A Winter's Day Full of Tourism
A dirty footprint graces my black wool coat. Evidence that I just successfully got Fierce to "step up" onto my shoulders. He is a lot heavier than he used to be when he was a little kid so a kind soul offered their hand for me to stand up again. Both of us smiling, I tried to sneek peeks of the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace through the packed crowd around the palace gate. Thankfully, Fierce got to see the whole procession just above the heads and phones outstretched to catch the moment.
We had arrived to the event a half hour early and had a spot near the entrance to the gate. It was an incredible view of the band and guard as they entered. Then we moved along to where the procession took place in the cennter and had to get creative in order to see the ceremony. It will definitely be a fun memory.
I wanted to hunt down Big Ben next. We cut through the park towards the Westminister area and discovered it was full of pigeons, ducks and other birds. Fierce loved it and renamed it "Bird Town."
We came accross Churchill's War Room Museum first so we pivoted our plan and headed inside and out of the freezing cold. What a fascinating museum. You are given an audio guide. They even have guides for children which was fun because there are little multiple choice questions to engage kids as they go along. The corredores of rooms are like time capsules and you can almost feel the real personalities of Churchill and the many people working below ground to keep England safe. The first thing you are introduced to is a German bomb hanging in the entrence. There was a whole city of tiny rooms below ground. Some included a BBC correspondence room, a typist room, several very small bedrooms including one for Mrs. Churchill, a map room with pins and strings keeping track of the war, a closet of a kitchen and Churchill's own bedroom/ office. There was even a room with a phone just for Churchill to secretly call the President Roosevelt. This room was disguised as a private bathroom. Earily, there were gas masks in every room. If you are interested in WWII, this is a must see museum.
Afterwards, we did get a picture of Big Ben :) Then we jumped on the underground towards the Natural History museum. After checking out the volcano and earthquake exhibit, Fierce lead me straight to the creepy crawlies to see if I would get the heebie jeebies. Then I wanted to check out the dinosoars. However, my favorite exhibit was the great hall that house giant skeletons of large animals such as giraffes under these gorgeous domes set in the brick architecture.
From here we headed back, but stopped at an adorable Italian restaurant for pizza before relaxing at the hotel. Fierce especially likes time at the end of the day to play with souvineers, read books, watch British cooking shows and imagine he is defending the hotel from a Plants vs. Zombies attack.
Love life.
