"London Baby!"

Ello London! What an adventure! We arrived at our hotel late Thursday night, grabbing a quick shut eye before waking early Friday morning to explore the city. 

We started Friday off by walking around Hyde park, taking a quick peek at Wellington Arch and Marble Arch before heading to Buckingham palace to watch the changing of the guard. It was quite entertaining watching the guards on their horses parade down the street, listening to the bands play mash ups of Queen and the Beatles and observing the guards as they stomped their feet and marched around the palace entrance. 

After the show, we took a walking break and met one of Jeff’s past coworkers for lunch (Harriet Potter who happens to be from England, best coincidence ever!). We followed lunch with a trip to Abbey Road, dodging the cars to capture our own picture-perfect album cover. With our photo shoot complete, we hopped back on the tube and made our way to the hotel to change before heading out for some more sight-seeing, dinner and the highlight of the day, The Book of Mormon!

As we waited for the show to start, we treated ourselves to the BEST donuts at Bill’s. Fresh, fluffy, hot donuts with a side of perfectly gooey salted caramel dipping sauce... yumo! Our mouths are watering just thinking about them! We wandered around Piccadilly Circus (aka London’s Times Square) stopping in at the M&M store and admiring the fancy LEGO displays across the street. Then, finally, it was time for the musical to start. We found our seats, settled in and spent the next two hours completely enthralled by the show. It was fantastic!

Hello! Hi! Bonjour! Ding Dong! Ni hao! Heigh Ho!

We woke early again on Saturday, ready to conquer more of the city. We hopped on our first real double decker bus and headed over to Portobello Road (“The street where the riches of ages are stowed”). We wandered the street, examining the antiques and peeking in a few books to see if we could find The Stars of Astaroth (If you haven’t seen Bedknobs and Broomsticks, you should probably watch it). 

Next, we made our way to the Hop On Hop Off bus (included in the London Pass, which we highly recommend if you decide to visit London). Our tour guide, the perfect Brit (blunt and sarcastic), lead us through the city. We hopped off at the Tower of London and spent the afternoon exploring the castle and admiring the royal jewels (talk about a fancy hat!). After the castle, we walked over to Tower Bridge where we admired the aerial view of the city as well as the feeling of walking on air thanks to the glass floors. 

Following the bridge, we took a jaunt over to Leadenhall Market (used during the filming of Diagon Alley). It was quite quiet, as many of the shops were closed, but it was still fun to see! Keeping with the Harry Potter theme, we hopped back on our bus and took a ride to King’s Cross Station where we watched as the muggles attempted to run through the wall at what they assume is platform 9 3/4. 

Expelliarmus!

We hopped back on the bus and took a ride to the waterfront. As we walked to dinner, we passed some trucks full of sound equipment and photography gear and a sign saying filming was occurring in that area (we’re not sure what was being filmed, but we think it was associated with the new Spiderman movie…). We found our dinner destination, and settled into a quaint basement cove and enjoyed drinks, fish and chips and English pie at Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese (thanks for the recommendation Cory!). 

Cheers!

Sunday morning came and we set off on Day 3 of adventuring with another full to do list. We started by visiting Kensington Palace while keeping an eye out for the royals. We enjoyed a tour of the palace while expanding our knowledge on Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Following the tour, we made our way to the Science Museum to wait out the rain (we had fantastic weather for most of the trip, so we can’t complain about this mid-morning storm). After the rain settled, we took a stroll over the Millennium Bridge before traveling back in time as we toured Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre. Our tour guide was phenomenal, cracking jokes as he shared the history of the theatre.

"To be, or not to be. That is the question"

We followed the theatre with a trip to Borough Market (also used in the filming of the Harry Potter) which we quickly learned is closed on Sundays. So much for that idea! Instead, we stopped at Anchor Bankside for a drink and fish and chips. The pub was adorable, the drinks were great, but the food was not much to write home about. The next day, we would learn that even though we weren’t completely impressed, it was in fact a famous tavern. On our boat tour, we learned that a tavern has been in that area for 800 years and famous folk such as William Shakespeare used to enjoy drinks there… who knew! We continued to explore this part of London as we waited for the sunset to approach so we could enjoy the view from the top of the Shard. Thankfully it was a clear evening and we were able to see for miles! As a bonus, we stuck around until the sun completely set and admired the city in the dark, lit by street lamps and city lights. Beautiful!

By Monday, our legs were definitely feeling the 92,000 steps we’d taken the past three days, but we pushed through because there was still so much to see! We started the day off at Westminster Abbey, admiring the burial sites of Sir Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Steven Hawking, Charles Dickens, C.S. Lewis and many more! The Abbey was beautiful and the history within is mind blowing. One special aspect of the Abbey is that on the hour they make an announcement and ask that everyone in the Abbey take a minute to pray as they name a special prayer request. It’s always incredible to see people of all backgrounds taking a minute to be silent and pray together for the same cause.

"I'm gonna have to go in the map"

Big Ben is getting a facelift! 

We kept our church theme going as we headed to St. Paul’s Cathedral (this was our favorite between the two churches). The art within St. Paul’s is mind blowingly beautiful. One of our favorite parts was the mural on the ceiling depicting the different stages of the creation story. As part of the tour, we climbed 528 stairs, nearly 365 feet, to the Golden Gallery where we admired another bird’s eye view of London (climbing large staircases to the top of a tower seems to be one of our travel themes… There’s just something incredible about seeing a city from up above). 

View from the Golden Gallery!

By midafternoon, we decided it was time to head back to the hotel to get ready for the highlight of our trip… seeing Hamilton!!! We changed and headed back out, stopping at a quaint little pub near the theater for a drink, followed by a pre-theater dessert at Bill’s (a different location but still the same delicious donuts!). Finally, it was time to head to the show and boy oh boy, it was INCREDIBLE! Jeff likes to describe it as three hours of pure goosebumps! We’re still singing the songs and trying to figure out how to see it again. It was SO good and definitely our favorite part of the trip!

"I am not throwing away my shot"

As Tuesday morning approached, we packed our bags and set off for our last day in London. We started the day with a boat tour, enjoying a view of the city from the water before making our way to Sherlock’s home on Baker street and ending the trip with a Boddington’s beer in our hotel room. If you’re a Friend’s fan, you’ll understand the importance of having Boddington’s in London, however, the ability to find a pub that actually serves it is near impossible. We spent five days searching for Boddington’s on tap and never found it… I guess things have changed since the 90’s… 

Are you home Sherlock?

BODDINGTONS!

And just like that (130,000 steps later), our five-day trip in London came to an end. What a city! The memories of the jam-packed tube stations will stick with us forever as well as the memories of walking where centuries of royals have walked. But most of all, we will remember sitting in the Victoria Palace Theatre watching Hamilton on stage, surrounded by our English relatives, remembering the history of how the U.S. came to be and listening to the laughter as King George sang, “You’ll be back, soon you’ll see. You’ll remember you belong to me”. 

Even after five days of non-stop touring, we still have several items left on our London To Do list, I guess we will have to plan another trip… Hamilton round two?