London Pass, Day One

(Tuesday March 22, 2011)

After the Ceremony of the Keys last night I figured I should see that great big castle in the daylight. Besides, I bought a London Pass and the Tower of London is in the Pass. So everything I do for the next two days will be on my Pass.

It's bigger than I thought.

This is just a wee bit of the Tower and the sign before the underpass to get there.

The Tower of London is where the Crown Jewels are. No pictures, but man, they sure are sparlky!!

One of the Ravens at the Tower.

The Tower is also home to Ravens, 6 of them (they also have 2 spares). Apparently if all the Ravens leave the Tower, the Kingdom and the Tower will fall.

The Ravens have their wings clipped so they can't fly.

At the Ceremony of the Keys last night someone asked about the Ravens. We were told that they have a keeper, and he feeds them, gets them up in the morning and puts them to bed each night. The Yeoman Warder said of the Raven Keeper 'He is the only bloke I know that can wistle and have 6 birds into bed in 5 minutes'. Hahahaha...

This picture marks the bottom of the stairwell where the bodies of two prines were found.

There is a Tower within the Tower of London called 'The Bloody Tower'. Two Princes dissapeared from this Tower and their bodies were later found buried at the bottom of this staircase. The Bloody Tower was also used to torture prisoners and has some other interesting, and fairly greusome, history.

The White Tower

The White Tower was the first part of the Tower the was built. At one point it was whitewashed and picked up the name of White Tower. What is now known as the Tower of London is a compund built in three stages by a number of rulers over a number of years.

I spent a good part of the day at the Tower and then headed off to a boat tour of the Thames River. Here is some of what I saw...

I have no idea what this is, but it looks pretty cool!

I guess they carved this in case you get confused while travelling on the river. There are 6 bridges in Central London.

Shakespear's Globe Theatre

You can't go to London without going to Marks and Spencer.

After the boat tour I headed off to Kensington Palace. There is a lot of contruction going on at the Palace and the State Rooms are not open right now. They have put together a display called 'The Enchanted Palace'. It was some sort of art installation that I don't understand. I didn't like it.

One of the gardens at Kensington Palace.

I liked the Gardens way better than the Palace...

After another day of marathon walking I am going to get off these feeties.