Houses of Parliment

From February 16 to 24, 2007,
Greg finally departed the Eastern Time Zone
and spent a week in England.

The trip included visits to Madame Tussauds; the London Eye; the Cabinet War Rooms, where Winston Churchill led the Brits through the Blitz; Sunday morning Eucharist at Westminster Abbey; a Beefeater-led tour of the Tower of London; HMS Belfast, a Royal Navy cruiser that is part of the British Military Museum and permanently moored across the Thames from the Tower of London; double-decker bus rides, and a boat tour on the Thames. Not to mention some delicious Indian food and a wonderful sidetrip to York where we saw the National Railway Museum and the gigantic York Minster.

 

Even though Greg left home, he took a little bit of the Eastern Time Zone with him, specifically his Block Island sweatshirt and a copy of the Block Island Times, which he read on the Thames Embankment near the Tower Bridge. (Below)
Greg in London reading the Block Island Times

 

Below, Margy and Greg in Green Park, which was immediately in front of their hotel.
Above, a very short walk through Green Park brought us to this liitle ole abode . . . Buckingham Palace. (The royal standard is not flying from the flagpole, so it was obvious the Queen had skipped town ahead of our visit. Imagine!) Below, we got out of the way as the Horseguard rode in.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right, Harrods, the most amazing store
on the planet.

 

 

Below, Greg in the famous Harrods Food Halls with an amazing Easter egg.

Above, Greg and some pirate buddies he met in the Harrods Toy Halls. Do you think they all share an orthodontist?

 

Below, the infamous Tower of London with storm clouds overhead. Just the right setting for a performance of Richard III, huh?
Above left, Beefeaters on parade at the Tower. Above right, The Tower as seen from across the Thames.

 

Below, Tower Bridge. (Not to be confused with London Bridge, although many have, in fact, made that mistake.)
Above, a ticket to visit the Cabinet War Rooms, where Winston Churchill (right) and his War Cabinet ran the war while the Nazis bombed London. The Nazis burned much of London's West End and the Thames docks, blew the roof off of the Houses of Parliment, and even hit Buckingham Palace. They never managed to hit the War Rooms.

Above right, Dad and Greg hang out in front of the War Rooms. (What's with Dad's hair?)








Below, inside the War Rooms, A British general officer at work.
Above, Greg and Dad in front of Covent Garden, which looks a lot more polished than it did when Henry Higgins found Eliza Doolittle there in My Fair Lady.




Right, inside Covent Garden, Greg and Mom peer through the window of the London Transport Museum Shop. As usual, Greg is looking at the models of trains.

Above left, Greg on a boat, permanently moored on the Thames, which now serves as a restaurant. That's Big Ben in the background. Above right, Greg and Dad in front of the London Eye, which is more than 400-feet tall. Immediately above left, Greg, inside one of the Eye's capsules (each of which weighs 10 tons!) about to video his aerial tour of London. Below, Greg shooting video of Big Ben and the Houses of Parliment at Westminster.

Above, a view across the Thames from the inside of our capsule.


Left, Greg looks around to make sure he's capturing everything.


Below, Greg turns his back on Big Ben and the Houses of Parliment.

 

 

 

Left, Greg pops out of one of England's famous grocers, probably right after procuring some Cadbury chocolates — one of his absolute favorite things about Britain!
Above, Greg rests on against the railing on the Buckingham Palace side of Green Park just as the Horseguards ride by on their way to work.

Below, Greg on the other side of Green Park, just in front of our hotel, the Park Lane.