London - Day 2

So obviously, it is going to take a while to get our whole trip to London posted, but I can't really think of a better way to do it.

In London, Jeremy is roommates with one of his co-workers, who like Jeremy is from the US. His wife also came to London, and she landed the same day I did. We all hit it off, so Saturday the four of us all headed to downtown London for our adventures to continue.

With just a short Tube ride, we made it down town. It was beautiful the architecture, was so different and so beautiful. It is crazy, instead of things being built out, everything is built up. Even McDonald's has an upstairs.

 This is what greeted us, when we came 

up to street level from the Tube.

 

 

A really cool looking street, that was more like an alley.

Check out the detail on the side of this building.

This building had a really cool convex shape,
with flags from all around.

We were not able to figure out what the building was.

Jeremy trying to figure out what the 'flag building' was.

There are 'fancy' stores all over. They all have guards at the front doors, making it feel quite intimidating. We never did try to even walk into those stores. We just enjoyed window shopping.

When we were downtown, we saw the Queens Horses Guard parading down the street. Very cool!

  After walking around shops and such we made our way toward Buckingham Palace, 

there is a very beautiful park just outside of the palace.

 

The Palace through the trees

 

At the edge of the park, there was a beautiful house. 

Jeremy was pretty sure that it was
the home of some of the Royal family.

Beautiful!

When we got up to Buckingham Palace, we realized that there was an Olympic event going on in front of the Palace. It was the Men's Race Walking event. Now I can say I was at an Olympic event:-) Let me just say as a side note, that Race Walking is about the goofiest looking sport!

The Palace was was beautiful, but we couldn't get as close as we normally would have been able to, because of the event. 

Buckingham Palace and the Run Walkers in front

The backside of the gates - they were gorgeous!

Jeremy and I at Buckingham Palace

There were mounted guards on either side of this gate.

The men on the horses never really moved,
but if you look at the picture closely, 

you can see that his eye is looking towards 

the direction of the camera.

Love his Minnesota shirt:-)

Here are the armed guards, guarding parliament.The guys behind the gate have loaded machine guns! Not even the local police men carry guns, but when it comes to these guys they don't mess around!

Next on our 'tour' was Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. We were walking along the street and Jeremy kept saying "wait for it... wait for it..." I had no idea what he was talking about and all of a sudden as soon as we came around the corner we could see Big Ben. I had envisioned it being taller, but it is still makes a great statement!

Check out the detailing

Not sure how we did this but

 I LOVE how the clouds and light look behind it.

  The London Eye on the banks of the River Thames

 One of our last stops Downtown, was M&M World. This was huge! It is 4 levels of M&M's and M&M products as far as the eye can see!

 

That about wraps up our day in London, I wish I had taken a pedometer to know how far we walked. We bought theater tickets for a show later in the week and then finished up with good dinner and lots of laughs at a nice Mexican restaurant.

Our walk home was at a MUCH slower pace!

 We came across the most quaint row of flats. 

They looked like they could have been on a movie. I LOVED them!

The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art

This picture was taken with my brother Nathan in mind.

They had some really neat statues on either side of their sign, 

very fitting for a school of dramatic arts.

 

We covered a lot of ground and had a great day!
Good Night London - Day 2:-)