A European Adventure: Tower of London

Before I begin, I should make a slight disclaimer: Some of these blog posts are posted in a hurry so please forgive any grammar errors, inconsistencies, etc. :)

Ok. I finally have some time to give a more in depth account of what happened since I left the United States.

The plane ride wasn’t too bad. I tried to sleep but of course it isn’t exactly easy to get comfortable in those seats. I may have gotten 30 minutes total. That coupled with the 4 hours from the night before (Time is getting kinda fuzzy right now, such as when should I take my medication now since I used to take it at night… should I take it in the morning? Afternoon?), I didn’t have much sleep by the time I woke up in England. I was tired, buy my excitement kept me going.

As with most of England, there are only minor differences. I noticed these the moment I stepped into the airport. I couldn’t even explain some of them to you – it’s like they just do something a little difference with almost everything. (Btw, all their movie posters are soooo cheesy. They would be laughed at in the US.) Finally I made my way to the place where I had to show the man my passport (Customs, right?) and he started asking me all these questions. Well, considering my lack of sleep and truly have no idea what I was going to be doing (Elliot is my navigator/planner), I sounded like an idiot. I just knew he wasn’t going to let me out of the airport with the way I was answering questions. But obviously he did. Haha.

Note to all of those who plan on traveling in Europe: Pack EXTREMELY light. I didn’t realize how burdensome it would be. I figured that since we were just going straight to the hostel there wouldn’t be an issue with my rather large suitcase, but noooo. Having to pull it up several flights of stairs, trying to find places to stick it when riding on trains… Boy, it was not fun at all. Elliot took pity on my from time to time and helped out a bit. But being the independent soul that I am, I refused for the most part.

Oh, and guess what. My room in the hostel is on the 4th floor… I had to haul my oversized suitcase up 4 flights of stairs. Not cool. Not cool at all.

Anyways, it turned out that the temperature was 50 degrees here in London once we got off the plane. I figured it would be awful (especially considering the fact that I was wearing shorts…), but it was actually rather nice. Nothing like 50 degrees in Louisiana. I would have actually been quite fine in my shorts, but of course Mother Nature thought that would just be too easy. So, it began to rain… and I forgot my rain jacket and my umbrella in the room because I’m smart like that. My entire trip to the Tower of London was rather unpleasant, at least weather-wise.

Speaking of which, my first exciting site to see in London was the Tower of London. OMG! I freaked out! This place where Anne Boleyn was executed and buried! I was beyond excited. Here are some of the pictures:

This is the remains of the old, medieval gate tower that once gave access to the City of London. It is the only known surviving example of a large medieval gate town within the City walls.

A replica of what they believe the bedchamber of Edward I looked like.

There was a lot of graffiti like this all over the Salt Tower, which was a tower where they kept prisoners. This guy was tortured for a while before he was hung, drawn, and quartered.