Tower of London Day

XXII BLOG Toto Travels
1 June – London Day 1
After a light breakfast, Fiona suggested we take the bus to central London if we were not in a hurry. It seemed like a good way to see the city, so off we went, taking a left from our BnB a few blocks to Parsons Green Park. We passed by the Parsons Green tube station on our way to the park. It was a lovely green as we walked through to the bus stops for the 22 bus to Piccadilly.

It was a pretty neat, although long, drive into central London. The traffic moved well for about 40 minutes then we were surrounded by buses and traffic came to a stand still. We departed the bus around the royal Academyof Arts and walked to Piccadilly Circus. Then to St James Park and around to Horse Guards Road. I wanted to wait to see the horse guards a bit more and asked Mike about watching the changing of the guard, but he didn’t want to do that. We wandered around and he
didn’t really have a plan, I was waiting for Mike to decide what he wanted to do. That really never happened, so I took us toward Big Ben and went across the Thames on Westminster Bridge and by the London Eye to the rooftop gardens. The South Bank is pretty nice now. Mike finally decided he wanted to go to the Tower of London.

I was getting hungry and cranky and insisted on eating something at Waterloo Station before we took the tube toward the Tower of London. So we ate a pretty lousy sandwich at Waterloo station before we took the Jubilee line to London Bridge. Walking toward the Thames again, we found very neat shopping areas and much better restaurants. I had to agree with Mike that I wish I had waited to eat lunch. Oh well. We walked across Tower Bridge and around the Tower of London walls to get to the west side entrance. We spent almost two hours touring the Tower of London, it is my third trip and I enjoy the history here very much. This time there were several multi-media presentations which makes the history come alive. Mike would not queue up for the Crown Jewels so I was glad I had already seen them twice. Of course I don’t remember specifics about them, just a large diamond, many other jewels and an impressive display.
Mike was ready to move on, so we walked to the tube and took the District Line to Victoria which is where we were meeting the Kennedys for dinner. Since we were early, we relaxed in a pub – The Duke of York – and had a pint of Young’s London Gold ale. It was great and good to sit and relax. Since Young was Mike’s Mother’s maiden name, made it extra special.

We walked out, turned the corner, crossed the street and met the Kennedys. After some discussion, we decided to eat at Seafresh and have fish and chips. They had found a favorite pub, Queen Arms, but it was too crowded. The Seafresh was very good, but not as good as it was in 1997 and 2003.
The Queen Arms was still busy after dinner, so we popped into the Warick Inn and had a Guinness with Mike and Karen. A very nice evening with the Kennedys and it was time to take to tube to Parsons Green and walk back to our B and B.