Also thanks to him, I got to skip leg day. Why? Because... stairs... stairs everywhere. The Monument, an obolisk that you can climb up and is dedicated to The Great Fire of 1666, had around 130 narrow spiral steps. Then in the afternoon we visited St. Paul's Cathedral, which had another 300 or so steps ranging from wide to narrow and steep.
That's not that many, you might think, especially if you've made it to the top of the Statue of Liberty. But, the difference is the foot traffic. The statue is stop-and-go the whole way. There was little to no traffic at these two (despite the fact that they offered spectacular panoramic views of the city) which means the climbing was constant... an other words... FEEL THE BURN!!!
I'm not complaining though, I had the opportunity to see some spectacular things. The artwork in St. Paul's is absolutely fabulous. I didn't go to Westminster Abbey, but I imagine St. Paul's is a fabulous substitute if you're looking for something that has a little bit less people at it.
Anyone who has any sort of interest in history, though, should make it a priority to go through the British Museum. It's enormous. When you read about it, it is raved as the world's greatest collection of cultural artifacts, but there simply isn't a way to grasp how vast the collection is without going there. I could have easily gotten lost inside its many halls for at minimum two days if I had allowed myself to do so. It was staggering. The pride of its collection is, of course, the Rosetta Stone, but there are many other wonderful sights ranging from Ancient Greece to Africa to Europe and the Americas.
Earlier in the day we also visited the old Roman wall. The city haas built up a lot around it in the millenia that have passed since its creation, but it's still wonderful thing to see construction so capable of standing the test of time (even if it's mostly crumbled or dismantled at this point).
That ended our touring for Day 2. My friend and I were quite exhausted from all of the walking.
Day 3 brought one of the biggest disappointments of the trip: The Tower of London. I had a chance to go out on my own for the morning and early afternoon, and needed to choose between Westminster and the Tower. I chose the latter. I think I made the completely wrong choice.
The Tower of London has a wonderful rich history intertwined with the English monarchy, and was also a notorious prison for criminals and traitors. It now also holds the Crown Jewels. The sad fact is that at a place like this you hope for a certain ambiance or atmosphere, but the site is so popular with tourists that that particular part is pretty much irrevocably destroyed. There are vendors for overpriced food inside the complex, and it's set up more like a museum than that of a prison and house for the royal family. Strangely enough I thought the fact that exemplified this most was that all of the stone walls on the way to the Crown Jewels had been sheet-rocked or plastered over to allow them to paint various phrases and things on the wall.
There was one good thing about the Tower. That was the Beefeater tours. Reviews raved about how personable, informative, and humorous they were. That was all very much true, and my tour guide was one of the best I've ever gotten in any particular place I've gone (not quite as good as the private guides in Gettysburg though!)
On to by far one of the highlights of my trip: The spectacular food and alchohol.
While out on Day 2 (Thursday), we went to a nice modern Italian restaurant. I ordered Ham Hock, and it was absolutely exquisit. No alcohol with that meal, but we had been doing so much walking that water was a better choice anyway!
Before that, and just before going to The Monument, we grabbed a beer at Fuller's The Banker. We split a bottle of Fuller's Past Masters Old Burton Extra.
That night we ordered some neopolitan style pizza from a place near where my friend lives.
Day 3, though we grabbed several beers and a bunch of cheese/bread for lunch. The beer: Innis and Gunn and bridge Kipling. The Innis & Gunn reminded me of a style similar to that of a Sam Adams Boston Lager. It was excellent. The Thornbridge was maybe the closest to an American IPA that I've had while here, in that it was probably the hoppiest beer I've had. It still wasn't hoppy to the point of being completely imbalanced, though, like many American IPAs have a tendency to do. If you're a fan of an IPA stronger in hops, this is a wonderful example of not going overboard but still having pronounced hop flavor. I don't remember the various cheeses, and I'm kicking myself for not writing it down, here's some pictures from the lunch:
One thing I wanted to try while I was here: Indian food. The British call it "Curry". I was told that outside of India, you can't get better Indian food than in London. I have absolutely no idea what we ordered, because my friend chose the meal. I do remember one was a Lamb dish, one was chicken, one was cheese/vegetarian. WWe also had Cobra, an Indian beer. Here is the pictures of that:
I think I'll be finding Indian food near home more often now!
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