Our RV Adventures

Jan and I left the rig about 10:15 heading up to Huntsville in the pouring rain, for another of our monthly get-togethers with Debi and Ed Hurlburt, and Janice and Dave Evans. This time it was at the Farmhouse Café, well known in the area for their great menu, delicious comfort food, and homemade pies.

But I’ll follow up on all that in tomorrow’s blog.

Today I thought I’d repost where we were 2 years ago today.

Total London Tour 5/20/19

Today was our first full day in London and we did it up right by taking the Total London Tour, a whirlwind, 9 hour extravaganza hitting the major tourist highlights of the city.

So we were up at 5:45, downstairs at the restaurant for breakfast when it opened at 6:30, jumping into our booked last night Uber ride at 7:00, and at the Victoria Coach Station by 7:20am. As it turns out, Coach Station is just the fancy British term for Bus Terminal.

Our tour bus pulled out right on time at 7:45am, and James, our tour guide, launched into his detailed description of pretty much every building we passed.

Our first stop was at St. Paul’s Cathedral, but something was going on inside the prevented us from touring it. Designed by Christopher Wren, this present building was began in 1675 after the previous one was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. But there has been a church on this site since 603 A.D.

The tallest building in London until 1967, it has been the location of the Silver, Golden, and Diamond Jubilee services for Queen Elizabeth II, and the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana.

After passing by many other locations, like both the Old and New Scotland Yard buildings, and the Houses of Parliament, our next stop was Westminster Abbey, the coronation site of every British Monarch since 1066 A.D. And here we did get to tour the inside.

Like St. Paul’s, there has been a church on this site since the 7th century, but unlike St. Paul’s, there are over 3000 people buried here, including, not only people like Mary, Queen of Scots, and a bunch of Edwards, Williams, Charles, Henrys, and James, but scientists like Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, and more recently, Stephen Hawking. And even actors like Sir Lawrence Olivier.

And supposedly there is another relationship between Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s. When it was under construction, St. Paul’s ran out of money to finished up the building. So other churches in the area were dunned to contribute to their ‘building fund’.

And since Westminster Abbey, officially titled “The Collegiate Church of St. Peter at Westminster”, was a major ‘contributor’, this gave rise to the old saw, “Robbing Peter to pay Paul”.

At least that’s the way the story goes.

Unfortunately they don’t allow any photos or videos inside, so no pictures for the blog. However I must say that this was the second abbey, the other one being the one in Melk, Austria, that we’ve visited that was so ‘sacrosanct’ as to not allow even ‘non-flash’ photography, but not so ‘sacrosanct’ as to have you exit the church on your tour through a ‘GIFT SHOP’. Just sayin’.

Next up was a stop at Buckingham Palace for the Changing of the Guard.

After a short walk from where our bus was parked outside the palace gates, we lined up just in time to see the Coldstream Guards leave their post and their replacement regiment march by on the way to take up their positions.

Then it was all back on the bus for a drive across the Tower Bridge,

to our next stop, The Tower of London. But first up, we were given an hour for lunch, so Jan and I chose the nearby Wagamama location, an Asian-styled fusion place, that turned out to be excellent.

First up was an appetizer order of Bang Bang Cauliflower,

crispy wok-fried in firecracker sauce with red and green onions, and topped off with ginger and coriander.

DELICIOUS!

Jan got the Chili Chicken Ramen,

while I got the Chili Steak Ramen.

After our break we met up with our guide who passed out our Tower tickets and we were left to explore the area for several hours.

This is the White Tower, the first building in the fortress.

Constructed between 1078 and 1100 by William the Conqueror, it was very formidable for its time.

Next up was the building that holds the Crown Jewels,

but again no photos were allowed.

So I just took a photo of MY Crown Jewel.

Jan was also interested to see the memorial placed at the site of the execution of Anne Boleyn.

A historical group keeps fresh flowers on the site.

As we were leaving, I took this shot contrasting one of the oldest sites in London, and one of the most modern.

The 1000 foot tall building, called The Shard for its broken glass-like top, is now probably the most recognizable things on the London skyline. Here’s a better shot of it.

Then after a 45 minute cruise along the Thames, we finished up our day with a ride on the Millennium Eye.

At 443 feet, the Eye is the 2nd tallest Ferris Wheel in the world. The tallest one, at 550 feet, is the High Roller in Las Vegas, and we’ve been lucky enough to ride both of them.

And of course the obligatory selfie.

Then it was an Uber ride back to our hotel, where we collapsed without even getting dinner, just had some snacks in the room.

