London Calling

Bloody England.

As some of you might have already read over at Gwen's more expeditiously updated blog, we just got back from a fun and surprisingly sunny four day trip to London, England. Despite being raped by the low dollar time and time again (estimated cost of our four day trip: about 34,000 dollars give or take), we still managed to have a good time. As with any great city of the world, London seems to live up to its billing, sassy Wank-uhs strolling around and all.

We flew out Friday morning, arriving at moderately distant Stansed Airpport - a nice little venue for a cheap flight by the way - and then trained into the city to wheel and deal and stick it to the lymies.

We sat down to lunch at a relatively fancy Indian place replete with a power business lunch crew (and us). The food was good though the total price was steep, about 70 pounds or 4,000 dollars. (Yes I'm going to make that weak dollar joke over and over again. I made it all weekend, why stop now?) After lunch, it was over to Westminster Abbey to stroll around and marvel at the famous people buried there. And after that it was a quick stroll to Big Ben and Parliament. (Estimated number of times I belted out the "Big Ben, Parliament Kids! I cannot get left!" line from European Vacation: ~ 235)



Big Ben, Parliament Kids!


We cruised down the river a bit at that point and stumbled on a pretty sweet Battle of Britain memorial which I proceeded to admire and then of course mock extensively by trying to frame multiple "Jackass" pictures - my trademark. You can see one result here and the others in the photo log.



Scramble Boys! We got an Air Raid comin', we do!



Following the photo shoot we went off on the train to Gwen's aunt's (Diane's) house, where we stayed each night. This was huge for us - for multiple reasons. First, it let Gwen ("Wendy") catch up with her aunt. Second, it saved us a LOT of money (estimated savings for three nights in London: 12,457 dollars). Third, it gave us exposure to a friendly local in the form of Michael, Gwen's uncle, who was quite pleasant. (More about him and the Brits in general later in the post.)

We ate Shepherd's Pie - a traditional English meal - that night. Despite the fact that it was a traditional English meal, it turned out to actually be pretty good. Also Michael was quite the proficient home brewer, so he managed to get us pretty looped that first night on home-brewed beer and cider while we traded comments on Americans and British in general.

On Saturday we ventured out into some beautiful and atypical British weather. We had lunch at a good Japanese place (the key to eating in London is to eat everything BUT British food - the aforementioned Shepherd's Pie excluded) and then met up with old friend Margie (see earlier posts, pics, i.e Chamonix) for a day at the Tower of London. Forgoing a tour with the Beefeater guides (too crowded), we spent several hours with an audio guide. The Tower is famous, a command post and prison (as well as place of execution) of old for Victorian England. It has its share of notorious stories of course, and further highlighted one of the coolest features of visiting European cities in general - the extensive history therein. It also houses the Crown Jewels of State, which are fairly impressive.

After the Tower we headed out toward dinner, stopping off first at a bar to have a round of drinks. Three drinks at the place we chose cost 25 pounds, or FIFTY DOLLARS! (No exaggeration here). Don't believe me? Here's a picture of the receipt.



London - Dirt Cheap


On Sunday Gwen and I headed out, on Michael's recommendation, to the "Imperial War Museum", which might be the best title of a museum EVER. This museum specialized in World War I and II memorabilia, and was phenomenal. Full-sized authentic vehicles abounded, plus endless exhibits of both the great world wars. Gwen and I spent nearly three hours in said museum (mostly at my urging), and we barely even touched World War I (other than this neat part where you walk through a mock-up "trench" while mannequins and recordings simulate the experience). There was also a Holocaust exhibit on one of the floors which took a while and was pretty solid. As always with those things, it was pretty sobering. Not sure why I like those exhibits so much, they are horrifying but mesmerizing. Unreal. One of the most powerful things they had there were lots of videos, several with new "colorizations". The result, going from black and white, to color, is pretty staggering - it just hammers home that the events were closer in time than we realize. Powerful stuff. I'll go out a limb here and say it - the holocaust sucked.




Do not 'Eff' with the Imperial War Museum

After the "Imperial War Museum" we headed off to the National Gallery to look upon fine art by the likes of Da Vinci, Van Gogh, and others. Not too shabby.

We headed back to Michael and Diane's at that point to join them again for dinner and home brew. Monday morning we were up and off to the city again, then the airport and then home. On the way to London the last time, I snapped the shot below of the power factory which is the cover of the Pink Floyd Album "Animals" which we had seen every day. Neat.





So London rocked and I'm adding it to my "list". I really enjoyed our time with Diane and Michael to get the perspective of both a local (Michael) and of an American-turned-local (Diane, who has been in London over fifteen years now). Diane's accent was can't win for her, British sounding to an American, and American sounding to a Brit.

The British are amusing. They tend to be very polite, and their speech, like that of the Irish, is mesmerizing. They seem to be into ending every sentence with a question. (i.e "It's a lovely day, inn't it") Plus they tend to slip in a lot of things under their breath and between sips of beer, etc, which are often quite comical. Michael was no exception.

Michael himself was a hell of a nice guy. He was a Britain-o-phile to the core, extolling the virtues of Britain at the expense of all else (best beer? British. best place to live? Britain, etc), but in an amusing way, kind of like my dad extols The Woodlands, Texas at the expense of all other places. Michael wasn't a huge "football" fan which I found odd, but when asked he said the Tatenham Hotspurs were his team. He was also a HUGE war buff (the Imperial War Museum was his recommendation) and proud to show off his impressive collection of war films. We talked extensively about the English take on World War I and (more interestingly) World War II, and I must say it was nice to leave a country where you have to walk on eggshells in regards to World War II and go to a place where you can hi-five an ally about how freakin' sweet we schooled the nazis. (Michael's take on the Germans: "A grouchy rule-following lot, aren't they?") So true, Michael. So true.

All in all, not a bad weekend.


Pics:

London 2008