London, England

On July 14th, Robert and I left Milan (woo hoo!) and flew to London. We were able to stay in London for a couple of days before boarding our cruise ship. We didn't do a lot while we were there, but we still had a great time.

We got there too late on the 14th to do much sightseeing. After checking into the very nice Royal Park Hotel, we rode the tube to Notting Hill and wandered around a little while. Then we rode the tube to Leicester Square and tried to buy cheap tickets to a show. We weren't successful for that night, but we did get tickets for Friday night. After wandering around a while and doing some shopping, we headed back to the hotel.

Friday we got up fairly early, but we weren't able to go sightseeing right away. Why, you ask? Well, because I'm an idiot. Somehow I managed to leave my Kindle on the plane the day before. I didn't realize it until Thursday evening, so I had to wait to call. By the time I tracked down the phone number and waited on hold and found out my Kindle was indeed at Heathrow's Lost and Found, it was already almost 10:30 Friday morning. Then we had to take the tube to Heathrow, and since the Heathrow Express wasn't running, it took over an hour each way. So, because of my stupidity, we lost about 3 hours of prime sightseeing time. Robert was much nicer about it than I would have been!

Our first stop (after retrieving my Kindle) was at the London Eye, a giant ferris wheel right on the River Thames.

We rode in gondolas with about 25 other people. Here's a picture of the gondola next to ours. I took the picture as we were at the top of the Eye. I was a little concerned because I hadn't ridden on a ferris wheel in years. But the Eye moves so slowly, you can barely tell it's moving. It was a great way to see the sights.

I had to take a picture of this sign. It's an advertisement for an outdoor pub located next to the London Eye. I had to take the picture because my maiden name is Magner. It's not often I see it in print like that.
Here's a picture of the House of Parliament (with Big Ben at one end).
Here's a picture of Big Ben with Westminster Abbey.
After we got off the London Eye, we walked across the River Thames. I even let Robert take my picture! I actually appear in a number of pictures on this trip. I may not always like how the pictures look, but I decided to be in them anyway. You should all be proud!

We went to see Westminster Abbey. We got there at 3:30, just as they were closing the doors to inside tours (due to some event). So we didn't get to see inside. But the outside was very pretty.

After we left Westminster Abbey, we went to the Tower of London. Alas, we didn't get to go inside there either. They would have sold us tickets, but the lady said there really wasn't enough time to do anything. So again we had to be content with outside pictures.

We walked over to see the Tower Bridge, one of the prettiest bridges I've seen.
After eating dinner, we did a little shopping at a fun store called Cath Kidston. Then we headed to the Victoria Palace Theater to see the musical "Billy Elliot". The musical was amazing. The 13-year-old boy who starred in it was an incredible dancer. They actually have four different boys who take turns playing the part because it's so physically demanding for a dancer that young. I really enjoyed the show, and even Robert thought it was pretty good. It was exciting to see a show in a theater in London's famous West End. Even though the seats were made for very skinny short people!
We didn't see as much as we had hoped to see, but that's okay. It was nice to be in a city where the people spoke English! And we got to buy Galaxy candy bars, so all was well!

Next, on to the Crown Princess!