A day my family would enjoy, something for all. Wednesday 23rd April.

Today was sunny, but with clouds, or maybe it was cloudy with some sun?  Have to get used to taking an umbrella and coat every day.

We bused to Victoria Station, then got lost.  They are building a new rail line, and upgrading the station, so there are so many diversions each day there are more.  The bus maps are not the best, however finally we found our way to St James's Park. A beautiful parkland in the area leading to Buckingham Palace.  The gardens were spectacular, and road beside is called Birdcage Walk.

The squirrels in the park

This part of our day is for our granddaughter Cloe, who especially wanted me to take a picture of the Queen. But instead of the Queen we managed some pretty good photos of her soldiers instead which I am sure you don't have to be a 6 year old to enjoy.

 So after the guard changed, the traffic could continue and we walked down past Clarence House

 where Prince Charles and Camilla live, and then we were standing outside the garden gate, when another lot of guards and band came towards us. It was a sad day for Camilla as her brother slipped on a footpath in New York and died of a brain bleed.

Up close and personal with the Queens Guards, weren't we a bit lucky for a change!

The gardens in the park are really beautiful, and there is a sign asking people not to feed the pelicans!

A walk further along brought us to the Horse Palace, where the horses are kept, can you believe they have such a place just for horses, and then on past the Foreign Office and the memorials to the brave soldiers of the World Wars.

The Memorial to all the people of all the world, killed in the Bali Bombing in October 2002.

A little further along, and we went to Winston Churchill's Cabinet War Rooms.  Now Greg would like this!
I guess for me the relevance is in seeing just how much went on behind the scenes, as my father was a member of the British Army, firstly in Merchant Navy, and then in the British South Pacific Fleet and also the clean up in Berlin after the fall in 1945.  He joined at 17.  So very young, but he came through or I wouldn't be writing this story!

Check out the officer's bedroom complete with chamber pot under the bed, because there was only 1 toilet with running water in the bunker. Defies imagination with the number who were working underground for 6 years they worked almost non-stop.

    But they were all kept well fed, as the 1940 kitchen showed! Along with the dining setting that was for his own use!   The tour was well done, with audio around lots of listening posts. 

 We decided to prop up the War effort and had

 Churchill sausages and onion jam with potatoes and gravy  for lunch! 

Winston Churchill's bedroom

 One amazing part, for me, was the size of the maps on the walls.  Every ship and every position of everyone of the Allies was pinned.  So with one one look they could tell where everyone was.  This was a 24 hour job for senior staff.

The Merchant Navy

And those important world maps.  The tour was well worth it, and when the war ended, the staff packed up walked out the doors and went home, leaving the place as it was.  They had spent 6 years there. One officer liked to hoard sugar, and when the rooms were later opened, his stash of sugar was found in an envelope in his desk drawer.  Then the whole thing was recreated to represent how it was from pictures taken during the time.  But one toilet?  

Next came a lesson on the phones in UK.  Apparently if you ring an 08 number here, it is a priority number for a business and guess what, that business makes you pay for the cost of ringing it. There are two ways to make of this either pretty smart, or pretty dumb.  John tried to call Europcar office and was told he had no credits, I tried and couldn't get them to hear me.  This was all explained to us by our friendly and helpful SIM card salesman.  John has a sim that lets him make 1000 minutes, just not to an 08 number.  Oh well another lesson for a couple of dumb Aussies.

Last stop of the day was to the London Bridge Experience and Tombs, and Thomas would have loved this.

But before we got there we as usual found ourselves on the wrong route, again because of the traffic diversions.  But we did find the old London wall.  London was a walled city and there is not much left now of the walls.  

The Bridge Experience was not what we expected, in fact I had a horrible time, as it was totally in the dark, there were strobe flashing lights, there were swinging walkways, narrow passage ways, and to top it off I had to close my eyes, hang on to John the whole time, and I went into a "spinout" as we had to walk through a tunnel of physcadelic coloured revolving lights.  Probably the worst experience I have given my brain in 11 years.  When we got outside I cried, as it was just far too difficult to do, and while there was some useful information, the majority of the tour was walking through dark spaces, dodging bodies hanging from the roof.  Sounds like something Thomas would enjoy!  Bad choice.

To recover we went on the subway, yep way down on the escalators, that give me a problem as well.

Any wonder we haven't bothered with the rail network, it takes forever to work out which platform is which, but we noticed the train went through Camden so we decided to stop off again and have something from the great choice of foods.  Another not so good choice, as it seems the food is better for lunch than dinner, finally we had Chinese, then another couple of buses before we arrived home.  

My 3 older granddaughters, Olivia, Ella and Amy would love the Camden markets, the sights, the strange getups, the interesting girlie things!

Tomorrow Hampton Court, Kingston on Thames and pick up our car for what I expecct will be a harrowing trip back to our accommodation, hope the new TomTom can find our way, cause we sure as hell are good at getting lost!