Back-dated England entry #6: Thursday

(Another of the really late batch.)

On Thursday , I got see London... or at least a tiny little portion of it.

The trip there (with soubrette and plotinus) was only the second time I'd been on a real train. Apart from the ear pain from the air pressure when going through tunnels, the experience was most enjoyable. plotinus and I both got out our tourist books and we all acted wantonly dorky. While I've used subways most of my life, the London Underground was exciting to experience live and in person. It was quite a bit more crowded and muggy than the TTC although, to be fair, the Central Line was closed.

We passed the Parliament buildings and Big Ben on the way to or from... Westminster Abbey! We had to wait a while to get in but it was worth it to see the coronation seat and the tombs of so many monarchs. I still can't believe that I saw the resting place of Elizabeth I. Nobody else understood why I was so excited at a monument to Sir John "Northwest Passage" Franklin but my little Canadian heart still found it fascinating. We missed all the musicians but Handel as those who put the pamphlet-guided tour together obviously didn't consider them important. They skipped Benjamin Britten's monument!

While soubrette went to buy pizza bases and stay around Victoria station to meet up with evershed, plotinus accompanied me on a hurried walk to see and photograph Buckingham Palace before dark. He obliged me in taking the standard tourist photo in front of the Palace; I got out my Canada scarf for the occasion. With the assistance of directions given via cellphone while wandering around the station, we found the others as darkness was falling. It was definitely evening at that point but we still saw the outside of the Tower and the Tower Bridge, accompanied by tour commentary from evershed. I have "amusingly slightly snarky Tube announcements" written in my notes but don't recall exactly what they were.

At Trafalgar Square, we climbed the base of Nelson's column. (No innuendo intended, really.) Luckily for me, there weren't many people around to witness my inability to find footing or a place to hold on with my hands; plotinus probably hadn't expected to have to practically lift me when he kindly offered to help me up. I had surprisingly little difficulty getting down, actually, unlike poor soubrette--cosmic payback, I suppose, for her ascent (assisted by evershed) having been so graceful.

The first fast or instant food of the entire trip (remarkable!) was consumed at King's Cross station. I noted the sign indicating Platform 9 3/4 but thought we were in too much of a hurry to stop and take photos. (It turned out we weren't. Oh well.)

We (minus both plotinus and evershed, I believe) did see Salome that evening. It was a pretty good production all in all though the Greek tragedy-style masks annoyed me, not least because they made the actor's breathing sound like panting.

Here is soubrette's entry about the day.