieval graffiti.)

Michelle "shooting" a crossbow.

Wearing an extremely heavy piece of armor. 

The smallest suit of armor in the world (built as a ceremonial suit for a young king) and the largest suit of armor in the world (probably built for a man who was 6'8" - quite literally a giant at that point in time).

The Tower Bridge is right next to the Tower of London, so we walked past that after visiting the Tower and before we stopped for (a totally awesome) lunch. (By chance we found a cool cafe that had delicious sandwiches. Super delicious.) Tower Bridge is not to be confused with London Bridge. I didn't even see London Bridge because apparently it is ugly and nothing to look at. Tower Bridge is the one you think of when you think of a famous London Bridge.

Tower Bridge photo 1.

And Tower Bridge photo 2.

The area we stumbled upon where we found our cool little cafe. Pretty nice, right?

Afterward we went over to the British Museum which is basically the main general museum in London. It's filled with tons of historical artifacts from all over the world. It was super interesting - but it's really absurd how much stuff from Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, Ancient Everywhere is in that museum. During colonization the British (and the French to a great extent as well) pretty much just stole all these priceless artifacts and then refused to give it all back. Yes, it was really amazing to see the Rosetta Stone...but shouldn't the Rosetta Stone be in Egypt or Greece? And the rooms and rooms and rooms of Egyptian artifacts... And, most polemically, the British Museum has pretty much the entirety of the decorative face of the Parthenon. They refuse entirely to give it back to Greece, despite the Greeks demanding that it be returned to them (the Brits took it all when Athens was under the control of the Ottomans; their excuse is that the Ottomans told them they didn't care if they took it all). The museum has a lame little brochure defending themselves ("it's everyone's history, not just the Greeks'!"), but I clearly wasn't convinced.

Anyway, my point is that it was all extremely cool to see - but it really is a shame that there is so much that should clearly be in other countries.

The outside of the British Museum. It's a huge building.

The inside courtyard of the museum with this crazy glass ceiling.

After the museum we walked to this nice little shopping area called Covent Gardens and peeked into some shops until we got too cold and had to sit down in a pub and have a beer. The area was very pretty - and very different. There seem to be lots of different areas in London.

Pretty little shops. Looking at this photo, it almost makes me think of Old Town.

The main square in this Covent Gardens neighborhood.

Whew, and I think that is all of London. We definitely did a lot of touristing, so I think I saw a lot. On Saturday I might stop by Westminster Abbey/Parliament again (since we didn't make it back there) but overall I'm pleased with everything I saw!

Oh, and I also realized that one of the reasons that London doesn't feel super foreign is because the people really don't look that different than Americans. Yes, they're a bit shorter and slighter on a whole, but they look a lot more like Americans than the French do.

Tomorrow we'll tour around Bristol with Michelle's friend we're staying with and then Thursday we head to Bath for the day. Exciting!

It is SO cold in London

This is actually the coldest I've been on any of my European trips thus far. For whatever reason, today was the coldest March day in London in more than two decades - and boy was it cold. It never got above freezing and the windchill made it feel like it was 16. It snowed this morning and then the wind just wouldn't stop, so it was a bit of a brutal day. I'm really hoping it warms up a little over the rest of the week! Tomorrow it's supposed to be up to 37, but with gusts of wind up to 40 mph, so I'm not too optimistic.

Me in Hyde Park getting buffeted/frozen/destroyed by the wind.

The first thing we did today was go to inside tourist sites. Michelle and I went to the Natural History Museum (I love all museums with dinosaurs!) and then to the Victoria and Albert Museum, though we didn't see much of the second because we were on our way to get lunch with her friend afterward. The Natural History Museum was very nicely done and, as any natural history museum, was packed to the brim with both tourists and small children on field trips. But there were some good exhibits on dinosaurs, mammals, fossils, etc.

Natural History Museum - pretty impressive building, right?

Monkey carved into one of the columns inside the museum. 

Main entrance hall of the museum (with their dinosaur named Dippy - whose head I didn't get into the picture). It was a really gorgeous museum.

The V&A (Victoria and Albert Museum) is right next door and we stopped in their quickly as well though we only had time to go through an exhibit on fashion (which I liked very much!) and see a room full of giant Raphael paintings. It wasn't a big deal that we couldn't go for too long though because the museums, as many are in London, are free to enter. It's another way that the city reminds me a bit of D.C. Not starkly, but there are certain things that are similar to D.C. (lack of tons of tall buildings, light colors of buildings, government buildings, etc. Also, the English language.)

