45under45: London Day 3

Our two day "hop on, hop off" bus passes expired at this point. So, today we took the "Tube". As a family, we love the taking the subway! It gives us all an opportunity to do something the locals probably find mundane and dreadful but we think it is exciting! Onward trusty steed!

After all of that goofing around, it was time to be quite proper at the Tower of London.

As we entered the grounds Shawn noticed the sign for the wait time for the Crown Jewels was zero minutes. So, we walked (quite briskly) to the exhibit and indeed...THERE WAS NO WAIT! We had the place to ourselves. Summer and Nicholas rode the moving sidewalk around the Crown Jewels about ten times while my mom and I had a lovely conversation with a British woman. She had a raspy voice that sounded like a man's and that made it all the more enjoyable to listen to her as she patiently answered our questions. (My understanding is that the Brits are taught history in school and their sense of pride for their country means that they have an inherent interest in retaining the information.)

Once we had our fill of the Crown Jewels, it was time for visiting the guards and snapping pics. Nicholas was up first.

Then Summer. (Note the "England. Just Do It." T-shirt and skinny jeans. Apropos for the trip!)

Circa 1981:

It damn near killed the kids to link arms. But this was important for the shot.

Whoops. Wrong guard. Good enough though.

We did the wall walk, saw an exhibit on making coins, bought a handy little book about the Tower of London and took our own guided tour with me in the role of docent. (Due to the "heat wave" the Yeoman Warder tour wasn't taking place in the usual way. We were invited to sit in a room with 100+ and have a Q and A with the guard. No thanks.)

Some of the ravens roamed about but several were kept in cages. Even the free ones perched themselves on the outside of the cages...my guess is that they were hungry and knew this was a nice place for an easy meal.