March 4th

Feb 26th

This was the day that everyone showed up. I got up and walked to the computer lab to wait for Dad’s call letting me know when they had showed up. When he called I met them at the train station and got them all set with train tickets and some maps. We hopped on the Tube and got back to their hotel. When they had gotten all their stuff dropped off and rested for a little while, we got a call from Frankie to see if we were in. Frankie, for those of you who don’t know her, is a pen pal of Millie’s from along time ago. They have been writing to each other for a long time, and she came to spend a couple of days with us in the city. We all met down in the lobby and went out for the rest of the day. We didn’t do a lot because everyone had a long day already by that point and was fairly tired. We headed off to get some food at the Black Friar. I think everyone but Frankie got one of their pies, which were really good. We sat around there talking for a while before moving on to the next set of sites. We walked out down along the river to the Tate Modern. An interesting building to be sure, but I think its more of Hanna’s cup of tea than mine. Its actually an old power station that was converted into a gallery. I thought is had some interesting pieces, but I have a hard time with modern art. For example, they had a couple of plates describing the pieces and it said something like this piece is thought to mean something or other. I can understand how that might be an issue with an artist long dead, but some of these pieces are only a couple of years old. It shouldn’t be that hard to ask the artist what he or she was going for. Whatever, maybe Hanna can explain it to me.

From there we walked over the Millennium Bridge to St. Paul’s cathedral and had a look. That’s a pretty cool structure but they were in the middle of a big restoration on the outside so we couldn’t see a lot of the outside architectural work, which was too bad. The inside was pretty nice, but we didn’t have a lot of time to look around because Evening Psalm was starting. They brought in a choir from Oxford College to sing that night. They did a really nice job and it sounded very pretty. The only problem I had was that I really couldn’t understand what they were saying. For some reason, that just wasn’t coming through. That was all most people were up for that day, so after a short walk to the Tube we were on our way home. Mom walked with me to the grocery store so I could get something to eat. She also wanted to get some chocolate because she had heard that is better here than back in the states. We picked up a couple of things and headed back

I got back to the flat and started to work on my computer with a couple of things that Dad had brought me. I was pretty excited to get my computer working again, so I got right on that. It looks like the hard drive is dead, but hopefully no much more. I sent the computer back with my parents to get fixed back home because with the exchange rate, it would be almost as much as new computer to get it fixed. If it’s just the hard drive, it should only take a couple of days to get fixed, but if not I’ll likely be getting a new computer. So, we’ll see how this all plays out. For sure from now on, I’m backing up my computer. With that busted, I just watched some TV and headed to a computer lab that our program has access to so I could check my mail then headed to bed.

Feb 27th

I got up and went and picked up Mom to go get some theatre tickets. We headed to Leicester Square to see what we could get for tickets. We ended up getting some really good seats to Wicked for that night. We had been planning on taking a tour of London on this bus service that takes you around the City and is pretty comprehensive. We ended up not going out to that because the weather was pretty windy and rainy, not really nice weather to go out and see the town in a bus. We ended up going to the Victoria and Albert Museum instead. That’s a pretty short walk from the place everyone was staying, so it made for a good trip. We spent a long time walking around there. The first place I went to with Mom and Dad was this area where they had casts of all these famous pieces of sculpture. They had David, works by Michelangelo and Raphael and Donatello. It was so cool. They had this one column that had to be a hundred feet tall. They had it cut up into two places so they had the pieces right next to each other. They had tombs, doors, tops of sarcophagi, and even the pulpit from a church. It was so cool. From there I wandered into this huge gallery of Raphael cartoons. These weren’t cartoon in the sense that we use today. For them, a cartoon was just a piece of art on a big piece of paper. And these certainly were big. They were made to be the pattern for a bunch of murals to be hung in the Vatican. They were probably 70 feet by 60 feet, if not more. They were also painted in mirror image so when people were weaving the tapestries they would look right. It was so amazing.

From there we met up in the lobby and went to the café for some tea and a break. We sat there for about an hour and then broke up again. Dad and I walked around and found the room on glass art. The first part was just a huge long history on the development of glass. It covered things like how trends changes, new technologies that allowed new things to be made and how different regions used glass to do different things. That was really cool. From there we moved on to the more modern part of the gallery. That had some really amazing pieces. Some were six foot tall pieces of multicoloured glass and there was even a really amazing bench. It had a bunch of little lights embedded between a couple of pains of glass. The bench was completely see through because the artist had used some sort of clear conducting material so you couldn’t see it. It had a really neat affect, I think. We walked quickly through a housing exhibit, some of which was pretty cool. A lot of it was more interesting for how it was made than the way it looked.

