We were both a bit tired this morning, and bit fed up with the fact that the accommodation wasn't as good as it first seemed - the shower temperature dial was stuck, and we discovered last night we had no cooking utensils and had to stir dinner with a chopping knife :/ But despite our lack of sleep catching up with us a bit we had another fabulous day, and the receptions guys had a look at our shower (fingers crossed) and found some cooking utensils too!
First up was the London Bridge Experience. We were a bit early so we did some wandering and exploring again around the area. We walked across the London Bridge past the Southwark Cathedral, saw Tower Bridge and wandered over to Shakespeare's Globe (but didn't go inside).
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| Southwark Cathedral |
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| Tower Bridge |
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| London Bridge |
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| London Bridge |
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| Shakespeare's Globe |
We couldn't photograph inside the London Bridge Experience, but it was of a similar nature to the London Dungeon which we went to yesterday, except it was more focussed on the history of London Bridge rather than the history of London in general. It covered all the various versions of the bridge and had some pretty awesome models of when the bridge still had houses along it. However at the end of the day the focus was on the interaction and scaring us so there was some pretty fun aspects to it to and some cool rides. I hadn't realised that the tickets I had purchased also gave us entry into the London Tombs, but they did so that was pretty awesome. The idea was along the lines of a haunted house I guess, but it was supposed to be the tombs under London Bridge. Good fun!
After lunch we walked over to Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. By this point our feet were already hurting from walking, which was not a particularly good omen to start with. Once we got there, I was astounded at how large Tower of London was - I honestly thought it was a single tower! But instead it was an entire fortress!
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| The Tower of London fortress |
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The ceramic poppies that are planned to fill the entire moat to commemorate 100 years since the first day of World War I.
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We started with the Coin and Kings Exhibition, and then moved onto the Medieval Palace and Wall Walks. In the Medieval Palace we entered St Thomas's Tower which was built by King Edward I between 1275 and 1279. We then entered Wakefield Tower which was built as part of Henry III's lodgings between 1220 and 1240.
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| King Edwared I's oratory |
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| King Edward I's Bedchamber |
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| Entrance Room of Wakefield Tower |
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| The throne in Wakefield Tower |
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| Stained glass window in the throne room of Wakefield Tower |
At this point we realised there was no way we were going to be able to see everything in one afternoon. So we decided that what we wanted to do most was the White Tower (the main building in the centre, and the "Tower" referred to in the name "Tower of London"), the chapel, the crown jewels and the torture and punishment areas.
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| Model of the Tower of London fortress showing the White Tower in the centre |
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| The white tower built by William the Conqueror |
The lawns around the White Tower was where the Ravens lived. They were HUGE I honestly never expected a raven to be so large! They were very tame but you weren't allowed to get close.Apparently they eat 170 g of meat a day plus blood soaked biscuits which is a little creepy to say the least!. There is also a myth that if the Ravens ever leave the tower then the tower will fall down.
Inside the White Tower was all the armoury displays, weapons, giant replicas of coins, the modern coins and a beautiful coat of arms.
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| Armour for both horses and people |
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| A dragon created out of various pieces of armour |
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| Guns and Cannons |
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| Lances, swords, and cannons |
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| Giant Coins! |
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| The modern coins form a shield |
After the White Tower, we re-evaluated again (after seeing the lines to the aforementioned things we wanted to do) and decided we were just going to see the Crown Jewels and leave.
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| The queue for the Crown Jewels doubled back on itself and was well over 60m |
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| The Crown Jewels building |
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| Entrance Way to the building |
Unfortunately no photos of the Crown Jewels were allowed, but they were amazing. There were like 10-20 different crowns, and sceptres, and everything was encrusted with emeralds and rubies and sapphires. The gold embroidered cloaks were breathtaking. The picture below is an example of one of the crowns from the Daily Mail.
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| Picture courtesy of the Daily Mail |
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