Another jam-packed day, very fun and exciting. Off with her head!To the Tower of London we went, the bus detouring a bit through parts of the city we hadn’t seen before: the business section, the more modern buildings built because that section sustained terrible damage in the Second World War, and the waterfront areas Jim and I visited a few years  ago.

It was hot —record- breaking hot— so we were glad we got there early and went right into the Crown Jewels with no waiting in line. They don’t allow pictures, but those diamonds, emeralds, sapphires, crowns, scepters and gold banquet dishes were really quite exquisite.

One of the beefeaters (a term they really don’t like preferring instead “Yeomen Warders of His Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress the Tower of London, and Members of the Sovereign’s Body Guard of the Yeoman Guard Extraordinare“), a rather grumpy one, talked to us about their role and responsibilities. He also shared with us that it was he who had to stand for over four hours next to the coffin at Princes Diana’s funeral in his formal dress uniform weighing over 10 lbs. with all the regalia on it. And that doesn’t even include the big beefeaters hat!

Jim and I also visited some of the sections we hadn’t seen before (Stella was doing her touring with her new friends) but the heat and crowds really got to us. Every school group in greater London seemed to be there too. We learned from Hannah, our friend Patti’s granddaughter, that British children are usually in school most of the summer with a short break in early August so this would be an ideal time for “field trips”.

We met up in the nice cafeteria and afterwards, a bit refreshed but now in the hotter midday, we headed down to the banks of the river to go on a high speed RIB boat ride down the Thames.

Our boatman, Simon was quite funny, in an in-your- face Irish kind of way and got everybody laughing as we raced down the river to wild music, all  the way to Greenwich where the boat hovered in the river as he explained Greenwich Mean Time and showed us the crosses on top of spires where it is measured. 

Then back we went, crossing over other boats wakes— a real roller coaster ride-until we had to slow down to make our way to the dock of the London Eye which is right next door to our hotel. 

The pods on the Eye are air conditioned ( 🤗🤗🤗) which felt wonderful as we circled the Thames waterfront, looking in every direction in our private ( just our group) pods. Also, bypassing the long lines was kind of cool.

After a short break, showers and trying to get this blog going, we opted for walking towards the theatre in the West End to get some dinner and go to our show, Mamma Mia. We walked about 20 minutes along the “Queen’s Way, the south bank lively area along the river. Crossing the Waterloo bridge, we got to the “Strand”, a long famous street, had some BBQ for dinner and then across the street to the performance of the show Mamma Mia!

Despite our (I guess we should say Wendys) misgivings, the show was fantastic. Fabulous choreography, cast, and energy in a very old theatre made the perfect ending to a long hot day. A curious thing though- about 10 minutes from the end of the first act, there was an announcement that they had to stop the show for technical reasons.  We never found out why, but chances are it had something to do with the heat— maybe the audio got fried or something similar. It also got very hot in the theatre. Luckily, it resumed after about 10 minutes without any further glitches.

Tomorrow we actually don’t have to board the bus to go to the British Museum until 9:30.  YAY!!