London in a day

We aimed for a nice early start once again but because of my inability to set the alarm clock properly we managed to sleep in a bit. Not to bad though as we were still out of the house and in the rented fiat punto before 9:00am. We drove to Stonehenge and managed to get through in front of a few buses and have a walk around Stonehenge. It was extremely busy all the same but we still managed a few good pics and made our way over to Kew which is on the outskirts of London. The advantage of this is free parking and a cheap ride into London on the tube.



After battling the traffic and to get into Kew we parked the car, jumped on the tube, and made our way into the city getting off at the tube stop "embankment" where we wondered around the Thames north and south banks taking in the sites of the London eye and the crazy performers around it, Westminster, and Big Ben. From here it was bit of a hike up to Trafalgar square for a quick subway meal before stopping in at Canada house and walking down the mall to see Buckingham Palace. This time the queen didn't come out and make an appearance so we walked over the Hyde park and rented a row boat for half an hour and went rowing on the Serpentine in the middle of the park. The weather was great for this part of the day so we really lucked out. After an ice cream in the park we walked over to Speakers corner on the far side of the park near marble arch and oxford street where we had a good laugh at some the crazy people rambling on before we (I mean Kelly) did some shopping in London's most famous shopping area. She was good and didn't go into every single store. We tried to make it to Hamley's toy store before it closed but just missed it by a few minutes. Yet another reason for you to come back Kel.





We continued our walk down Regent street (the street Hamleys is on and one of the main streets off Oxford Street) which brings you right out into Piccadilly circus. This by night is one of my favourite parts of London. Its full of flashing lights, and people sitting around on statues. Plus it has a brilliant walk up through Leicester square (theatre district) and continues through to Covent Garden (the pub district). One place we had to go of course in Covent Garden is the Maple Leaf. A good old fashioned Canadian Pub that serves Moosehead beer. Yes it was my first Canadian beer since Christmas so I savoured every last drop.

We walked back down to the water and jumped on the tube for the first time since the morning (trust me we did a lot of walking) and made our way over to St. Paul’s Cathedral and millenium bridge and then on to the Tower of London and Tower bridge. We found a great little pub to eat at on south bank while we waited for the sun to set so we could get a few pictures of tower bridge by night. London at night is a beautiful city so its worth waiting for. London by day is one of the dirtiest cities I have ever been too. But it has so much character it is still one of my favourite cities in the world.




Well it was getting late so we made our back to the car in Kew and then drove the hour long route up to my grandmothers and crashed for the night around 1:00am. The following morning we drove to Gatwick where Kelly caught her plane home and I made the long trek back over to Bristol to drop of the car and home for some much needed sleep. It was a wonderful trip with many great memories. Thanks for coming to visit Kel. You are more than welcome to come over again anytime.