A Sad Farewell.....

We got into Rothenburg, Germany just before dinner last night. We had a quick orientation meeting and then checked into our hotels and had dinner. We were left to explore the city for the rest of the evening and then our final staff meeting to figure out how we were going to get these kids home.

I spent the evening taking the Night Watchman tour. This was really intersting, it was just a man who dressed up as a traditional Watchman who used to roam the wall of the city throughout the night keeping the town safe. He knew a ton of history about the city and explained how daily life worked in a walled medieval city. It was really cool to see how well preserved the town was and understand what life was like when the town was first thriving.

town square

The next day was almost entirely our own, with the exception of our final concert. I spent most of it with my new friends, Josh and Melissa Toppass. We did a lot of souvenier shopping and walking the cobblestone streets. Rothenburg is the home of Kathe Wolfhardt, which is a hugh manufacturerer of handmade Christmas decorations. She had a store on every street corner and I think we went into almost everyone. We wrapped up our free time at a German sidewalk restaurant where we ate Bratwurst and German potatoes. It was delicious!

We had our final concert in the town square, just after the town clock did it's thing, demonstrating the town story of the mayor drinking a ton of wine in order to save the city. Only in Germany, I think!

the famous clock reenacting how the town was saved

I went back to the hotel to finish packing and then we ate dinner and the entire group got together for our final celebration together. Some of the buses performed sketches of their interpretations of the trip and we went over the details of tomorrow so everyone was on the same page.

walking on the wall around Rothenburg

one of the main streets from atop the wall

the other side of Rothenburg from outside the wall

I am a bit nervous about tomorrow because we have one hour to depart our gigantic plane, go through customs, recheck our luggage and instruments, and get to another terminal to board our next plane (which was going to Minneapolis!!). We will be cutting it close but we have forewarned the kids and so far when we have important situations like this, my kids have stuck close to me and we've always managed to survive.

As my time here ends, I am very thankful for the expereince and of course all the friends I have made on staff. It has been a great group to work with and it was fun to spend the last night reminiscing with some of my closest new friends. We do say that we are excited to return without 3oo high school students, but they have made the trip good as well. I can't wait to get home and share this with Ryan and my family and friends.

Dachau

It was another early morning and the weather was really dreary and rainy. It was appropriate since we were visiting Dachau today. We took the Autobahn through Munich and got to Dachau before lunch.

We got a little lost trying to find the entrance because nothing was really marked so we ended up being soaked before we even got inside. Once we were in I went into the museum, which was an old building that housed the hospital, kitchens and armament factory. They had a movie about what happened at Dachau and lots of informative displays. I didn't have much time to look around inside because I wanted to see the housing areas and the crematorium.

They actually destroyed all the housing after the prisoners were liberated so they recreated two buildings to replicate what they had to live in. It was really mind blowing because they fit 500 people into each section of these houses (I think there were three sections in each...). All that is left of the original housing are the footprints of the foundations.

I made it to the crematorium which is at the opposite end and outside the fences surrounding Dachau. If my information is correct, they never used the "showers" at Dachau, even though they were built. Even seeing them, knowing they weren't really used, was still very sobering and completely unbelievable.

We then got back onto the bus for the rest of our trip to Rothenburg, my mind was definitely on what I had seen today, I am glad to have had that experience.

The area where they would line up the prisoners many times a day

The old building which now houses the museum

Inside one of the housing buildings, the bunks were three high

Part of the trench surrounding Dachau, also a guard tower

The main gate of Dachau "Work Makes you Free"

Hot Day in a Floating City

Happy Birthday Dr. Speck! We woke up insanely early this morning in order to get some good time in Venice. It was about a 5 hour bus ride to Venice but most of us slept the whole time. We got to Venice around 11am and had a quick lunch before jumping on a ferry over to the actual city.

We were really overwhelmed by the heat, we had not really dealt with heat at all during the trip so it was especially tough to deal with. We took a walking tour of the city led by a tour guide which was interesting. We stuck to the back streets to keep in the shade and avoid crowds and got to see how real Venetians lived. We also got to see the church where Vivaldi was baptized, I get real excited to see places like that, where famous composers had once been. We then went to St. Marks Cathedral where other composers like Monteverdi and Gabrielli had once performed, very cool. The Cathedral itself was so great, very dark and had these amazing mosaics that looked like paintings they were so good. Even the floors were covered with mosaics, our guide says the church floods several times a year, even just a few days ago. I can’t believe it was still in that good of shape after all that abuse.

The church where Vivaldi was baptized

St. Mark's Cathedral

We ended our tour at the Murano glass factory, which I guess is a big deal even though I had never heard of it before. We got to see one of the master glass blowers create a vase (which he proceeded to destroy when we left) and also saw their showroom. The glass was beautiful but expensive, as you can imagine.

a canal with a gondola

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering the streets of Venice, eating some pizza and of course having gelato. The architecture was beautiful throughout the city and it was always mind boggling to thing that we were standing on stilts and this whole city was floating, it is a shame that it is also slowly sinking. I really liked Venice, although it did sort of smell like urine at times and there were a ton of people in a small amount of space. It was definitely nice to get back to our small, open Austrian town.

some canal boats lined up along the water

leaving Venice, neat sky!

Tomorrow we’re finally off to Germany, my most anticipated part of the trip. I have always wanted to go to Germany. On our way to Rothenburg we’re going to stop at Dachau, that will be interesting to see for sure.

My first encounter with Mozart....

