We arrived to London early and dragged ourself to our friend's house so we could shower and take a nap and catch up on emails and pictures. The house was in a nice neighborhood called Kensington and our friend's brother was a very gracious host. Around noon, we made our way out and caught a bus towards a central area where Hyde Park ends and the parks around Buckingham Palace begin. The rain started around this area and made our walk quite unenjoyable and wet. We arrived to the palace and as the picture might say itself, its a tad underwhelming. Actually, its really disappointing and the dreary weather magnified that aspect. After poking around the palace, we made our way towards the river, where in one area, you can find Big Ben, the Parliament building, Westminster Abbey, and other famous landmarks. The rain eased up so we were able to take some good pictures but the wind on the river was strong and made the cold air feel really cold. The name Big Ben actually refers to the bell in the clock(named for Sir Benjamin Hall) and has been extended to mean the tower but the tower is actually called St. Stephen's Tower. During both World Wars, the clock bells were silenced and the face was darkened at night to prevent providing help to German fighter pilots. The Parliament building(Westminster Palace) had some very impressive architecture. It was originally built in the eleventh century and served as home to the Kings of England but burned down in 1512 and after being rebuilt, it became the home of the houses of Parliament. It burned down again and was rebuilt in the 1830's but retained the original form as much as possible and still looks quite Medieval. Westminster Abbey was closed because of the Easter weekend celebrations but the outside looked quite Gothic in design and the church has seen several different floor plans and designs over the years and houses an impressive array of famous tombs such as: Geoffrey Chaucer(The Canterbury Tales), Charles Dickens, John Keats, Rudyard Kipling, Alexander Pope, and even Sir Isaac Newton. A recent addition to the London skyline as of 1999 is the Millennium Wheel, commonly called the London Eye. It is a large ferris wheel with egg shaped pods that take you up so you can get a bird's eye view of the entire city. We passed over the London Bridge, the one that inspired the famous children's song but it was quite uninspiring as its just a bridge. The really nice bridge in London is the Tower Bridge, close to the Tower of London, which is why its called the Tower Bridge. The bridge construction was started in 1886 and took eight years to finish. Now the two towers and walkways house various public exhibitions. From the Tower Bridge, we walked over to the Tower of London but didn't pay to go in because we've heard its quite expensive and not that thrilling. The Tower construction was started around 1078 and has continued until it became the current tower and has housed lots of executions over the years. We had lunch at a great Japanese place that had reasonable prices. One thing that surprised us overall about London was how inexpensive the food was in comparison with other touristy cities similar to it like New York or Paris. Anyways, our first day was really fun and we enjoyed checking out all the sites.
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