2008 - United Kingdom - Day 2 - White Tower, British Library and Museum

Breakfast at the hotel was very good. I had scrambled eggs with mushrooms, and tomatoes, hash browns and bacon. We left the hotel on our bus at 7:15 am. Our first 2 hours was a London City tour. We drove around the city with a local guide. We made a couple stops, one at Westminster Abby and the other at Buckingham Palace. Then we went to the London Tower, or White Tower. My favorite part of the day was standing outside the walls overlooking the fortress, and Michael Wilcox telling us the stories of Lady Jane Gray and Thomas More. We then walked around through the fortress. We saw the crown jewels, which I was pretty shocked was out for the entire world to see. Wow, soooo many gems, it was amazing. We also saw the spot of all the beheadings, and went inside the Bloody tower where Sir Walter Raleigh was imprisoned and the 2 princes disappeared. Also the suicide of some duke whose name I can’t recall. We then drove to the British Library. There we saw the Magna Charta, some first printings of the bible in English, and the last letter of Thomas More to Henry the 8th. There was also a document from Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth. They had amazing things there. On our way to the British Museum after we left the library, we had a small collision with another car. And we also saw a bus with a motorcycle under it. Not good. At the museum we saw many Greek statues, and Egyptian statues and mummies. I liked them better in Egypt and Greece. I really liked all the English History stuff, even some old Viking weapons and armor and boat pictures. After the museum, we were supposed to go back to the hotel and have a sacrament meeting, but an older woman was lost and we spent over an hour looking for her. It turns out that she couldn’t remember where we supposed to meet so she had taken a taxi back to the hotel. Mom and I were both pretty hungry and the Wilcox’s recommended a restaurant across the road. We went there for dinner and it was really good. I had turkey and British beef. It came with yummy new potatoes and lots of veggies to choose from, and some scone type pastry called York pudding. We asked an English man next to us lots of questions and had a nice conversation with him and his daughter.