Confession: My original plan for my trip was just to go to London, and maybe one or two nearby cities. But after talking to some people and realizing that I had the time and resources to explore more, I ended up branching out to Eastern Europe for things like like cultural exposure and experience. Anyway, I decided to save the best for last and end my trip in London (also so I could do a lot of shopping and not have to worry about carrying it around for weeks).
Slightly more shameful confession: I started thinking about going to London after I binged on the third season of Sherlock in January 2014.
I've heard tons about this popular city for years, and really wanted to see what the hype was all about. I gave myself 8 days to explore, but it wasn't nearly enough time.
I really think I've found my favorite city in the world (Berlin is second).
There's so much to do, so much to see, and so much to enjoy. Every corner is different, with its own unique attitude and character. And of course, the Tube is just perfectly efficient (usually). Too bad it's also the most expensive city in the world, so I guess I won't be moving there anytime soon. I think I spent $1k in this city alone (I will acknowledge that some of it was splurging that resulted from two months of semi-repressed spending). Still, I can see why John Watson felt this incredible need to return to London, even though it was out of his price range. It's a pretty magnetic city; I really wouldn't mind spending my yearly vacations here.
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| Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day, so I had no problem indulging in a few of these comically large meals before noon. |
One huge highlight of my trip: meeting Peter Capaldi! I had no idea he was going to be in the city when I arrived, but I guess I timed my arrival with the premiere of the new Doctor Who season. Anyway, I was in the Westminster area because I was waiting for my 1pm Parliament tour (that I booked months ago) and was just killing time. I was already amused to see people setting up a TARDIS in Parliament Square and thought it was just a promotional thing. My ignorant American mind thought, "
there's no way Peter Capaldi's actually going to be here. There's not enough security!"
I snapped the picture of the TARDIS on the makeshift dinosaur bones (above) and pretty much thought that was as cool as the day would get.
"I'll just Instagram it later, no biggie."
After that, I walked away and made another loop around Parliament, but still had another hour to kill. This area's not very big, so I soon made it back to Parliament Square, but I saw smoke everywhere! To my amazement, Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman were RIGHT THERE posing for fans and publicists. I didn't want to walk to a stop sign and safely cross the street, so I just ran across a scary intersection with some other people.
After that, I thought, "
Wow, my day could not get any better! Just saw some famous people!" So I walked away because there's only so much I can do while trying to take pictures in a crowd.
Once again I wandered to the Parliament gift shop, took some more pictures of the London Eye, and found myself back in front of Parliament with a lot of time to kill. ...And that's when I realized Peter Capaldi himself was giving out autographs and taking pictures with people!! I could have cut in line like a lot of people and just gotten a quick picture with him. But I figured,
"I'm in England. I should probably queue." And so I did, and it was totally worth it because he eventually walked down the line to everyone who had been waiting for a while. Queueing justice!
So after I got my selfie with Mr. Capaldi, it was finally time for me to go on my Parliament tour. I wasn't expecting much from the tour because by this time, I was sick of museums, castles, churches, and old buildings, but it was actually pretty educational and interesting.
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| Of course I had to go to Baker Street! After visiting the museum shop, I also went down the street to North Gower Street, which is the place where the BBC Sherlock's 221B is filmed (just the outside of the apartment, since the majority of the show isn't filmed in London). |
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| Decided to splurge and try out a $50 afternoon tea. Pros: They gave me two people's worth of food because I guess it's easier and less wasteful to just give whole sandwiches rather than throwing away the half. I couldn't finish everything and they even came out later with a cart of unlimited desserts! Cons: Everything was just aight. There was a delicious ham, watercress, and red marmalade sandwich, and there was also this revolting bologna and mayo sandwich on overly healthy nut bread. |
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| Burger and Lobster: Your choice of a burger, half a lobster, or a lobster roll, plus fries and a salad for £20. Very tasty. |
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| Fortnum and Mason: home of delicious biscuits :D |
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| It was on Carnaby Street that I discovered my new favorite clothing store: Jack Wills. It's pricy, but not outrageously expensive. Perhaps something I can work towards being able to afford occasionally. |
Speaking of Jack Wills, whose slogan is "Fabulously British," pretty much everyone on the streets of London was GORGEOUS. And by "gorgeous" I mean that they were dressed impeccably. I really think that colder weather makes it easier to dress up (hello tights, structured coats, and preppy sweaters), so I'm going to have to wait for this insane San Diego heat wave to subside first so I will have a desire to wear something other than hobo lounge clothes.
