Greenwich and the Prime Meridian

So we went to Greenwich (pronounced GREH-nich) and toured the Royal Observatory. Although the place is most well known for Greenwich Mean Time (GMT or UTC), that was one of many of the things the observatory had in their museum. The museum included an interesting exhibit on the history of watches. Thanks to Mr. Perkin's 10th grade discrete math class, I remembered that knowing the exact time was useful to finding one's longitutde - a feat that was very difficult back in the day. Anyway, they had some really interesting watches and clocks from the 16th century or so forward. The guy that made a watch that worked at sea (pendulums don't work so a grandfather clocks - the first accurate clocks - were out of the question) made over £20,000 from the Royal Observatory - quite a sum two hundred years ago.

We were able to stand on the prime meridian, although the place next to the cool plaque had a very long line to it and we wanted to enjoy the day a bit more, so we just took a picture from over the door. It was an interesting day, and a great break from the city - Greenwich is about 30 minutes by light rail and, although you can see the city skyline, it's a quieter village still within Greater London.

London Temple

The ward temple trip to the London Temple was a much needed trip. We loved getting out of the busy city and into the country. The months since Tyler and Ali’s wedding feels like forever.

The Queen's B-day Parade

Funny story to start out our day:

We were looking for a good spot to watch the parade on Saturday. We stopped for a minute to look at our map by this ol' guy and Tay said, " whenever I see a statue like this I always think it is George Washington." I looked at it a little closer and without missing a beat said, " good, because this one is!" :) Who would've thought he'd be hanging out at Trafalgar Square in London.

The best part of the parade was when Queen Elizabeth II's band introduced her. They had such a great song. She was not so friendly though...haha. In the video she hardly looks around, let alone wave. We heard that she waves when she gets to her palace. I'll give her the benefit of the doubt because we were at the very end of her hour and a half parade.

Exploring

We were headed to an art museum which was closed for a private function so, with the help of a local lady who saw that we looked lost we found this great little town called Hampstead Heath to explore. The walk out there felt like the country and I loved it. We found a great cemetery that was opened in the late 18th century. As you can see in the picture, it is all overgrown with grass and trees.


Here are some local artists. The at the top is in the underground walkway to the tube. The little boy at the bottom is captured by the mime at Trafalgar square.




Taylor loves this one. Those Texans finally got what they wanted...

Queen Elisabeth the 2

This one is for Esther! Here are some pictures of the Queen, her palace, and some of the men in Parliament. Crazy how they still dress like that for certain occasions. We were talking about them today so I thought I'd put up some pics for her. Unfortunately 2 of them are from the newspaper...rip off I know, but your hopefully in for some real ones (that we've taken) after Saturday( the Queen's parade).

While I'm writing I thought I'd let you know what happened with all the money the machine spit at us. A worker from the metro came and picked it up, but the next day we received a thank you letter and about 24 bus passes, about $65 worth of passes!! It pays to be honest;)

Tower of London

At the request of Grandma Tanner we went to see the Crown Jewels in the Tower of London. It was fun to be in there knowing that if "G" were there she would be loving every minute of it! Many of the towers were built in the early thirteenth century. It was a beautiful Saturday, quite hot for the early afternoon, then it cooled off with an amazing breeze. We walked along the port of the Thames river and along part of the bridge that you can see behind Tay in one of the pictures. The two bridges we've seen so far are bright blue and olive green.

We also went to Trafalgar Square and to our surprise it was a Thailand Cutural day. There was a great dance going on when we got there: the cock fight dance;)





Here is a picture of some fruit that they were selling there...very detailed!