Last Days in London; Soccer Stadia and Matchs

Well, the trip to London is over. My Dad flew back to LAX yesterday morning, and I took a train back up to Durham. I have been too busy during the ending of the trip to provide another update, so here is a summary of end of the trip.

The last two days of the week, Friday and Saturday, were possibly my favorite two days of the trip. On Friday we toured Arsenal FC's Emirates Stadium, and on Saturday we went to an England international football match in Wembley Stadium.

Arsenal are on of the most successful Football (soccer) clubs in Britain. They have a long and decorated history of success. They are one of the dozen or more clubs that make their home in London. In fact, their home ground was only about a mile from our apartment in North London. For nearly a century they played in Highbury Stadium, but in 2006 they moved to a much bigger state of the art stadium- The Emirates.

Because there were no club matches last week, we settled for a stadium tour rather than a match. However, the tour was way better than expected- in fact, it probably was better than going to a match. We learned alot about the club, it's history, it's manager and got to see lots of behind the scenes areas. We got to go into the directors box and see their plush seats, we got to go into the players parking lot entrance, we got to see the locker room, we got to go through the tunnel to the pitch, and into all the media rooms. For a big soccer fan like me, it was amazing.

(The tube stop)

(The tunnel)

(In the locker room)

The following day I finally went to my first soccer match in England, after being here for months. We went to see an international friendly, England vs. Slovakia. The game took place in possibly an even cooler stadium than the Emirates: Wembley Stadium.

Wembley is another brand new arena, built as the home ground for the English National team. It seats 90,000. It's a bit out of town, and took about 30 minutes on the subway to get there. But it was well worth the trip. Everything about the game felt like a world cup atmosphere.

(The packed walk to the stadium)

(Dad with his England Scarf)


(During national anthems)

(Kick Off)

(We were sitting in the upper deck, but still had good views)

(England won pretty easily)

(It was pretty much chaos after the game, everyone trying to get to subway)

(Waiting for the train)

And so that was it. The next morning we packed up and headed out. It really was an amazing week; I can hardly believe all the stuff we saw and did. As promised, I'll post even more pictures in the next few days.

Massive London Update

Wow, what an incredible city. The amount of stuff we've done since my last update on Sunday is ridiculous. I couldn't possibly do a day by day breakdown, but I'll do my best to get you up to speed with what we've done, as well as show some of our best pictures from the last few days.

We moved into our new apartment on Monday, the place where we're spending the remaining nights of our trip, through Sunday. It's on the 6th (and top) floor of an old Victorian Building in Upper Holloway. It's about 15 minutes by Subway from central London. It's in a more residential neighborhood, with lots of small shops and restaurants. Because we're on the top floor we've got an amazing panoramic view of the city, and we can see the London Eye, St. Paul's and even Big Ben. However, as it's an old Victorian building, there is no elevator. We've tried counting the steps several times, and the general consensus is 101. Now that's not too bad empty handed, but on the day we moved in with our very heavy bags it was less than pleasant, to say the least.

(Me in my new blogging spot at the kitchen table)

(Sunset from apartment window)

While we haven't seen everything in London yet, we decided the time was ripe for some small excursions out of the city. On Tuesday we took a boat down the Thames to Greenwich. The ride itself was amazing, with many historic and picturesque sights along the river.

In Greenwich, we walked through some splendid parks on the way up the hill to the Royal Observatory. This is the home of GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) as well as the Prime Meridian of the World- longitude 0"0".

(The Tower Bridge)

(The Observatory)

(Dad on the World's Prime Meridian)

(Me on the top of the hill with View of London in the Background)

On Wednesday, we embarked on another excursion, this time a bit further- to Windsor. Windsor, the home of the Royal Family's Windsor Castle is about a 50 minute journey via train from London. We ate lunch in a pub, and then hiked up the hill to the 1,000 year old vacation home of the Royals. It was worth the journey. Far more spectacular than Buckingham Palace, the castle was resplendent, even on a cold and wet day. We spent a few hours wandering around the castle and grounds, carefully avoiding the Queen's Guard who will supposedly march right over/through any tourists who don't move out of the way.

(Main tower of Castle)

(One of the guards)

(The 'Long Walk'- the path from the castle through the grounds)

After we'd seen enough of the castle, we made our way back through town and across the river to Eton. In the town of Eton is the famous Eton College. Founded by George VI in 1440, Eton College has produced 18 Prime Ministers, as well as many other famous alumni. The campus and grounds are closed to the public, unless you pay an exorbitant fee for the tour, but we managed to sneak around.

