Our last day in London - where has the time gone?? It seems like only yesterday we were packing our bags, getting on the planes, meeting out Topdeck family... It's all gone so fast!! I'll try not to get all emotional for all my blog readers out there - but it may be inevitable. I really am such a lucky person - I never thought I would be able to see the world once, let alone twice - and with one of my closest friends as well. Very lucky indeed.
Today we are off to visit the queen!! We want to see Buckingham Palace and the changing of the guard. We caught the underground and walked across Green Park to where this massive golden and black gates were - then we saw it. Just like in all the movies we had seen and exactly how I imagined it... Buckingham Palace. The majesty and beauty of this building was like nothing I have seen. Plus the queen lives there! How cool is that?!
We were typical tourists and took lots of photos and then found the prime position to wait out the morning before the changing of the guard. We were told that it was a must see in London and we needed to get a good spot. So we found one behind a gated area right in front of the main entrance to the palace. Score.
Unfortunately it was quite a wait and as it kept getting busier and busier we were squished in quite a small spot - but no one was making us move. We didn't wait all that time for nothing. It was finally time, the royal band came past first, playing the guards in - the entered Buckingham palace and proceeded to do something that I couldn't see or hear... Then some super cool guards on horseback cake through and entered the palace too - it would have been good to do this as a part of a tour so I could have better understood the procession and the meanings of everything that was happening. Oh well - it was still really cool - plus no rain!
Once all of the guards were inside the palace gates - some more stuff happened Thayer couldn't see - but we were getting hungry so we decided to try to beat the crowd. Unfortunately we didn't realise that we had chosen a place to stand on a traffic island and it was near impossible to get off it! Haha just our luck. We finally found a break in the gate and made our way back to the station and to Leicester Square to find some food.
We found a relatively quiet with a good menu and headed in - we had, quite possibly one of the best pub feeds we have had on the whole trip. Pimms cider, baked Camembert with baguette, and pies (but not just any old pies - the most scrumptious pies EVER), we also were keen on dessert but we were so full we couldn't even move let alone eat more. Best thing about London by far... PUB FOOD!
We headed back to Oxford Street for (shocker) more shopping, Alysha was set on getting a present for Matt and her brother so we went in search of some sport shops. Oxford Street really reminds me of shopping in peak hour in Sydney or Melbourne. People everywhere, bumping into each other, always in a rush, Asian tourists... The lot! But we got what we wanted and headed back to the hotel out of the hustle and bustle.
Our room was about to become packing central, three suitcases, five weeks of stuff, two girls... Oh dear - this will be fun. But first, another pub dinner (because, well why not?). It definitely wasn't as good as our lunch, but it gave us enough energy to pack our bags as best we could. We were ready, ready to leave the life we had been living for 5 weeks now, ready to come home to our family, our boyfriends, our jobs, everything that was familiar. I'm gonna miss it, mostly all the amazing people that I now call friends, the magical places that I fell in love with, all the places that caused me injury... Haha it has been full on. But awesome.
All that was left was the long journey home!
Comments
Post a Comment