On my first full day in London, miracles happened.
I saw the Queen. The Queen.
She was roughly as far from me as you are from this screen. In her car, wearing
a cute pastel suit and matching hat, chatting with a lady-in-waiting, being
ruler of half the world. Whoa.
When we set out to plan our London trip, we created both
serious and joke goals ie, Visit Buckingham Palace, meet the Queen. Turns out,
it’s harder to see Buckingham than the leading lady herself. She might just be
in a sexy town car inches away from you outside Charing Cross station. We were
just touring around, hitting up the War Rooms (where Churchill planned WWII)
and Westminster Abbey (Royal Wedding, lots of dead people), walking back up to
the tube. And suddenly a motorcase with THE QUEEN OF ENGLAND (and Australia,
Canada, Scotland, Wales, and over twenty others…) passes by. I have never
considered myself lucky, but now, I think I am.
I am not making this up. I saw the Queen of England, on my first full day in London. By chance. Or fate.
This moment was so impressionable on me that I purchased a
50p poster of HM first thing the following morning. We started our day at the
Royal Mews, where the big fam keeps some of the silly Cinderella coaches on
display. Think lots of smelly horses, velvety cushions, and goldleaf emblems.
We proceeded to Buckingham Palace twenty minutes before the changing of the
guard. Forget it. It was a complete mobscene (only Harrod’s was worse…) and 5’3”
me couldn’t see anything. I swung up on the gates to catch just a glimpse before
a policeman made me get down. He was the only not nice British person I’ve met
so far. We decided we're better off Youtubing it. As we headed away from the guard change, we were a little disappointed,
but since we saw the queen, nothing could really be upsetting.
We stopped by two more museums before a boat cruise: the
Cavalry Museum (more horses, some funny hats, several shiny swords) and the
Banqueting Room (frescos, flowers, beheadings – typical Brit stuff). The boat
cruise was impossibly slow and the guide, inaudible. We were in a hurry, hoping
to see the Tate Modern, St. Paul, London Bridge, Globe Theater, Tower Bridge,
and London Tower (insertbreathinghere) in the afternoon. Hard to hurry when you're stuck on a boat though... Not sure why we
thought this was remotely realistic in threeish hours. Without factoring in
lunch.
We ended up at London Tower, (not a tower but actually) an entire village with
hysterical tours run by ‘beefeaters’. While I still don’t positively know why they
are called beefeaters, I do think they are delightful and charming people who
know a lot about every single captured, tortured, and beheaded person in
Britain in the last 1000 years. We also got to see the crown jewels there,
which are shockingly sparkly. After Kate tried to sneak a picture, a guard made
her delete it and then told us a wonderful history of the Crown of India, the
shiniest of them all. Turns out, if you sold half the jewels, you could take
half of India out of poverty in minutes. But, instead it’s in a box in the
Tower of London, not being worn, and just being sparkly. We also saw the armor
of every great royal, torture weapons in a dungeon, angry-looking young
beefeaters, and the graves of most of those beheaded queens.
We took some nice dusk photos on Tower Bridge, which is what
you probably think of as London Bridge. We sang the Fergie hit song “London
Bridge,” a classic, before ascending to the top of the centuries old
drawbridge. They have a beautiful photo gallery of other famous bridges,
including the Brooklyn Bridge, which made me all excited for America again. How
can you not enjoy the views of downtown London lit up around the Thames?!
Pretty stuff.
After procuring a sheet of children’s stickers and candy canes
from the Bridge, we headed to Starbucks to rest our feet and get some wifi to
plan our night. The original plan considered Brick Lane for Indian food and
24-hr bagels, but that was quickly reconsidered for a Hyde Park Harrod’s and
Winter Wonderland adventure. Shopping and Christmas won. I
should really wait for New York bagels anyway (hint: that means everything
toasted with veggie cream cheese, tomato/onion/lox at the airport…).
Harrod’s Christmas shop and souvenirs floor was a
claustrophobic nightmare of tacky tourists clamoring for stuffed animals and
keyrings, the only under 20GBP items in the whole store. We eventually escaped
the utter madness of Texan accents and double-decker bus ornaments to the
bottom floor: fine jewelry and accessories. Elizabeth looked for mittens, but
only found cashmere. Kate and I searched engagement rings and emerald necklaces
and interviewed a DeBeers associate on her favorite cuts and sets. We are now
experts – we just need someone who loves us a
lot to make that kind of sparkling investment. Kidding! Sort of…
After Harrod’s, we got lost and asked some chauffeurs for
directions. They drive Rolls Royces outside Knightsbridge Apartments. If you
know anyone who lives there, please do put us in touch.
Since we do not have wallets that sponsor DeBeers and Rolls
Royces, we ate at a pub, enjoying chips and cider and such British fare. The
subsequent Hyde Park WinterWonderland was a magical carnival world, with fudge
and ice skating and lights. You could smell happiness. Or maybe just sugar and
beer.
We tubed home after checking out the hotels on Park Lane. I
will be sending every event department there my resume in the next week.
As this has been an exhaustive blog, so too was this day.
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