Day 8 - Tuesday, July 16

Refreshed from our first night’s stay in London, around 10:00AM we walked a block from the condo to Abbey Road, and then strolled along it until we reached its namesake studio where dozens of tourists were holding up traffic to get “the shot” in the iconic crosswalk out front.  We then took trains from St. John’s Wood to Westminster and emerged from the Underground in what picture books and postcards have always told me was London.  Big Ben, Parliament, Whitehall and 10 Downing were all clumped together presided over by the stoic Westminster Abbey.  Laura got her picture taken with the scowling statue of Winston Churchill, and we had ice cream in St. James Park on our way to Buckingham Palace.  This part of downtown London loves to give its visitors the royal treatment.  

We then went to Kensington Gardens so Laura could have her picture taken with Peter Pan, and headed back to our condo to rest before going to The Globe where we held tickets for the night’s performance of “Much Ado About Nothing.”  It had been our longest walking day of the trip so far as we put in 8.5 miles (or about 13.7 kilometers.)

The show amazed and delighted.  The cast worked their hearts out, and the words of Shakespeare glowed bright as did all the city lights along the waterfront of the Thames.  Those folks certainly know how to put on a show.