Gemma & Claire Carry On: Trip to London with the Exchange students

Thursday 20^th January 2011

The bus ride from Hertfordshire takes about an hour to the centre of London and we were dropped off opposite the London eye. The student guides gave us a walking tour starting with a stroll up towards Big Ben which was at the end of the street. From there we continued to Downing St, where you can’t actually go down the St but we had a few photos with the guards out the front. Gemma got a great photo with the horse as its sticking its tongue out. We made our way to Trafalgar square via Buckingham palace and St James Park to say hi to the Queen. I don’t think she was at home today, there is meant to be a flag raised to let the public know if she is on residence or not but we couldn’t see it. We didn’t see the changing of the guard ceremony as in winter they happen ‘every other day’. We figured that we’d be back anyway. Also the guards were dressed in grey for some reason. Planning to visit the palace in my royal guard costume at some point so I can have photos, and maybe have my own changing of the guard ceremony lol :) Not sure how Gemma feels about that, I think she’s a little embarrassed and worried about my enthusiasm to do so lol. As we walked down the mall Ben was giving us a tour of the street and its magnificent buildings were, describing what he thought the building would be/should be (he had no idea) and therefore it was.

At Trafalgar square we climbed on to the large lion statues, felt like 5 yr olds! It was great! The information centre up the street was helpful with lunch. Pointing us in the right direction to get fish and chips and happened to sell ‘coupons’ for £3, when the meal was worth £8. The pub she pointed us too was a Sherlock Holmes pub with all kinds of Sherlock Holmes memorabilia on the walls.

Unsure where to go next we ventured on to Piccadilly Circus. Unfortunately, A few of the surrounding building were having a few renovations and were covered in scaffolding but we were still able to wonder around the streets. We found a massive 5+ level toy store called Hamleys which was celebrating its 250th birthday!

The National Art gallery was our next stop ... it was free and the crowd we were with “liked art and $#!T” to quote Jordan. (bleeping, as im not sure who is reading this.) Outside the gallery was a man ‘juggling’ a glass ball and doing all kinds of tricky things with it. Apparently if we had of stayed longer he would have done back flips!! But we missed that and wondered through level 1 mostly; viewing Van Gough, Monet, Michelangelo, Renoir, Da Vinci. There was also a section with 500+ year old art. It was mostly religious art... lots of ‘virgin with child’.

We had a good day! Exhausting. Slept on the bus on the way home... lucky we already had left overs set aside for dinner! :) so we just snuggled up and watched a movie.