London - Day 4 - Thursday

We realized that it was time to get serious about our sightseeing, so we found a place near Trafalgar Square where we could pick up the hop-on/hop-off tour bus and at least get a good idea of places we wanted to come back to visit.

Our first place to hop off was at St. Paul's cathedral which is situated on the highest point in London. It's where Charles and Diana were married. From there we walked towards the river and past the Tower of London. On the riverwalk between the tower and the river we had some great views of the Tower Bridge as well. Since A had seen the Tower on her 1-day whirlwind trip 3 months ago, the rest of us decided to save our visit for another day. Instead we caught the Thames River tour which took us on a leisurely ride down the river and dropped us off at Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament. After seeing the big bell tower up close we walked a few blocks more and were right outside Westminster Abbey. Again, A had recently visited and D had seen it a few years ago, so C and I took the audio tour while the others scouted the area for lunch places. In a way it's too bad the Abbey doesn't allow photos because there was so much to see and I surely don't remember it all. But we'd have taken 2-3 times longer to tour if I'd gotten photos of everything I wanted!

Next stop, lunch for 4 hungry women. A & D had scoped out a place we had to visit, The Old Monk Exchange. Since we had no old monks to exchange for lunch, they accepted our cash. We looked for Harry, the Abbott of St. Costello but did not see him. At least we did not have to play charades with the waitstaff!

Feeling refreshed we walked by New Scotland Yard and C flirted with 2 leather-clad cops from afar. A few more blocks away was Buckingham Palace where we got some pretty good photos of the front of the palace as well as of the gate to Green Park, which is right beside it. Walking around the palace walls (the back & sides are really quite ordinary) we came upon the Wellington Arch and got a few good photos of that.

It was late afternoon by this point so after walking around for HOURS (well not hours, but it seems like hours when your feet are very tired!) we finally found another stop for the hop-on/hop-off bus. It took us back to Trafalgar where we caught the tube back to the hotel. Rain began to fall about this time and continued through the evening. However, we considered ourselves fortunate as this was the only rain we encountered all week.

We finished the night with 4th row seats to Mamma Mia! at the Prince of Wales Theatre. Because it was a Thursday night, we had several understudies but everyone was fantastic. Naturally we brought our feather boas along and had them on display for the final few numbers.

One difference we noticed about London vs. NYC is that the city actually DOES sleep. There were not a lot of eating establishments open after the show and we barely made it to the hotel dining room before it closed. With lots of walking, we are plenty tired and none of us will have trouble falling asleep!