Officially Touristy in London

So, today started off interestingly.   There was a loud banging in the house around 6:30 in the morning.  Then, around 7, a woman started shouting as what sounded like her child, telling him to "come here."

I fell asleep after this ended.  Got up at 8, showered, dressed, and headed down from my tower.  Ok, it's the third floor bedroom...

Christi was finishing getting ready, so I made some coffee and got my yogurt out of the fridge.  We sat down and had our breakfast.  She headed back to her room to finish getting ready and I started straightening up the kitchen.   Through the front door, I saw someone approach.

As you can see, the window on the front door is lovely, but not quite see through, and I could see someone trying to look through the glass as they knocked.  Since this was not my house and I don't answer for unexpected guests, I stood still as a post so that movement wouldn't give me away.  Nobody wants to deal with a Jehovah's Witness on vacation.

She must have seen something because I see the mail slot lift and a pair of pale blue eyes peer through demanding that I tell her who I am.  I tell her I am a lodger and ask who she is.

She is the neighbor and it seems she has a beef with the owner of the house I'm staying in.  After arguing about my refusal to open the door a few more minutes, I try to turn this ridiculous conversation over to Christi, who is also unable to persuade her to leave us alone.   Something about a water pump running day and night.

I finally open the door to hand her the business card of the management company.  I'm very sorry, but there is nothing we can do.   We do not run the water all night long, and we are being as quiet as we can.  Apparently "The Bitch" who owns our rental is in Canada and cranky neighbor lady is trying to get the Council to intervene.  Maybe now, a solicitor.  We finally get her to leave.  This sets the tone for the day.

A tale of traffic, a hop on-hop off tale of woe, and a market under a bridge will follow soon.

And here is our tale of woe.   We decided to take advantage of one of the hop-on hop-off bus options that came with our London pass.  Soon, it was apparent that traffic was not moving at all and we could hear the radio for the drivers re-routing them constantly.   It took us twice as long as usual to get where we thought we wanted to go, which was near Buckingham Palace. 

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We got off at Wellington Arch, which we figured was not as close as we thought.  But a nice walk later and we were at the palace.   

No changing of the guard that day.

The gates were closed, as usual.

Then, we went to Borough Market, mostly a food market with some very interesting stalls of local and fresh foods.

We first had lunch at Roast, where I had a drink in a fish.  Lunch was very good, pricey, and fancy.

I bought this fudge.  I ate like a pound and a half in one sitting.

Then it was off to the Tower of London, where we saw the Crown Jewels.   No photos inside (although that did not stop some of the ruder tourists).

View of Tower Bridge from inside of the Tower of London.

One of the famous ravens, who was actually quite friendly.

We didn't stay long after the Jewels... We shopped a bit in the Tower shoppes, where I got a raven charm for my bracelet.  Back to the bus stop, where we met a couple from Oklahoma.  We were all headed to Harrods.

Our new bus driver was very funny.   He took us on a couple of shortcuts and asked us if pedestrians in the US were as suicidal as they were in London after a couple of them ran in front of our bus.

After getting to Harrods, we headed to the Godiva Cafe, where we ate chocolate and drank coffee.  Then it was off to the Harrods shop to spend some money.

Got back kind of late, so picked up takeaway fish and chips from a kebab joint where the guys asked us about Texas while our fish fried.   Long day over.