APRIL 18 - 25, 2011
Well now that I've settled back into sleeping in and watching a lot of TV (loving this break thing..), I can finally put out this update for the week my parents visited! We had a ton of fun and it was great to see them - and have them pay for everything! Here's the pictures I took; I may update this later if I get my hands on all the once my mum took:
After I picked up the flight-weary travelers from the airport, took the tube ride to central London, and got them settled into the (correct!) hotel on the river, we got to a bit of sight-seeing in the surprisingly beautiful weather! We walked around for a while - my apartment, Strand campus, the Strand, Trafalgar Square, Big Ben - before grabbing some pub food and a pint! But at that point, they were pretty tired, so I dropped them off and came back to my place to watch the Pens in Game 3. Much better game than the past one - won it 3-2 after quickly going up 2-0 in the first. Wooooooo
On the second day, we walked through a bit of Green Park before checking out Buckingham Palace - but the changing of the guard was off that day..
Outside Buckingham Palace - all prettied up for the wedding! Such beautiful flowers
After that, we headed to the Tower of London to check it out!
Entering the Tower of London!
Trebuchet in the now-empty moat, and the tall walls
Up on Tower Hill inside the inner walls. Neat old houses
Tower Bridge past the walls
Building with the Crown Jewels on the left, armory on the right
An old church in the background. That coffee table-looking thing with the glass pillow is a to mark where they used to chop people's heads off in the old days!
Afterwards, we walked for a bit towards St. Paul's Cathedral, though there was a service going on and we couldn't go in. We settled for admiring the outside and surrounding gardens, followed by a nice Italian dinners - one of my first in London since being here!
Neat pillar outside St. Paul's Cathedral
On Wednesday morning, we hopped on the tube and headed to Paddington Station to catch a train to the beautiful town of Bath!
St. John's Church in Bath
Such a neat little town! Although apparently not so 'little' - population of around 80,000 according to Wikipedia!
Cute park
First look at the Bath Abbey
Front of the Bath Abbey
Entrance to the Roman Baths
The rest of the family!
The old baths!
Another side of the Bath Abbey
Ruins of the ancient Roman Temple!
Remains from the original entrance to the baths
Steaming waters heading to the baths!
Hanging out by the pool
What a cool place!
Doors to the Abbey
Inside. Huge place
Busy shopping alleyways
Looking at Pulteney Bridge, similar to Florence's Ponte Vecchio with all the shops along the side, hanging over the water
So pretty
Rugby pitch over the river
Last look down the river and towards the residential surrounding hillsides before heading back to London for the evening.
After a couple more pints, I left the fam again to watch Game 4. Another great playoff game by the Pens - keeping me on the edge of my seat (and up until 3am!) all the way to a second overtime, where Neal's surprise heroics ended a 3-2 game for the Pens! Wooooooooo
Slept in Thursday (had to after staying up so late!), but headed through Covent Garden and Piccadilly Circus in the afternoon. Lillywhites in Piccadilly was a lot of fun with all of us getting cheap football jerseys - got myself a cool new Celtic F.C. one!
Mum and bro on Waterloo Bridge!
Regent's Street, decorated for the wedding
That evening, we went and saw Les Mis, which was fantastic! I'd never seen it before, or heard much of the music, but it was so good - the music and story were great, not to mention the voices of the actors! Definitely one of the best shows I've seen in London so far.
The Queen's Theatre and Les Mis!
Inside the theatre
Looking down at the stage
Friday involved another trip to Covent Garden in the afternoon to do a bit of market shopping and grab some lunch, then went to the British Museum for a little while to see all the neat stuff (granted I've seen it all before, but it's still awesome)!
A neat church in Covent Garden
Did a miniature 'pub crawl' that evening, hopping a couple pubs around Covent Garden and Leicester Square and having some fun and some good pints! Our 'Cheers bar', as my mum called it - basically our home base pub near the hotel - was called 'The Rose' and was pretty fun! After a couple nights in a row, the friendly Spanish bartender was able to recognize us!
