[Back In Time] London Vacation - Day 2: Just Relax

At the end of the last post, I mentioned that our host baked cake at 2 am. I don't know how you feel about this, but we definitely didn't get it. Especially when you want to sleep. But there was nothing to do. It's her apartment. On the other hand, we weren't even aware of whether she was at home or not during the day. We spent most of the time out, of course, so we didn't have to care about it.

I woke up early in the morning. Well, it's early in London. It'd be seven am in our country, which is not so bad. I was bored, so I started to figure out what to do during the day while my fiance was still trying to sleep. Unfortunately for him, I opened the window because there was almost no air in the room. It awakened him completely because it was not a quiet housing estate like in Prague, where only a dog barking sounds from time to time or a motorbike. On that thirteenth floor, we could hear all the noise from the street. Every car, every train (the train station was only a few yards away from us) and every man. Just everything. Of course, he yelled at me a bit. But nobody knew that it is such a mess out there.

We have decided beforehand that we will make such a relaxing day and get around the monuments that are for free. We had six-day London Pass purchased (prepaid admission for a lot of monuments - the more you use, the more it is worth it), but we didn't want to use it the very first day.

There are much more for free options than in Prague. A lot of museums, galleries, churches, etc. have free entry. Only at every step, you find a box where you can donate. Isn't it cool? And it's not just some boring museums. You could spend a whole day in such a Natural History Museum. Apart from exciting expositions, there are also many interactive elements and games. So it is also perfect for children!

As our goal, I chose this museum, because I wasn't interested in others. Just all the attractions in London (except for exceptions) open at 10 am. So I had time to let my hair dry after washing it. The hair dryer was found in one of the drawers just before we were ready to leave for Prague.

The closest underground station destination was South Kensington, and the nearest underground stop from us was North Greenwich. It looked like a short walk on the map, so we went to North Greenwich on our feet. It was hot. A strange smell came from the river. Almost whole London smelled like it. And we were just passing through the very industrial facilities. It was not a very nice walk. Besides, we couldn't even get used to their left direction. Most of the pedestrian crossings had "Look left" or "Look right" written on the road, but we just looked automatically where we were used to. Every crossing without a traffic light was quite dangerous for us.

After about an hour we found out that we were still far from North Greenwich and decided to take a bus. One has gone, and there were no normal timetables at bus stops. It's just mentioning that they came every ten minutes or so. Fortunately, there are lightboards that show info about the nearest buses. We were waiting. Without big luggage, we could finally try a ride on the upper deck of the double-decker.

Apart from the fact that climbing the stairs is pretty dangerous, especially when the bus is moving, it was just a normal bus journey. You just have a slightly better view.

How would you pronounce the word Greenwich?

In the end, we switched to the Jubilee Line underground. London Underground has a total of 11 lines. If you ever see its map, Jubilee is the gray one, and I'll tell you, you wouldn't want to go there when it's hot weather. Unfortunately, we had to.

We were used to get chilled in the underground and the deeper the tunnel is, the colder it is. That is not the case in London. We didn't use all lines, but Jubilee and Northern (black) are overheated. In the metro, which is terribly tiny to ours and to those who run on the other lines, you'll die of heat. The platforms are the same. There is warm air flowing from all sides and sweat flows from you. The only place where you won't sweat is the open window in the door between the wagons. But there is so much cold air flowing when driving that you would just get ill. Going by this underground was, therefore, a punishment. It can be pleasant just in winter.

We, all sticky from the sweat, get out on South Kensington. From the stop led an incredibly long underpass that spat us before the museum. There are more museums, but we only went to the Natural History Museum.

The building is huge and beautiful. Overall, I like British architecture. Especially their bricks.

As I said at the beginning, the museum has free entry, and only some short-term exhibitions haven't. Whoever wants can donate to moneyboxes.

The museum is really huge, and although we thought we were already at the end, we were bumping into new and new expositions. You can find everything there. Dinosaurs, mammals, fish, birds, stones, beetles, history of the Earth, evolution, ... I would only compare this to our National Museum in Prague, but this one is much larger. However, I will give you more details about it in a separate post. For now, I have only a little tasting for you:

We got out of the museum at lunchtime. We went to look for some, not too expensive, restaurant. Well, after recalculation everything is expensive. We went to some Italian restaurant. And guess for what. For a pizza of course.

It was yummy, but we didn't eat it all because of the hot weather. In addition, everything was falling out of it, because nothing held in place the ham, the rukola, and the cheese.

Then we headed out to the underground again to get closer to St. James Park to went to see Buckingham Palace. This year, you could book a tour in it, but we didn't do it. It was enough from outside. Buckingham is not a nice building.

We have shortened the way through the once mentioned St. James Park. I was there last year, so I knew it. Ducks, geese, pigeons, and swans everywhere. Even black swans. Some birds were eating directly from people's hands, and the pigeons sat on you when you had something to eat in your hand.

I also knew that the best photo could be taken from the bridge that runs across the lake. You can see the London Eye and some towers (I don't know the building) from there.

Our way to Buckingham

One guard stood there with their typical hat. It was a pity that there weren't two of them. It was a pretty unbalanced look.

We ended the trip. Well, I ended it (I was already dead, and my feet were sore), with a short stay in Green Park. But it was not green at all because of the heat. The grass was dry and yellow. We sat for a while on the ground, because all the benches were occupied, and then we went home.

Unlike the day that was supposed to wait for us, it was really just relaxation, and we didn't see a lot, but despite that, we slept hard enough that the noise from the street didn't wake us up.

To be continued...