(My) London Eye

(part 2 blog entry of my UK trip)

There was so much to see in London !

We only had 3.5 days (if I remember correctly) to explore the city and surrounding places and it was definitely NOT ENOUGH. We flew in from Aberdeen on a Thursday afternoon and right away that night we saw Wicked, The Musical at the Apollo Victoria Theater . It was wonderful beyond words! Unlike any musical I have seen before. I do have faulty memory at times (a number of people can attest to that), but I can remember clearly how I felt during the Defying Gravity song – I was in awe of the set, of the singing, of the acting. Definitely the best! That alone made my London trip worthwhile.

We spent the next day on a Big Bus tour around the city. Tiring, but enjoyable. My favorite stop was the Tower of London – this castle fortress which used to be a prison (among others). It was scary for me walking around the place. At that time, I was reading already the biographies of Mary Queen of Scots and Elizabeth I (and how their lives were as queens, cousins, and rivals) and the Tower of London was mentioned a number of times where they imprisoned Elizabeth for a short while, and beheaded Mary Queen of Scots, as well as others – Anne Boleyn, Jane Grey, etc. I was actually having nightmares about the place! I blamed my pregnancy hormones (and my overactive imagination) for having such vivid dreams.

One our last full day, we joined a tour that went outside London where we saw the Windsor Castle, the Stonehenge and Bath. The Queen wasn’t at Windsor so the castle was opened to the public. My favorite display was Queen Mary’s dolls’ house – there was this huge dolls’ house, a gift from the people to Queen Mary, with electricity working and toilets flushing. It even had a small working vacuum cleaner which was newly invented during that time. The Stonehenge was… just stones! Apart from having the chance to photograph an iconic monument there wasn’t really much to do. Bath is one of those cities made famous by the ancient Roman Spas – Roman Baths (those big public pools). The look and feel of the city was different from that of London as they tried to preserve the Roman architecture. Interesting place, but it was still Windsor that was my favorite for that day. I guess my fixation for castles weren’t over yet then.

Anyway, a day wasn’t really enough to fully explore every place that the Big Bus tour covered so we had to go back to explore the museums on our last morning in London. I would have preferred to explore Oxford St (the shopping district) then but Bob cleverly steered me away from the area, saying that I might “hurt myself”. Hehe.

So, if I have the chance to go back, I’d probably explore more of the city. I’d definitely catch another musical (or two). And of course, go to Oxford St! :)

* more photos to follow!!!