London England

• Well, we had a Wonderful time in London! I have been late to Blog about it because in addition to all the fun, I came home with a sinus infection. Working non-stop for 30 days is tiring and it takes its toll on you! It was disappointing to not be at "full capacity" in London of all places.
• First, everyone spoke English - and that was a great comfort to us. Although, there were times where I would have asked a question and it took a minute to realize I could do it in English and be understood!
  
• The herd boarded the bus in Strasbourg, we went to the Baden Baden airport, and flew into London. We had a healthy meal of snack food purchased at the one and only store that offered edibles in the little airport at 8 pm.


• We met Michi, our guide, and hopped on our bus and took about an hour ride to the Hotel which was situated on the west side of London. After a quick drive past Big Ben, Parliment, and other attractions we checked into the hotel. The royals were our neighbors - so to speak - but they did not invite us over for tea : ( We were not far from Kensington Gardens, the Victoria & Albert Museum, Harrods, and Royal Albert Hall.
  
• Friday was a bus tour of the city with our lovely, proper, and conservative British guide. She informed us that Diana was a tramp, Camilla is lovely, just lovely, and that the whole lot of Parliment should be flushed! She was incredibly knowledgable and let us off the bus for pictures of a few things such as London Bridge.
  
• We had free time to wander around town (many of us took in the Victoria and Albert's Museum) we all met back at a restaurant near Trafalgar square and ate a wonderful dinner before heading off to see Wicked at the Apollo Victoria theatre. What an amazing show. I definately want to read the book. Amazing production and incredible actors/singers. The Stage set is in the center.

• Saturday was a tour of the Tate Modern. WOW! An amazing collection and an interesting building to house it. The building is a power plant, much of its space is now musuem but I believe it still produces some power as well. We all posed for a group picture under Louise Bourgeois famous spider entitled Maman (below). There was a show dedicated to her but since it took $2.02 to equal 1 pound. No one paid the $24. US to see it. London is very expensive because it is a big and amazing city but the fact that the dollar is in the crapper is NOT helpful!

We were on our own for the afternoon and met up again at 6:15 or so to board the London Eye. The "London Eye" is the closest Ferris wheel in size to the original which debuted at the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago known as the "White City." The ferris wheel was meant to illustrate America's engineering prowess after Gustave Eiffel wowed the crowds in Paris with his Eiffel Tower. We will visit Eiffel's masterpiece in Paris in a few weeks.

Sunday, our guide Michi took a lot of students to Cambden town. It is a marketplace for anything and everything that you would like to find! There are massive "markets" with hundreds of booths with everything you can imagine - touristy junk, gothic clothing, handmaid goods and more and more.

We hopped back on the tube and made our way to the British Museum.

I was totally sick at this point, and thus did not enjoy the tour as much as I normally would but it was an incredible musuem! Inside one finds: the Rosetta stone, the marbles from the Parthenon, Mummies and other interesting objects from ancient Egypt, and even, much to my surprise and delight, Albrecht Durer's Triumphal Arch!

After several hours of looking, and a quick and uneventful trip to the store, I took the tube back to Trafalgar Square. I went to St. Martin of the Field's Crypt area where the Brass Rubbing center just opened two weeks ago. I sat down with the special crayon and did several rubbings of pictures on brass plates from old churches around Europe.

Finally, on Monday we all hopped on the super busy, rush hour tubes and made our way to St. Paul's Cathedral by Christopher Wren. We had an audio tour and a good hour to walk around and see the entire cathedral. After a few final hours of freedom in London we met at the Hotel and took the bus to the EXTREMELY busy London Stanstead airport and flew back to Baden Baden where our fabulous Chateau staff was there to meet us and bring us "home."