England Trip -- Day 10

We are so exhausted.  Today was a good day, but long! 



We started from Carrie and Ben's house this morning and packed up the car.  Then we were off to London for the day!



We passed the time in the car playing the initials game (where everybody has to guess the identity of the person whose initials you picked.  You answer "yes" and "no" questions until they guess it right.  It's fun.).



We checked into our hotel (which is really nice!  The Radisson Blu, really close to the airport) and then made our way to the center of London.  We got totally ripped off in a taxi, which took us to a subway station, where we rode the Tube! 


I had never ridden it before, so it was interesting.  Actually, it's very similar to the metro system in Mexico City, with which I became very familiar during my summer there.



When we finally got to Picadilly Circus, we found our tour bus and began touring the city.  What can you say about London? 


It's enormous and has more history than our entire country.  It's like a cross between New York City and Washington DC, sort of.  It was crazy crowded and busy.  The top of the tour bus was like a little safe spot above the crowds. 
 

There's too much history and interesting things in the city to even begin to try to do it justice in a blog.  But sufficed to say we learned some interesting things about some buildings, and I'll probably have forgotten it by next week, if not tomorrow.  Still, it was time/money well spent.  And we were glad we did it.



We had dinner at one of Jamie Oliver's restaurants!  That was a real treat, because he is inspirational to me.  He is an English chef who traveled to the US to try to reform our elementary school food programs.  There was a show about his efforts, and it was infuriating to watch (because of all the resistance he came upon), but I commend him for his efforts.  Anyways--his restaurant is fantastic!  We were thoroughly impressed with every dish we tried.  He has several restaurants, actually.  I hope someday he opens one in Texas!  That would be so fun to visit.




There was a talented street performer/comedian/magician in Covent Garden, and we enjoyed watching his little show before dinner.



After dinner we finished our tour and then headed back on the Tube--and then a bus--to finally arrive back in our hotel a bit ago.  Carrying and feeding and changing a 6-week-old while touring and eating out in a place like London is just exhausting.  I am so eager to go to bed!  Tomorrow we fly home, so no blog post tomorrow.
 

It's been a great trip, over all!  There were some hard parts and also some very fun parts.  It has been so nice to see Ben and Carrie and spend time with them.  I hope to always remember this trip--but if not...  at least I can read back on our (mis)adventures on the blog, day by day.  Thanks for reading!