London: Saturday

Well, we've accomplished London in a day, as best as one can with a four month old in tote. What have we learned? Much the same as we learned in Rome in a day: there's way too much to see, and we will have to come back. But it's not clear we can afford to come back. We spent the day pretending the prices were actually all in dollars (and even then, things weren't cheap...). Let's start things off with a sample picture (for those crazy Americans just asking to be run over):


Tim had a plan, and we managed to hit everything we intended to get to. We started early, with breakfast at a greasy spoon and a stop at a supermarket for baby wipes. Then we headed over to the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey. We went inside the abbey and did the entire tour; very impressive and very much worth the cost of admission.





From there, we headed on up north to Trafalgar Square. We went into the National Gallery for about a half an hour; saw the highlights (Tim had pre-researched some paintings he wanted to see; I just wanted to see the impressionist rooms). It was getting on about lunchtime, so we headed into the Covent Garden area, saw the markets, and had a fantastic lunch (with pints) at an upscale pub. I had Shepherd's Pie; Tim had Venison, Beef, and Red Currant Pie. He had beer; I had cider. Yum.



After lunch, we caught the Underground and went to Saint Paul's Cathedral. We peeked inside, but didn't pay the admission to tour the entire place.



We walked down to the next Underground station and headed for the Tower of London. We did pay to go inside here, and we took the Beefeater-guided tour. Fantastically amusing. We didn't take a lot of time to look at the buildings aside from this tour; there was a lot to see that we missed. From here, we went out and grabbed a quick view of the Tower Bridge, and then walked along the Thames to the London Bridge.





The next stop was the Monument; Tim wanted to climb it to get some good views of London. But the Monument is closed for renovation until December, so we had to forego that stop. We instead grabbed another Underground and went towards Buckingham Palace. We walked along the mall, and ended up at the Palace. We didn't go in (it was too late by now), but we got some good views all around.



After a brief stop in Saint James park for a rest, we headed back to the hotel to get everything repacked and ready to go for the morning.



Jamie came in this evening (she was good and stayed for the entire conference in Croatia), so we met up with her and grabbed some Indian food for dinner. Very good. Tim and Jamie are "having a pint" now; I brought Maya back to the hotel for bed. Our wakeup call comes in less than 7 hours, and then its back to Austin.