London Day 4

Today was a wonderful day.  Why?  Because we knew where we were going!!! J We didn’t get lost once, and we got to our destinations without any grief.  Getting home was another story, but at least we weren’t lost.  The Jubilee subway line was closed so EVERYONE was going the direction we were.  We would get in an already tight subway and people would keep coming in, and keep coming in, pushing themselves into EVERY available air pocket.  We were literally pushed into each other like a car in a trash compactor.  I send out a huge apology to everyone I unintentionally bumped groped or in any way violated.  I don’t feel too badly though, because you all were probably the ones doing that to me.  Regardless we still made it home without mishap. 

Two words about breakfast.  Very good. We got pastries at this little shop called Pret A Manger.  They were a puff pastry loaded with wonderful butter and goodness, and then the savory one had ham and cheese and a tomato basil sauce folded inside, and then the sweet one, was like a Raisin cheese pinwheel that looked like a cinnamon bun but was very deferent.  After breakfast we went and saw London Bridge and did a tour of this most AMAZING old castle/fortress.  It was a huge collection of buildings built centuries before our country was even the thought of a thorn of its parent’s side.  The castle was all stone and cobblestone streets and the castle included rooms in the outer wall and towers, but also a large conglomeration of buildings inside the outer wall creating more of a village than just a royal family.  We also went on this walking tour with this crazy awesome guy who was so animated and funny.  He gave a whole history of England and the fortress all in his own British sense of humor.  They are really funny if you can get their jokes.  He had a great accent too.  Though when he got going super fast it became difficult to understand him.  After a long Morning we hit the trains and Upper Crust.  This time we got lunch foot-long Baguettes and they were DELISH.  British people are all so skinny because they use public transportation, and they eat hardly anything, and what they do eat seems generally healthy.  We got two kinds of sandwiches, one was tomato slices, lettuce, brie Cheese, and whole basil leaves.  That’s it.  How healthy right? But it was actually tasty too.  The other had bacon, spinach, brie and cranberry sauce.  So simple but also very tasty.  They have brie everywhere here, and other hard to get in America items like shrimp or “prawns” and Duck.  Almost every corner shop will have something like that.  British food seems very simple, not very spicy or overly flavorful but a humble cuisine.  You have to pay attention to the flavors or you might miss them, but they are good. 

After we ate on the train we arrived at the town of Winsor and did a tour of Winsor castle.  Wow.  Really. Wow.  It was amazing to me that a centuries old castle is still working and functioning as a 21^st century structure.  The queen still uses it as her weekend home.  This “home” is also home to over five hundred live in employees and government workers.  Winsor castle is home of the Queens dollhouse or rather doll mansion, a fully down scaled home with miniature paintings, miniature forks and spoons, miniature everything.  It also has fully functioning electricity and pluming.  Here we also saw the china that Obama ate on when he came and saw the queen.  We saw a small section of their art collection which included no less than five Rembrandt’s, Reubens, Van Dyke, among others.  It was way cool to see some of these works in person.  Totally worth it.  I can now see what all the hype about Rembrandt is.  Seeing the originals was an amazing experience. 

After some studies and nearly falling asleep on our feet we returned home and got more Chinese but from a different place.  IT was much better. J  Tomorrow we go to Chislehurst caves and then take a train to Calais.  Then two days to Paris. J Calais is a hotel so happiness for clean showers!!!