LONDON: Day 7
6.21.2009 by Kerrie
Ah, last day across the pond... was a great day, though. :)
We successfully got up with our alarm this morning to grab breakfast. We then came back to the room where I proceeded to fall asleep again for another hour or so. (My body needs 8 hours of sleep!)
...I've just been distracted for literally 15 minutes because Minority Report is on our TV...
Anyway.
We took a bus out to the south bank side of the Thames River to pay a little visit to Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. :)
Took a walk along the bank side to get to the theater, came across yet another crime warning sign:
We were lucky to get tickets - the show was completey sold out, but as we stood in the queue for returns, a woman came up to the line asking if anyone minded standing because she had extra yard tickets. Ah, I was a groundling at last! (Read a book, people.)
The theater is insanely gorgeous. Pictures don't even capture it. We were lucky to, yet again, have an absolutely gorgeous and sunny day. (In fact, the only rain we've had the whole trip was about a minute or so of light sprinkling. We're the luckiest travelers ever.)
The show was Romeo & Juliet, because I am destined to never see any other Shakespeare play... despite me being completely sick of seeing this play, it was really fantastic. But what else would you expect at Shakespeare's Globe? :)
After the show, we took a boat on the Thames up a bit to a tube station to connect to where we needed to be.
Stopped at a bookstore up near Charing Cross to grab a book someone asked Mike to buy for them, and then headed back to the Tower of London to take the "Grim Reaper" walking tour.
It was much shorter than the other walking tours we'd been on, but interesting nonetheless. It covered all of the hauntings and murders and the plague and the general "poor" area of London - the East End. We also followed the "trail" of Jack the Ripper, which was really freakin' cool.
Where one of the Ripper's victims was found:
The pub he used to hang around, where he'd find his various prostitute victims:
And, the clock tower the prostitutes would use to time their customers:
PLAGUE PIT:
Accidentally took a picture while walking, but thought it was kind of cool:
A man playing a piano in the middle of the street:
HAH:
Oh, and one other important thing to mention... our tour guide was a gorgeous british guy:
And, I'd seen this a million times on the back of ice cream trucks - or, rather, "super soft ice" trucks:
The tour happened to end around the corner from Brick Lane, home to ten or so of what we were told are the best Indian curry houses outside of India. And, having stated earlier in the week I wanted to try Indian food for the first time, it was pretty convenient. So we strolled over there and found a place to eat. The verdict? I LOVE Indian food, but I definitely need to have milk because water in not effective when your mouth is burning off. Right off.
Back at the hotel now... watching Minority Report, as I'd said before, and packing. Our flight takes off at noon tomorrow. The tube line near us goes right out to Heathrow, so we're going to take advantage of that. Eat some breakfast in the morning and then head out. Admittedly, I'm pretty sad to be going back. I really like it here and would love to spend another week or so. I definitely want to come back at some point in the future... it's a pretty remarkable city. And it's also, of course, made me want to travel pretty much everywhere else. But that's nothing new.
Okay, to sleep perchance to dream.
*K
Guess what?! I just booked my flight to London for August 31st thru September 7th. I can't wait! :-)
DONELL
Please tell me you walked across the Millenium Bridge! God, I love that walk. One of my favorites!!
Aaahh Donell, you're going to have so much fun!! Hit me up beforehand for walking tour info, because they're totally worth it. Especially the free one. :-D
Allison - we didn't walk the whole bridge, no. :( But it was really pretty. I guess I'll just have to go back and do that! ;) haha