London Baby!

   To finish off my prelude to my study abroad I went to London. Which was absolutely fantastic! I started out my day by walking through Hyde Park on my way to meet some cousins for brunch.

After brunch, I mozied on over to Buckingham Palace.

Because I only had one day to explore I decided to just look at free things and get more of a feel of London instead of being super museum-oriented...so no, I did not go in to see Kate's dress. I heard that it was displayed in a somewhat eerie fashion (haha) in that the dress is on a headless mannequin with the veil floating above it. 

    I then went to Westminster Cathedral and walked around there as well as the Houses of Parliament.

   I heard Big Ben (contrary to popular belief Big Ben is the bell in the Parliament clock tower...not the actual tower--so now go and impress a local)

    Then I went on a nice looong walk along the Victoria Embankment to:

The Tate Modern

and Shakespeare's globe theatre! 

Again, there were admission fees and tickets and other nonsense, so I just looked and then moved on. 

   Then I went to Soho (the big shopping area) to go visit Liberty of London--which was almost more exciting than Harrods...I still can't decide which is best. It reminded me of Emile Zola's book Au Bonheur des Dames which is about how a clever business man seduces money from ladies by having an absolutely delicious clothing store (it's about other things to, but that's just the bit that Liberty reminded me of). The description of all of the clothing laid out in a place just so it will catch someone's eye and the idea to totally overwhelm the senses with finery--definitely felt that at Liberty.

   After that lovely place I went around some other shops, people watched and went to lunch at a lovely place called Joe and the Juice--amazing food! 

  Then I hung out in another cafe, wrote some letters, wandered around a bit more and then went back to my cousin's place to get sorted out for my flight the next day. 

P.S. sorry this (and all of my blogs in general) is so rushed--I don't really have time to make things pretty--too many other things to do :D Maybe one day I'll come back and expound on things and stop my laziness. Loves!