On Saturday, we went to Portobello Road and looked at all the neat stuff for sale! After that, with ominous-looking storm clouds (the first ones we'd seen all week!) nearing, we headed to the 'Isle of Dogs', where all the apparently hooligan Millwall fans cheer for their football club, Millwall F.C.
'The Den', the stadium of the Millwall Lions
Watching the game with the rest of the Millwall hooligans- I mean fans!
Millwall went up 4-0! Great game to watch! Poor Preston fans on the opposite side
The match was a lot of fun, and we had no problems with the 'crazy' fans. Granted, they were loud and rude in all their chanting and cursing, but no more-so than any other true English football fan! Plus, we were protected from the rain under the overhangs! Had some Chinese in Chinatown after getting back to central London before heading home. But after such a fun day, there was some absolutely awful news: Pens played while we were at the match and ended up losing Game 5 8-2. Absurd. Good thing I missed it. Pens still up 3-2 in the series though.
Sunday: Happy Easter! We got all dressed up and headed to Westminster Cathedral for Easter mass!
Inside Westminster Cathedral
Christmas card..?
The altar
Neat building!
So pretty
Afterwards, we went to a local pub for some traditional English Sunday Roast! Delicious! Now that the weather was nice again, we decided to take a boat ride along the Thames, which was really nice! I didn't take any pictures though, as I've pretty much seen it all before.. but it was a fun last day of their visit!
The next morning, I took them back to the airport for their flight home. It was an awesome and fun week and I'm so glad they all came to visit! We saw some great stuff, had fantastic weather, and shared a lot of laughs! I'm sad to see them head back home, but if the next month goes as fast as the past couple, I'll be home for summer in no time!
After hauling my tired self back to London (hey, 8am is early for me!), I restocked on some groceries, grabbed a quick nap, and got back to the relaxing! Actually, there was a bit of catching up that I had to do - emails and such (possible job offer this summer!), as well as TV shows of course! Plus I had to get up that Rome post that was sitting forever on here unpublished. Since there was still nothing really going on, and with a Pens game later that night, I figured I'd keep up with the WWII theme and find another new flick to check out. After a quick search for some forums on 'Best WWII films', I came up with a 1985 Soviet film called 'Come and See' that seemed to appear pretty high on a few lists I saw.
First thoughts: this thing is depressing. It makes 'Schindler's List' look like 'Toy Story'. But I see where a lot of people were coming from in describing it as one of the most realistic portrayals of the horrors of war - especially from the perspective of the Soviet Russians being invaded by the Germans. Good film, but man it got pretty intense: scenes where German soldiers burn down churches with people inside stay with you. I wouldn't put it at the top of my favs list (I'd probably have to still reserve that honor for 'Saving Private Ryan'), but it stood as a pretty good non-traditional WWII flick.
Quick aside for something I forgot to elaborate on in my last post: I liked 'The Pacific', but it will never be up there with 'Band of Brothers'. I've read a lot of reviews about how it focused more on the characters - three in particular - than the battles, but the stories just got boring in a couple of the tamer episodes. An entire episode dedicated to soldiers on leave in Australia, just hanging out drinking and getting with the Aussie 'Sheilas' for an hour, really didn't do it for me.. When it was good, it was great, but when it was bad, it was just slow. But maybe I'm biased because I've watched BoB so many times. Oh well.
Anyway, back to Monday night. Turned out that a depressing film was NOT the one to watch before the Pens game that evening. A well-fought game where the Pens, after going up early, just couldn't get the bounces and could not put together a single powerplay opportunity to quell the eventual Tampa comeback. 4-2 loss puts the series at an even 3-3. Oh man. Game 7 looming. I don't know if I can make it through it!
In the end, it was a fun week with the family - a nice reprieve from hanging out in my room, and from paying for everything myself! If I get a hold of more photos from the week, I'll eventually get them up here as well
Good music of the moment:
Bob Dylan - 'Blowing in the Wind'
No idea, just heard the song while browsing some sites and couldn't get it out of my head!
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Whew, almost caught up!
Cheers!
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