We met up again and Dad and Bill wanted to head home and take a break. Mom, Millie and
Frankie wanted to go and see Harrod’s so I took them there. The store wasn’t that far from the
museum, so it was quick walk. We walked around the various exhibition halls, focusing mainly
on the food halls. Mom and I both bought a snack, just to say we had. Both were actually pretty
reasonably priced considering where were. We spent about an hour wandering around there
before catching the Tube home. Millie and wanted to stop and get a couple of things, so we went to one of the grocery stores near the Tube stop. From there, we headed to a pub nearby for some dinner before the show. It was your typical pub fare, but I think they enjoyed it. Almost everyone got fish and chips, partly because I messed up the order I think. Frankie wanted some tea, so she and I stopped over to a Starbucks on the way to the Tube. She apparently wasn’t a fan of the American tea. Woops.

We got to the show with plenty of time to spare. The seats were right on the edge of the balcony, so that was really nice. There were some of the understudies in this show, but they all did a really good job. In fact, I kind of liked this Fiyero better then the one I saw the first time here. After the play we headed back home. I stopped and checked my email than crashed for the night.

Feb 28th

We got up this morning and the weather was better than it had been yesterday so we decided to go and take the bus tour. The weather was actually kind of interesting today. It would just pour for about forty-five minutes to an hour and then it would get really sunny and be really nice for about an hour and a half, maybe a little more. Weird day, but I guess that has been pretty common for the weather around here. The tour took us on a big circuit around the city. We saw Parliament, Big Ben, Westminster, St. Paul’s, The City of London, The Monument, Trafalgar’s Square, Piccadilly Circus, The Tower, then a bunch of theatres and pubs. We also saw the only street you can drive American style on in all of England. Its like that so people can pick people up from a theatre. We were a little more than half done when we stopped at the Black Friars Bridge to get some lunch. The Place we stopped was called Dogett’s and was a pretty big place. It was four stories tall and had a different theme on each floor. We spent about an hour there eating and talking before getting back on the bus. We timed it really well actually because as soon as we got on the bus, it started raining again. We beat the rain to the bus though, so we stayed dry. The tour itself was pretty nice. The commentary, while not live, was pretty good. It was a really nice way to get a good overview of the city without having to do a ton of walking. That was really nice. The only kink came after we got back on after lunch. The bus driver was having problem with one of the wipers, so we had to stop and get on another bus. We waited for a little while and got on another one. The thing that they didn’t however was that this bus was taking a different tour route than the one we were on. That took us out of the way a little bit and we had to do some Tube hopping to get back to the hotel, but it wasn’t that bad.

Once we got back, I ran home to get changed while everyone else took a break and got ready for dinner tonight. I stopped by Metrogate on the way to check my mail again too. I met them back at the hotel and we headed out. The restaurant, called Fifteen, was actually right of the Tube stop where I work, which was pretty cool. We took the same route as I normally do and luckily beat the worst of the rush hour. The ride wasn’t anywhere near as bad as I was thinking it would be, so that was really nice. The walk to the restaurant wasn’t bad at all and we got there really early. They seated us anyways and we got down to eating. We had a wine recommended to us by the staff, which was really good. We got to choose two of the seven courses and after that they brought us our food. It was so good. Mom had a copy of the menu and I can’t remember what all was on it right now, but it was absolutely amazing. Every dish was really, really good. We had an absolute blast. The staff was just great too. They were really helpful and really nice. The best part of this restaurant is its mission though. Jamie Oliver takes fifteen people from disadvantaged backgrounds and helps them to become chefs. The spend 18 months going through cooking, learning the trade, going on trips with Jamie and really just getting to know the business. Its really cool.

We spent a good three hours eating and talking, so by the time we were done it was pretty late. Once you add on the Tube ride, it was time for bed.

March 1st

We got going a little earlier this morning because Frankie was leaving tonight and we wanted to make sure we had plenty of time to see everything. We started out by going to Westminster Abbey. That was a really interesting church. There are an absolutely amazing number of tombs crammed in there. Every little niche along the wall was filled with graves of high ranking members of British society. The markers were sometimes simple slabs on the ground to huge memorials with effigies being supported by statues of pall bearers. There really was a lot to see in there. We all split up and made out own way around the cathedral. When I was about three-fourths of the way around building, I walked into a little museum that was built into a really old part of the cathedral. It had some stuff from the various coronations and then pieces from the funerals that had been held there. That was a little weird. I ran into Dad and he told me I had to go and take a look at these gardens that were out back. They were really spectacular. They were completely secluded from the rest of the city and had some really amazing beds of flowers that were just starting to bloom. It was really nice. We sat in there with Mom for quite a while before finishing the tour and meeting everyone out at the exit.

