London, May 31

We woke up feeling fairly rested having slept from midnight to 9 in the morning.

At eleven o’clock, we departed the hotel to meet the Underground to take to Greenpark station. This was fairly straightforward in the main. Alistair, though because he was under the age limit of “an adult”, had to run through the gates when you presented your ticket. This was not very smart becuase he was often hit by the door. This was there way of not having to print as many tickets. So when one of the rest of us put our ticket through Alistair would have to be right behind us and when the gates opened, run through them with us. The train ride took nearly one hour. This was very interesting to see some of the outscurts of the city.

We went through Green Park. We started seeing people spreading out blankets for picnic lunches, and having business meetings. This was a fun sight. We walked through the park a little bit more and then found Buckingham Palace. This was a lot of fun after seeing this on television with the Royal Wedding. We looked through the gates and saw the traditional guards and people coming out. We thought this was the Queen but it was only her guests.

We walked down the street in from of Buckingham Palace seeing all of the flags. All of these flags were in place because of the Diamond Jubilee. This happened to be the Queens’s 60th Anniversary as Queen of England. It was very interesting to see the construction happening for the event.

We then proceeded across another park to find ourselves face to face with Big Ben. This was a really neat sight to see after all of the pictures that I’ve seen before. The next more exciting thing for me to see was Westminster Abbey.

This was particularly alluring to me because of the organ. I walked in astonished at the architecture and wonder of the cathedral. I walked around the whole entire thing hoping to get a glimpse of the Organ Console. To my complete dismay, I could only hear it but not see it. The pipes were extraordinary! I saw the light reflections and the amazing shape but what I was not so happy about, was all of the statues of famous, rich, British Leaders. This was not welcome to me, especially since we were in a church. I saw the tombs that said beside them that supposedly famous kings and queens were within them but it was hard to know because there wasn’t much security around them. The whole feeling of the place had more of the feel of a museum which was kind of sad to me especially because it is such a beautiful place.

Later we had lunch and went to the British Museum. This was a lot of fun. We saw the Egypt wing. Alistair was particularly interested in this. I could hear the voice of our Turkey tour guide, Meli, saying “All of this was unrightfully stolen everywhere!” Furiously. She did not like the British Museum at all because of this.

We later rode the train back to our hotel and prepared to depart for Johannesburg. It had been a fun day.

The flight later was smooth and almost empty! We could spread out very comfortably and lie down!