Mark and Charlotte's Travel Blog: London, England

8/29/24

London, England

We stayed in London three different times, in three different locations during this trip. We were in London for a few days at the start of our trip, (London Bridge area). Then after our walking tour through the Cotswolds, we stayed a for a couple of days in the (Paddington area), before picking up our rent-a-car at Gatwick. During our final days in London, we stayed in and explored (Covent Garden area).

Overall we spent about 10 days in London, but we could have easily stayed a month in this must see world class city.

Westminster Abbey where England’s kings and queens

have been crowned and buried since 1066

Westminster Abbey

The choir at Westminster Abbey

The building in the middle is the Shard, it’s a 72 story pyramid shaped building opened in 2013

Tower bridge

Tower of London complex

Hoppy at the Tower of London

Ouch!

Hoppy the Brave!

Hoppy thinks he’s royalty

Borough Market, one of the largest and oldest food markets in London. It’s been a market site dating back to at least the 12th century

Hoppy saves Big Ben

Big Ben

Parliament in the background

Parliament and Big Ben

Meat and ale pie for two, with bone marrow

Shard Building from London Bridge Hotel Entrance

One of many skylines over the Thames

Pub where Sir Arthur hung out

Hoppy hanging with friends near Paddington Station

Mostly used the tube, but London is very easy to get around

Sherlock

he Royal Courts of Justice in London (when former Spice Girls sue the tabloids for libel, when the Da Vinci Code author gets sued for plagiarism, or when former Beatle’s pay $50M to ex-wives, the trials are likely to be held here!). There are 76 courtrooms within the complex.

Tribute to Newspaper offices

Dating from 1549 this pub hosted Pepys, Dickens, and Dr. Johnson (Dr. Johnson’s most famous work was “A Dictionary of the English Language”, thanks, doc!)

Prince Henry’s Room. This Tudor style building from 1610 is one of the few to survive the Great Fire. The top floor of the house is Prince Henry’s room, once an office for King Charles I’s son.

Twinings has been in business since 1706

St. Bride’s Church. The distinctive steeple - stacked in layers as it tapers to a point - is said to have inspired the wedding cake. Supposedly, a Fleet St. baker named Mr. Rich, gazed out his shop window as he made the first multi tiered cake.

Clock on the Royal Courts of Justice

Hodge the cat. Dr. Johnson’s beloved cat, dined on oysters

Punch Tavern (as in Punch and Judy), named after the London political magazine famous for its satirical cartoons. In the mid-1800s, the pub became the magazine staff’s hang out

St. Paul’s Cathedral

Bank Junction

Great time meeting up with our long-time friend, Bob for dinner! He took the train in from Cambridge to see us

Buckingham Palace

221B Baker St.

Portobello Market

Portobello Market food court

Portobello Market

British Museum

British Museum Reading Room

Rosetta Stone, created in 196 BC

. Discovered in 1799 it allowed linguists to finally decode Egyptian hieroglyphics. It contains a single inscription repeated in three languages (hieroglyphics, medieval Egyptian, and Greek)

Wooden doors with hieroglyphics. To prepare for our upcoming trip to Egypt, we focused on

Egyptian artifacts at the fabulous British Museum

One of two Assyrian human-headed winged stone lions that guarded an Assyrian palace (11th-8th century BC) / Cats were considered sacred animals in ancient Egypt and were depicted in art and religious scenes as early as 1980 BC