From there we made out way to the pier to catch a tour of the river. We went up and down the river on a big catamaran. That was part of the tour that we had gone on yesterday, but in the rush to get to the hotel this morning I had forgotten my ticket. Woops. I got another one and we were off. The computer system had gone out so the captain was giving the commentary for the trip. He was really cool. He knew an amazing amount about the city and was really funny. It’s really nice to come across someone who is truly passionate about his job like that and brings you into that passion. That ended up being a real highlight of the week for me. We next went into the basement of a Methodist church that had a café for lunch. This is apparently one of the only places in the area that serves food, so I guess they do pretty well for themselves. It was just simple cafeteria style eating, but it was pretty good and nice and relaxed. Once we were all relaxed and contented, we headed back home so that Frankie could get ready to leave.

I went and checked my email than went back to the hotel. Frankie, Jim, Millie and I all headed out to station. The trip was longish, but not to bad. We again missed the worst of rush hour and got there with plenty to time to spare. We found a little place to sit and got a little dinner while we waited. We didn’t have too long to wait before they posted the train platform and we got Frankie all set up. We headed home after that and I dropped Jim and Millie off. I got back to the flat and wrote in my journal for a little while. A couple of my flatmates were around and we started playing 500 before Aliens came on. Neither Paul or I had seen it, so we watched that then I headed to bed.

March 2nd

Today it was just Mom, Dad, and I. We started off the day by walking down to the Parks to check those out. We popped into Kensington Palace and took that tour. It was a cool place. I especially liked the exhibit they had on Diana. It was a collection of pictures that had been taken of her right before she died and she just looked very nice. There was something very pretty about this simple elegance that was very alluring. The other thing I really liked was that they had one of the formerly royal apartments on display. It was lived in until very recently, so that was pretty cool. It just felt a lot more human than anything else I had been in until that point. Everywhere else had been ornate and really over the top, I couldn’t picture anyone actually living in those places. These rooms, while obviously very elaborate, where places that felt they could have been a home to me. I liked that.

From there we headed over to the orangey for some food. This was a big green house that the royalty would have put here fruit tree in during the winter to keep them growing year round. They had turned it into a very nice little café. Our server was a really nice guy from Poland. He had been trying to get into the states for 3 threes, but hadn’t been able to get a visa. Once we were done there, we headed out to explore the park. We started walking around the perimeter of the park before we headed into the centre to look at a couple of monuments. From there we headed out to the fountain head of the Serpentine. We walked around there and went to look at a little house surrounded by private gardens. I’ve passed this place many times, but I always thought it was just a cute little house they had kept, but apparently someone live in it. We then walked down along the lake for a while and just enjoyed it. We stopped at a big sign that detailed all the kinds of ducks you can find in the lake when a man approached us and started talking. He apparently wasn’t a real fan of the mallard ducks and had some, interesting we’ll say, facts about them. He was a funny old man. We walked around to an observation deck with a statue of Peter Pan. We spent a lot of time watching the birds that had gathered there to sun themselves or hope for food. I think Dad really enjoyed this part. The ducks were in the height of there colour and looked just beautiful. They were really pretty. We walked around a little further until we came to another observation area and spent a little more time there. That was also right across from the Diana memorial so we went and looked around that. It’s a cool thing, but the symbolism is not real clear, at least for me I guess. We continued walking around the park and looked at this little garden at the far end of the Serpentine. It had a nice little waterfall and gardens. It also had a really spectacular magnolia tree that was just coming into bloom. Both Mom and Dad wanted me to go and get a picture of it in a couple of weeks when it was more fully blooming, and I’ll be happy to oblige them. We then moved on to Speaker’s Corner and starting walking around my walking my running route. We walked around a fountain then down to the statue of Achilles near Hyde Park Corner. We walked through another garden in that area before making our way to my flat. We walked by Horses Guard’s Barracks and the Prince Albert’s memorial. After that we went up to my flat.