Tomorrow, thank goodness, is pretty much a do-nothing day, before we start again on Wednesday with a day-trip out to Stonehenge.

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Following on the above blog, I thought I’d also repost this one about my teenage brush with British royalty, well, despite the fact that I’m related to Sir Thomas Parr, the father of Catherine Parr, the sixth and last wife of Henry VIII.

You remember –  Divorced, Beheaded, Died, Divorced, Beheaded, Survived, don’t you. She was the ‘Survived’ one.

And because I’m a descendent of Thomas Parr, that also means I’m a descendent of King Edward III.

 
Bowing To The Inevitable . . .

This is one of those blogs that results from the intersection of several recent events – Our recent time in London, and President Trump’s upcoming visit there.

The subject is bowing.

There’s been several articles about whether President Trump will/should bow to the Queen. For the record, he shouldn’t and won’t. And neither will the First Lady.

To start with, our President doesn’t  defer to any other leader, and we’re no longer British subjects, anyway. There was that little dustup back in the late-1700’s that took care of that.

Last week as we were passing Buckingham Place, we saw a lot of fancy dressed women wearing big hats, getting out of limos, and Jan wondered if Sam was among them.

I’ve talked about Sam, though not by name, a couple of years ago in a long blog post called The Pixelization Of Memory. This part is about halfway down.

The whole idea started when we were visiting my old hometown in north Alabama a few years ago, and I mentioned to Jan, that I had been checking out people around us, wondering if I would run into one of the several old girlfriends that I had back then. But as I told Jan, I realized that I was looking for them like they looked back when they were 16 or so, not in their 60’s like they are now.

And that’s why Jan brought up Sam as we passed Buckingham Palace.

It all started here.

Beginning when I was 13 we lived in South America for a couple of years, mostly staying at a large old hotel that had both nightly guests, and also residents like us.

Turns out there was a very cute British girl, about 14, also living there. Soft red, curly hair and bright green eyes. Since we were the only English-speaking kids our age around, we naturally ended up hanging out together. She told me her name was Sam (Samantha) and that her father worked for the British government.

After we had been together for a month or so, one day she showed up to where we usually met on the large landscaped grounds, all dressed up for a party, filly dress, hair pileup on her head, the works. A big change from the shorts and T-shirts she usually wore.

She told me her mother wanted to meet me for afternoon tea at 4pm. Told me in no uncertain terms that I was to dress nice, wear long pants and a nice shirt, and comb my hair. (Yes, I had hair back then)

And “DON’T BE LATE!”

As she left, I ask what suite she was in, and she said, “6^th floor”. And when I ask what room, she smiled slightly, and said, “You’ll figure it out.” And I did.

When I got off the elevator, there was no hallway, just a vestibule and a set of ornate double doors with a pull rope for a door bell.

A few seconds after I rang the bell, there stood a butler in full regalia, but young and very fit looking, and about 6’6” tall. Looking down at me, he said, “Ah, Master Gregory, right on time, thank you.”

Then, after he closed the door behind me, he said, “Please follow me. The DUCHESS and LADY Samantha are waiting for you in the library.”

Wait, What?

When I followed Andrews into the library, I found Sam standing behind her mother who was sitting at a writing desk. And I could tell from the look on her face that she was terrified that I was going to screw this up. And knowing me, she had good reason to worry.

After Andrews introduce me, I said, “I’ve never met a Duchess before. Am I supposed to bow, or curtsy?”

Sam blanched white as the proverbial sheet.

Her mother looked at me very seriously, and said, “In this informal situation, neither is required. Then with a big smile she said, “But I would like to see your curtsy sometime.”

With that the ice was broken, and Sam started breathing again.

After that I was regularly invited for tea. The only time the Duchess ever got mad at me was when I made the mistake of referring to Sam as ‘Sam’ instead of Samantha in front of her.

Her eyes flashed and her voice got cold as she said, “Sa Man Tha”

Turns out that Sam’s stepfather was Consul General, and Sam would inherit her mother’s title someday, a title that had been in the family since the late-1600’s. And with that title came, not one, not two, but three ancestral estates.

And if that’s not bad enough, it turned out that both Samantha and her mother were actually royalty, and in line for the throne, though in the double-digits position.

So, was Sam among those limo passengers at Buckingham? I’ll never know, and I don’t want to know. I prefer to remember her when she was 14.

And I never did learn how to curtsy . . . or bow.

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Thought For The Day:

Of course this might explain why some people say their pizza tastes like cardboard.