(The Thames, from the Eton Bridge)

(Swans in the Thames, between Windsor and Eton)

(Some of Eton College)

(Tree Blossoms on Eton's Campus)

We've also seen more stuff in London too though. Earlier this week we went down to Piccadilly Circus during the nighttime, and that really was a sight. There was a ridiculous amount of lights, cars, taxis and noise. It was like Times Square, just not as vertical.

And this morning we saw Westminster Abbey. Also around one thousand years old, the cathedral was truly amazing. It was enormous on the inside, and highly ornate in its' decorations. It is the site of Coronation, wedding, funeral and burial for most of England's Monarch's of the last Millennium. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but we took many of the splendid grounds and exterior.





After seeing the abbey we walked up to the British Museum. We spent nearly the entire afternoon inside, but we could have spent days. It has almost half a million artifacts, from nearly every continent. Some of the items were too old to really comprehend. We saw the Rosetta Stone, mummies, Roman artifacts and much more.

(The Front of the Museum)

(Me with the famous Rosetta Stone)

(Dad with some Egyptian Gods)

That's it for now. We are starting to slow down, with less things planned for this weekend after our whirlwind tour so far. Tomorrow we are taking a tour of the Emirates Stadium- home of Arsenal FC. On Saturday evening we are seeing England play Slovakia in an international soccer match, in Wembley Stadium- England's 90,000 seat home stadium.

Although it may seem like I'm posting loads of pictures, there are really way more I'd like to put up. The internet here is really slow though, and it takes me a few hours for each of these posts. I'll post more pictures next week.

Sunday in London

Sunday was a beautiful day in the city. It was very sunny and may have got into the low 60s. For much of the day I was able to take off my sweatshirt and just walk around in jeans and a t-shirt. My dad even got sunburnt.

We took the subway a few stops and walked down Regent Street, a fancy shopping street with stores like Lacoste, Louis Vuitton, Prada and Burberry. Eventually we reached Picadilly Circus, which is like the Times Square of London. Even during the day it was pretty exciting.

We walked around through the gardens and parks near Buckingham Palace, enjoying the wide streets closed to cars on Sundays, the spring flowers and the warm weather. We missed the changing of the guards, but still got some good glimpses of the palace.

(Flowers in the park)

(Buckingham Palace in the distance)

After seeing the palace (no Queen sightings) we walked a bit further to Trafalgar Square. The size of the square was amazing. It was just on a much larger scale than everything else in London. It was huge and spread out, with tons of people sitting around on steps, eating lunch, and soaking up the sun.

(Posing on one of the square's famous lions)

We dipped into the National Gallery for a while, and the minutes turned into hours.

(The gallery)

It was full of so many amazing works, and some very famous paintings. We were not allowed to take pictures inside, but we did see these:

('Bathers at Asnières' by Seurat)

('Sunflowers' by Van Gogh)

We finally left the museum because our stomachs were growling. We walked across town to Harrods Department Store. It was more amazing than I ever imagined. Harrods has 7 floors, and covers 4.5 acres! It takes up one giant city block, and has been in operation since 1834. But we were most excited about the food halls. They had whatever you could dream of eating. Tons of meats and cheeses, pies, sushi, Indian food, fruits and vegetables, chocolates and pastries, even a real Krispy Kreme operating. It was unbelievable. We got enough for a picnic/mini feast and took it out to Hyde Park to sit and eat in the sunshine.

(Standing outside a side entrance)

We went back to Harrods after lunch, and spent a few more hours walking through various departments. It was larger than most malls I've been in.

After Harrods we went off in search of a certain underground station, but were highly unsuccessful in finding it. We did have a very nice walk through Chelsea, a very exclusive and nice neighborhood. We saw lots of Ferraris and Bentlys.

(Dad consulting a map)

(A charming square)

Eventually we found a good subway station, and hopped on for a quick ride to Westminister Palace- also known as the House of Parliament. We spent quite a while walking around, taking lots of pictures and enjoying the amazing Big Ben clocktower.

Finally we walked back to the hotel and had a very early night. Our legs and feet were hurting and we were just exhausted. We estimate we walked about 10 miles each of the first few days.