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| I spent the first 3 hours at the British Museum exploring the second floor before realizing I missed the entire first floor. Overwhelmed with all the exhibits, I eventually learned that the museum itself is older than America... |
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| The beautiful, colorful houses of Notting Hill. I went back there one evening to check out this Notting Hill carnival that I kept hearing about, but left immediately because it reminded me of Sun God. A few days later I read in the news that some people got stabbed at the carnival, and a girl got her face completely beat up because she told a guy to stop groping her. Yikes! |
Just like in Edinburgh, I spent a day doing a bus tour to places outside of London. The one I joined went to Warwick Castle, Stratford-upon-Avon (Shakespeare's birthplace), and Oxford.
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| Nice castle, but INCREDIBLY commercialized. I think the owners of Madame Tussauds (the wax museum people) took over the castle so there were some exhibits with creepy wax figures. It can also be likened to a theme park for little kids who want to do something medieval. |
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| Lovely pear tree outside of Shakespeare's birthplace. I wish I knew more about Shakespeare... |
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| More breakfast. |
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| The inspiration for Harry Potter's Nearly Headless Nick. |
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| Oxford. |
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| More breakfast, this time at Covent Garden. With all of these breakfast pics, I feel like Walter Jr. |
Last, but not least, I saw two musicals while I was in London: Phantom of the Opera and Les Mis. Les Mis was good because I knew all of the songs, but I also kind of felt like some of the performers (like Cosette and Fantine) were a little flat, and were just singing pretty songs. Didn't really affect me too much emotionally. Funny memory: a kid in the audience starting crying pretty loudly when Jean Valjean died in the end. That made it difficult to take the scene seriously hahaha.
But Phantom of the Opera. Oh man. That was
breathtaking. I was on the verge of tears throughout most of the musical, not necessarily because it was sad or anything, but because it was so musically beautiful. That combination of orchestra music with perfect notes... ah! It's been about 3 weeks since I saw it, and I still have the soundtrack running on Spotify. I also sat next to this super nice woman from Mexico City, who happened to be a chemical engineer, and we ended up having dinner together after the show.
I would now like to direct your attention away from my DSLR pictures and towards a few of the iPhone pics I took when I was too lazy to lug around my camera and when it was raining too much.
The main thing I want to show is some of the art on the Underground. You should already know by now that I love street art, so you can imagine my fascination with Tube art. Some of the posters I saw were advertisements, but I appreciated the fact that a lot of them were PSAs and safety tips. I think what I liked most about the art was that it was simple and minimalistic (mostly vectoring or color blocking), but it still conveyed more than enough information. Later, I found some interesting books in the Transport Museum gift shop that showcased the best art posters and font designs of the London Underground throughout history. Totally would have bought one if they were cheaper than £40...
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| The South Bank one wasn't underground, but it's representative of the simple yet creative designs seen in other official posters. |
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| The left one is just cute. |
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| I visited the extravagant Harrod's department store and got stung by a bee. It flew into my hair and then stung my finger when I tried getting it out. Couldn't bend my finger for a few days... |
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| View of the Shard from the Tower of London. Fact: During WWI, the Tower was still open as a tourist spot, and a total of eleven spies were executed at the Tower before opening hours! |
On my very last day in London, I didn't have enough cash to fill up my Oyster Card for one more trip (hostel to King's Cross). I think I was short about 10 pence or something, and I was frantically fumbling through my wallet looking for more coins. I think I spent a grand total of 2 seconds looking worried before a kind young gentleman asked me how much I needed and offered me money. I only needed £1, but I still could not thank him enough for allowing me to get to the train station without too great of a delay.
After London, I headed back to Paris to spend one more night before my flight back to 'Murica (round trip tickets pretty much cost the same as one way tickets). I would share about my exciting last night in Paris, except all I did was veg out in my hotel room (yes, hotel room!) and celebrate the fact that I survived two months in Europe by myself with a 46L backpack. I didn't lose anything, I didn't get kidnapped, and I managed to travel through a bunch of foreign countries without a chip in my credit card and without a cell phone plan. I think it's really easy for me to look back at those facts and think, "Yeah, I'm really awesome," but really, the relative ease with which I was able to travel with was really due to the prayers of friends and the grace of God.
