Whirlwind tour of London

After UKYC, Kate Barr flew in, and Shann, Cals, Kate & I stayed at the Bucklers for the weekend and enjoyed their amazing hospitality. It was at that point that Shann & I decided that our bags were way too heavy to drag through London and we repacked and sent some things home to lighten up the cases.
Monday morning Mike Higgs, Bek Thiele, Abigail Coish, Cals & I all headed to London. We hit the ground running and spent the afternoon between the British Museum (which isn't that amazing when you are really really tired, actually would like to go back someday)& Buckingham Palace. I was shocked by the Palace. Why on EARTH would the queen choose to live right there with traffic going by right around the palace? But then I'm not the queen, and maybe it wouldn't be a good thing for the palace to be elsewhere!!
Katie Morahan met up with us in the evening and we split up with the other guys (heading on to St Johns and Bek busing back to Brum) and we went to the London eye and saw Big Ben. And what is so good about Big Ben? I'm not sure yet. To me it just seemed like any other clock tower in any part of the world but it had a name!!
The London Eye was great. To see all around filthy London was interesting. Actually I found the LE structure amazing, but if the view was just buildings I don't think I would've enjoyed it much at all. As you can see amazing architecture and man made buildings don't grab me much at all. But I did enjoy the view over the river as the sun set, and then Cals and I went on a cruise down the river which was really peaceful and relaxing. We had planned an nice dinner somewhere overlooking the river and then the only thing they had on the boat were pasties!! But we made the most of them, and the most of the plastic plates, and cutlery. And made the most of the cruise above the food on the boat:-)
Then it was back down the tube... so glad I didn't have to do it in rush hour. What an organised system of transport!
We were so thankful that we didn't have to carry our cases around with us the whole day. We then got back to the 'left luggage' and made a bargain with the nice guy for us to leave our baggage there, but to collect a few things for the night. It made getting back to Katie's apartment which she was sharing with her brother and sister-in-law so much easier.
We had a fly by night visit with Jonny Roberts and then crashed.
The next morning on our rushed exit to the airport, we randomly bumped into Justin Alderson who was staying with Jonny at the station!
On to the airport, and I must say, I have sounded slightly negative throughout this post, (but maybe it's because I've heard a lot about some British Icons, and they just haven't meant much to me.. ) but they definitely need to redo the London airport. Maybe it's because it's so busy that they never get a chance to, but the area we flew out from was like the old Virgin Blue shed that we used before our international airport!! :-)

Our 12 hour dash through London was fun. But I'm glad we didn't have any more time there. I much prefer scenery over the busy city lifestyle.