The V&A. Another pretty building.

The entry right as you walk into the V&A Museum. I loved the chandelier.

We got lunch with Michelle's friend, Emily, on Oxford Street which is one of the major shopping streets in London. Appropriately, I bought a dress at TopShop, a British store, so my British shopping quota has been met. We went in and out of a bunch of shops up and down the street and eventually went into Selfridge's which is one of their big expensive department stores. Get this: they were advertising a "shoe carnival" which was basically just a massive display of all the shoes that are just coming out for the season so there were thousands of pairs of shoes to look at. Heaven. I also made the decision that if I ever save up money to buy a designer pair of shoes, it's going to be a pair of Christian Louboutin's because I loved a ton of the shoes I saw in his department.

An enormous row of double-decker buses on Oxford Street. Just bus after bus after bus.

A pair of Louboutin's that I absolutely fell in love with. If only I had $600 or so to spare...

Seriously. I loved looking at all the shoes. Luckily Michelle loves shoes, too.

We walked to the end of Oxford Street to Marble Arch (which, unsurprisingly, is a big giant marble arch in honor of a war) and to Hyde Park, which is basically London's equivalent of Central Park. Though it would have been around long before Central Park. It was so cold however, as you can see in my first picture, that we didn't last long there and soon after we got back on the subway to go meet another of Michelle's friends for a drink.

Marble Arch and a bunch of pigeons that were super puffed-up against the cold.

We went over to an open-air market, Borough, which was closed since it was after five so maybe we'll go back later, to meet Michelle's friend. We peeked into an old church, the Southwark (pronounced "Suth-erk") Cathedral, and then headed to an old pub called the George. The pub is so old that Shakespeare used to stay in the inn above it and drink in the pub, as did Charles Dickens. It was very authentically British. We had a few pints (I had a British ale which is very flat, not dissimilar to Guinness) and chatted; it was a lot of fun! It was nice to buy a beer that didn't cost 6 or 7 euro for a pint! Also, Michelle high-fived me at one point which I reacted to by saying, "Oh my gosh, I miss high fives!!" which her friend thought was quite funny. The idea of high-fiving in France is quite bizarre - in any circumstances.

The front of the Southwark Cathedral, which has been around since 1400 or something.

More Southwark Cathedral. 

 Entrance to the George and a picture from one of the balconies. It was very authentic inside - clearly not much had changed over the centuries! Very, very cool.

A picture of the inn/pub from the outside. Not a great picture, but you get the gist.

Tomorrow we have a lot planned and in the evening we'll be headed to Bristol! The wind is still absurdly loud and strong right now - I hope it calms down by tomorrow or Wednesday!

Again, not a ton of history in this post. It's honestly also just been nice to see Michelle and catch up and meet her friends and chat with people in English! It's a bit of a reprieve from France. I'll be re-energized to go back for another six weeks before the program ends.

Sleepy - must go to bed now!

English Weather

Hello from England! It is cloudy and freezing here.

The first thing I did when I got to England yesterday evening was speak in French. When the border guard asked me where I was a teacher and I told him that I was in a high school in the south of France he immediately switched to French and spoke to me in French for the rest of the questions. I don't know if he was trying to faze me or if he just wanted to speak in French...

Look - a very British thing! Not French at all!

Anyway, I'm in London, staying with Michelle at her friends' apartment. Today we got up and wandered around London with a couple of her friends and like I said, it was bitterly cold. It might have felt like spring in Normandy but it feels like the dead of winter in London right now. It's also, unfortunately, cloudy and on-and-off misty. But we went out anyway and saw a lot of the major sites in London: the Globe Theater, Trafalgar Square, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Parliament. We didn't go in anywhere today since the weather might be worse tomorrow, so tomorrow we'll probably go into some museums and see the Tower of London and the Tower Bridge.

I don't have a whole lot of history to tell today since we mostly just wandered around (and then came back here before it got dark because it's so freezing), but I do have some pictures!

The walk along the south bank of the Thames. We stopped and got coffee in a trendy cafe after we went into a modern art museum.

Shakespeare's Globe Theater! I'd like to maybe go back and go inside tomorrow or Tuesday.

Parliament and Big Ben. Very quintessentially London. 

Big Ben and Parliament + the London Eye.

In Trafalgar Square in front of Nelson's Column. Michelle bought a bright neon jacket (and then talked about how excited she was about her bright neon jacket nonstop) and therefore stuck out everywhere that we went.

Another very London picture!