I introduced them to a couple of my flatmates who were around and we talked for a while. We all had a cup of tea and just sort of hung out. We were probably at the flat for about an hour before we all left. One of my roommates was going out shopping, so he walked with us. I left them a little early so I could go check my email before we went to dinner. I met with everyone down in the lobby of the hotel about an hour after that and we went to an Italian place. That was really good pasta. We all had really good food. After that we all went up to Bill and Millie’s room for scones with clotted cream and jam. Those were really good. They had gone and picked them up after spending the day in the park too. They did almost the same thing we did actually.

March 3rd

This was the last day we all had to explore. We set out in the morning to go to Kew gardens. This would have been a really easy trip but there was some engineering work, which meant we had to make a change. It wasn’t hard, but it was just really annoying. We made that transition and got to the station just fine. The entrance was about a mile from the station, but the walk was nice. On either side of the street there were some really nice old houses. Mom really liked them and declared that she could live there because they all had garages. That seems to be her new metric for deciding on where to live. Good for her I guess. We entered the park and were greeted by this huge bed of naturalized flowers. It was so pretty. Just thousands of these flowers coming up in the grass. It was so cool. From there we headed to the Tropical house. Outside that, they had this huge bed of flowers that are repainted twice every year. It takes them one full month to replant and every time they have a specific theme. This time was yellow, black and white. It was really pretty. The Tropical house was really cool too. It was so hot in there. It must have been 90 degrees and just wickedly humid. You all can think about that when you’re shovelling out from under all the snow. It was worth it though. The plants were nice, but what was really interesting were all the descriptions of the various species that lived there and the uses that they could be put too. I walked up to the top of the house so I got to look down on all the plants, which as a unique perspective I think. I then when down to the basement of the house where they had an exhibit on the different coastal environments of the British Isles. That was really interesting.

From there we moved on to the Orchid house. I can’t even begin to describe how beautiful this place was. They had some absolutely amazing arrangements of orchids on arches and just spread about. It was so cool. I was taking pictures like mad, but my camera dies part of the way through, so I only got about three-fourths of what I wanted. As soon as I get a chance I’ll be putting those online. What I found a little weird was the exhibit of cranberry farming at the end of the exhibit. There wasn’t really an explanation or anything; it was just kind of there. It was cool to see, but I guess I didn’t really think it fit with the rest of the place. We went and had some food at the local orangery there, which was nice. It was a little brisk that day so the warmth of the greenhouse was nice. We then started walking towards the Japanese gardens. On the way we passed a bench with my name on it, literally. It was Dave’s bench. Who knew. The first of the Japanese gardens was pretty cool. It was made up of different kinds of bamboo and had a traditional Japanese home in the middle made from all natural materials. While we were there it started raining so people flocked to this little house to try and stay dry. It didn’t rain for long, and then we were on our way. The nest garden was really cool. It was centred on a replica of a shrine, to what I didn’t catch. It had a winding path that took you around the shrine, then up to it. It then took you down to a huge rock garden that was very nicely maintained.

We all wanted a break after that so we made out way to another café on the grounds. There weren’t enough seats at the table, so I just started wandering around the park. I made my way to this huge tower and just sat at the base of that and enjoyed the birds. That was rather nice. I made my way back to the café and people were ready to leave. Before heading out we made a trip to the gift shop then headed back to the station. Mom had wanted to go get a couple of pint glasses for gifts to the people at the office, so we hopped off the tube early and picked those up. I think they’ll be appreciated. We got back on the train, which was running kind of slow for some reason. When he got to the station we needed to change at, things got bad. The first train that showed up terminated there, which was a bad sign. We got on the next train that showed up, but an announcement came on and said that because of a train failure there were major delays on this line. Luckily we could change lines, but things were going to get interesting. We had to take a train that went way north then catch another one that would take us somewhat close to where we needed to be. That all worked out, but the line we had been on was shut down completely, which meant people were pouring out of the Tube for the buses, which was how we were planning on getting home. The line for the bus we needed was about 200 hundred people deep so we started walking. The trip home was about 4 miles and what should have been a half an hour trip ended up being two hours. Mom loved it though.

We ended up going to a pizza place just down the street that was really nice. The food was really good and it had a really nice atmosphere. Mom, Dad and I headed to grocery store afterwards to pick up some food for me. Since they were picking up the bill, I splurged a little bit and know I’m in food for a while. That was really nice. They walked me back to my place before parting ways. When I got to my flat I spent some time getting everything put and away and getting things ready for the freezer. A lot of people had gotten back during the day so I caught up with them before calling it an early night.