London and Paris!

We just got back from 10 days in London and Paris! We had a great time seeing all the touristy sites: Stonehenge, Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, The Louvre, etc. We also got to see Matt's cousin, Michael. For some reason, I didn't take any pictures of him! Sorry, Michael! He's a marine and works at the US Embassy, so we got a personal tour of behind the scenes at the embassy. We also went through the states rooms of Buckingham Palace with him and had some great Fish & Chips.

Tower & Tower Bridge

We visited the Tower & Tower Bridge excited to see the Crown Jewels and the site of all the beheadings! The Crown Jewels were UNBELIEVABLE. One of the diamonds was over 500 carats. Most of the jewels were authentic, but in some cases they replaced the original jewels with crystals and passed the jewels on so that they could be used in other crowns, etc. I was excited to visit the gift shop after seeing that exhibition - thinking that I might be able to score a replica, but the gift shop was a hokey let down!

After checking out the jewels, our next stop was to see the site of the beheadings. I told Matt to ask the guard where the guillotines were, so he did. The Beef Eater guard replied with, "This is Britain, Mate! We use the AX!" HAHAHAHA Oops. Wrong country.

So, we headed to the White Tower and stumbled upon a special display about Henry VIII: Dressed to Kill. He was quite a character.

STONEHENGE!

To get to Stonehenge: take bus from hotel to the Tube, take Tube to train station, take train from London to Salisbury, take double decker shuttle bus to Stonehenge! Whatta trip! I have to say, public transportation has its place and serves its purpose, but it is NICE to have personal transportation!!! No stinky weirdos, no swine flu, no doors to get trapped in (sorry, Hubby)!

Overall, Stonehenge was one of our FAVORITE places to visit. It is pretty amazing to look at something that is 4500 years old. We took the audio tour, which was nice, but basically it said: "One theory is..." "We're not sure how...." "We're not sure why...." ....so it didn't have a lot of answers! It rained and was cooooold the entire time we were there, but it was very worthwhile!

Phantom of the Opera!

One afternoon we headed over to visit the TKTS booth in London. They sell half price theater tickets for day of and next day performances. We both love the theater and neither of us had seen The Phantom of the Opera, so this was a great opportunity. The venue was Her Majesty's Theater. It was second to none. The sets were impressive and the voices were perfect! We loved it!! Brava!!!

Changing of the Guard & Shakespeares Globe Theater

We watched the infamous Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace. It was a lot of pomp and circumstance involving two marching bands and a calvary. The crowd was huge so we didn't get to see the actual palace guards up close. Bascially, we are glad that we went, but overall think it's pretty over-rated :)




South of the River Thames, you can see a replica of Shakespeare's Globe Theater. Except it's not really a replica! They have no idea what the original theater looked like, so this is their best guess! They tried to make it using authentic materials with a thatched roof (the only one in London today) and goat hair in the wall plaster! It was neat to see, but I was dissapointed to hear that it's a guesstimate.

British Food

We stopped in for a late night snack at a little pub and ended up with chips, salsa and guacamole! It wasn't exactly Hobbs quality, but we laughed. Matt also ordered a Coors Light -- notice the Rockies are white! There are no blue Rockies in London!!!

Our favorite 2 meals: Fish & Chips and Bangers & Mash! We tried many, many varieties of Fish & Chips (Haddock, Hake, and Cod). All were served with plenty of malt vinegar and MUSHY PEAS (they were actually really good)! The ketchup situation was quite surprising though - most of the ketchup was super sugary. Bangers (sausage) & Mash was my fave. That gravy is unreal. YUM.
One night, after tiring of so much British food, we decided to check out "Chiquitas" Mexican food. When we saw DUCK FAJITAS we had to bite....literally, heehee.

Duck Fajitas with Fries (?!)

Big Ben & Downing Street

For some reason, most of London was closed while we were in town!! We went to visit Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament to find out that they were closed to the public! We also took a stroll down to Downing Street to sneak a peek at the prime minister's pad.

The CHUNNEL!!!!!!

We rode the CHUNNEL from London to Paris!!!! We were UNDER the water! So wild. It's amazing that the tunnel is made entirely of glass and we were able to see so much sea life. Dolphins, sharks, whales, mermaids.....ok,ok, so it's a dark tunnel and just feels like a regular train! However, the Eurostar was extra special because we were served a fancy lunch complete with warm damp towels to freshen with before arrival. Fannnnccceee.

The Eye of Paris

The Eye of Paris is a gigantic ferris wheel that we rode. We were able to see just about everything in Paris and got some cool pictures!

Notre Dame

The Louvre

We wanted to beat the long lines at the Louvre, so we showed up an hour before it opened....and look -- no line! If you look really closely, you can see that Matt's up there - 2nd in line! By the time the museum opened, the line was enormous. About and hour later, we looked and there was no line at all. We could've slept 2 hours more! Joke's on us!
Matt thought that this was a Renaissance painting of me. I so could've been a supermodel in the 1400's.

Louvre

If you look close, you can see Winged Victory at the top of the staircase behind us.

At the top of the Eiffel Tower!

View from Elevator to the top

Seine River from the top

At night, the Eiffel Tower lights up for 5 minutes each hour and sparkles!!



(Anyone know how to flip this video so it's not sideways?)

Eiffel Tower

Lance Armstrong @ the Arc d'Triomphe
(Well, not really, but we were there on the day the Tour ended)

A replica of the flame that the Statue of Liberty holds
(Eiffel Tower in background)

Arc d'Triomphe