Walking up to Buckingham Palace. It was actually a very unobtrusive building. It wasn't super elaborate or ornate. If you took away the gates and the big statue, it would probably just look like a government building.

Buckingham Palace continued.

St. James Park, right next to Buckingham Palace. There were all kinds of birds in the park - it was crazy! Unfortunately my camera was dying so I couldn't get a lot of pictures.

Big Ben. It's in pristine condition.

In front of Westminster Abbey, which was closed because it was a Sunday (except for religious services). We'll probably try to go back on Tuesday.

And one more shot of Parliament. We'll go back to this area tomorrow so I want to get more pictures. My camera was dying so I was taking rushed pictures and turning my camera off to conserve the batteries.

Not the most exciting or educational blog post today. Tomorrow since I'll be going into museums and monuments, hopefully I'll be able to tell more interesting stories!

Forgetting how to plan a trip

I’m writing this from the Paris airport. It got late quickly last night and I didn’t have time to post about Mont Saint-Michel. I left Caen early this morning and I’m waiting for my flight to London this evening. Then on to the second leg of the vacation!

Yesterday we didn’t do much in the morning because it was gray and rainy and our plan was to go to Mont Saint-Michel in the afternoon.

Mont Saint-Michel!

Mont Saint-Michel is not easily accessible – from anywhere. The trains are scarce and we were given the choice of a train at 7am and then no return until 5pm or a train at 2pm (to arrive at 4pm) and a return at 7pm. We figured we wouldn’t want to be at Mont Saint-Michel for eight hours, so we went with the later time.

Unfortunately, we didn’t really have enough time to see everything – and the clouds rolled in pretty much as soon as we got off the bus. We also – I have no idea why since we’re definitely experienced travelers – neglected to check the hours of the abbey at Mont Saint-Michel. It closes at 6pm, which I saw when we got there, so we figured no problem. But, of course, the last entry is at 5pm. So we didn’t get to go into the abbey which was extremely disappointing. Totally our fault, but still. Frustrating.

The abbey that we didn't get to see.

And its entrance!

Anyway, Mont Saint-Michel is an abbey built on a mountain in the middle of some marshes out on the coast of northeastern France. It was first built in the 700s, though the current abbey and the tiny town surrounding it on the hills of the mount have changed over the centuries. Mont Saint-Michel is well-known because of the massive differences in high and low tide. The high tide can sweep in at something like 17 feet per second; at the highest/lowest tides the mount is either a hill in a marsh or an island in water. Pretty cool, right? (Another bummer: the tides weren’t noticeably different yesterday. That purely depends on when you go in the year/monthly lunar cycle though.)

Very high tide (example from Google)

Versus very low tide (also from Google). It looked more like this when we were there.

(Side note: a bunch of surfers just walked past me – having just arrived – in the airport. First of all, I don’t know where they think they’re going to surf or how they’re going to get those giant surfboards to wherever they’re going. Secondly, they look ridiculous because they have on flip-flops and it’s probably only 50 degrees outside)

The town of Mont Saint-Michel was pretty cool. There is a cool path you can walk around on the outside of the walls of the city and despite all the tourist shops, it’s still pretty quaint. It’s a lot like the town I visited when my family was here, Rocamadour, just in a totally different setting.

Some of the streets.

Walking along the ramparts.

I supposed it was worth going to Mont Saint-Michel because it’s something that you’re supposed to see in Normandy and it would stink if I didn’t get to go in the future and every time I’d say I’d been to Normandy, I’d have to say no when people would ask the inevitable question of, “Oh, did you go see Mont Saint-Michel?” But it wasn’t necessarily a great little trip. I’m disappointed we didn’t have more time, didn’t see the abbey, didn’t see the big tide changes, couldn’t see it lit up at night, etc (half of that is my fault, a fact I’m well aware of). I’d like to go back in the future (and stay in one of the really cool little hotels actually in the town!) and have more time to explore – and also plan to be there to see the tide changes. In all, I don’t regret going, but it was a bit disappointing. It was a lot of time and money spent on trains for something that I didn’t love. I definitely enjoyed the tour of the beaches and the Bayeux Tapestry more.

But hey – this is still a pretty amazing site!

View from the ramparts.

Another view.

The abbey at sunset, as we were leaving. The sun peaked back out again as we were getting ready to get on the bus back to the train station.

Now it’s on to England. First stop London (I think for three nights) and then to Bristol, Bath, and Oxford. I don’t know what my internet will be like since we’ll be staying with Michelle’s friends, but my goal is to keep posting! I’m excited to see Michelle for the first time in about six months!