16 July - London, England

We had a nice breakfast in the breakfast room (included in room charge). Fortunately, the hotel was able to offer us a slightly larger room on the 1st floor which was a great improvement on our dungeon in the basement. So I'm feeling a lot happier and comfortable about our accommodation. That took most of the morning to sort out. Tama (my niece Michelle's husband) had rung and we arranged to meet him for lunch at Covent Garden. We got week Oyster cards at the Earl’s Court tube station and got the tube to Piccadilly Circus. The tube is a small train with seats lining the sides of the train, so you are seated on the sides. When we got off, we had to ascend via very long, steep escalators. We walked along Leicester Square and on to Covent Garden to meet Tama. This is the theatre area and I saw that “The Lion King” is on at the Lyceum. We had lunch at Covent Garden which is not really a “garden” but a shopping/market complex. We had a lovely time catching up with Tama who had just returned from Paris where he was playing touch football.

Tama then took us for a walk down to the Thames River where we could see the London Eye ferris wheel and on towards Big Ben. We then walked along the riverside to Big Ben and Trafalgar Square. Tama had to leave us to go to work. We then walked through St James Park, with its beautiful gardens and ponds, going towards Buckingham Palace, which was just magnificent, as you'd expect. There were heaps of people there, some even getting their photo taken with a London bobby. We walked through Green Park and got the tube back to Earl’s Court and back to our hotel.

I phoned Nicole (my niece) and arranged to meet her for lunch on Friday. I booked three tickets for “The Lion King” for the Saturday matinee and invited Nicole to come with us to that. So that will be our London show.