We got into Seefeld, Austria in the early evening last night. It was nice because we got to explore the town a bit and not have to rush off to bed. I spent the evening hearing the choir sing at St. Oswalt’s church, a church where a miracle occurred. It was an interesting story of a knight who came into the church and demanded to take the wafer during communion, which I guess is usually reserved for the priest. The priest finally gave into his demands and when the knight took the wafer it became bloody and his feet sank into the ground and his hand melted the stone altar. The priest got the wafer out of his mouth and the knight was so overcome by this experience he dedicated his life to becoming a priest. We got to see the altar and floor where this happened after the choir sang in the church. The choir sounded amazing in this space and the church was absolutely beautiful.

The choir singing in St. Oswalt's

Where the knight's foot sank into the ground

Today we drove to Innsbruck, which was home to the ’64 and ’76 Olympics. We first went to the ski jump which was on top of a mountain overlooking the Inn Valley. It was so neat to see and there were ski jumpers practicing while we were there so we got to see them go off the jump! They designed the jump to be usable year around with a special turf they would wash down with water in between jumps. It was really cool to see and also to hear those jumpers.

Can you see the ski jumper?

Next we drove down to the Wilten Basilica, which was visited by the Pope. It was so amazing to see, it was decorated in the Rococo style and was so overwhelmingly ornate and beautiful. There were lots of pinks and golds with cherubs and very detailed paintings on the ceilings. It was really remarkable and was even better because the choir got to sing a few pieces while we were there. The acoustics of those old churches are absolutely amazing and was a really great experience.

After that we drove to the Altstadt or “old city” to do some shopping. We saw a house where Mozart and his father lived and played a concert for the King, that was really cool. You wouldn’t even know it unless you saw the tiny plaque above one of the outdoor cafes. That is one things I noticed about Innsbruck, they do not really get into publicizing the cool things about their city. I was looking for some neat Olympic things, but couldn’t really find anything…..you wouldn’t even know they hosted one if someone didn’t tell you.

Where Mozart once stayed with his father in Innsbruck

We went back to Seefeld and had time to do some more shopping and eat lunch before our concert. Our concert was a challenge for myself and the kids. It rained up until our time to perform and the sun came out in full force during the concert. It was impossible to see and the heat was intense. We were lucky to still be dry because it began to pour and lightning real bad right after we locked up the trailer. The rain was welcome because it cooled everything off pretty good, just in time to see another Alp Horn concert. I think I’ll become like Dr. DeZeeuw and her bagpipes, only I’ll play the Alp Horn.

An Alp Horn concert in Seefeld (my new obsession!)

The weekend is obviously a big party time for the Austrians because the streets were filled with people who were dressed up and several DJs were out there, along with a million street vendors selling various food and drink. The Supremes were to perform but were going on too late, we had a 4am wake up the next day so an early bedtime was in the plans. When we woke up today, there were definitely still people out drinking in the streets, definitely more fun than I can handle!

I love Switzerland!

Today was another long but pretty relaxing day in Switzerland. We had the morning free to do as we wished so myself and Paul and Frederick went walking about the town. It was pretty brisk outside, but that has been the theme of the trip. I guess we’ve gotten really lucky with the weather, I’m definitely using my long sleeved items. We found a post office and got some postcards mailed and then were on a mission to find some cuckoo clocks for some people. We knew there was a specific toy store in town that would ship them home for free, the problem was we didn’t know where it was. We wondered around for quite a while and finally stopped at the tourism office and they gave us some more bad directions. We finally found the store but were disappointed in the selection so we didn’t end up getting any clocks.

After a hurried lunch we drove to Montreux to visit the Castle of Chillon which sits on Lake Geneva. Our tour guide was great, but I realized how much I don’t know about Swiss history. The castle was used for many things over the centuries, a prison, toll booth, home to royalty. It was probably made famous mostly because of Lord Byron’s poem The Prisoner of Chillon. I didn’t buy a copy of it but will probably check it out at the library when I get home. It was an interesting place, for some reason I always like to see old prisons and places where they tortured people.

one end of the Castle of Chillon

where Lord Byron carved his name into a pillar

We took a long walk along Lake Geneva to get to the city of Montreux. It was really crowded there because the Montreux Jazz festival was going on. Paul Simon was playing that night but we were not going to be able to stay. I did pick up a show lineup guide and a couple of souvenirs and noticed that the KU Jazz Ensemble I is playing there in a couple of days, pretty neat!

breathtaking Lake Geneva while walking to Montreaux

We got back to the hotel right at dinner and had an excellent meal provided by our hotel owners. It is a very quaint and hospitable setting, definitely a memorable experience. After dinner the band and choir gave a concert down at the town tent. It was really chilly, which was good for the horn section as we tend to play insanely sharp….we actually sounded ok! The Swiss audience was unbelievable, they clapped along to just about everything and gave us two encores. They were really fun to play for and such an excited audience. Dr. Speck made a joke and said they would clap to just about anything, even “Music for Prague”…I thought that was especially funny! He also said he would play just about anything they wanted because they loved everything so much.

Our time in Switzerland has ended and everyone has been threatening to “lose” their passports so they could stay….we actually did have a lost passport scare, but it was resolved thank goodness! Tomorrow we stop in Lichtenstein and then on to Austria, finally to some German speaking country!

sunrise view from my hotel room on my last morning in Switzerland

What can I say about my favorite day?

So today’s entry may last forever because it has been by far my most favorite day on the tour. We woke up early, any day that starts with a look at the Alps has to be a great day. We drove a couple of hours and took a train up to a little ski town called Zermatt, which is a the base of the Matterhorn. We got to do some shopping there and even sampled some pastries from one of the many bakeries. I didn’t buy too much b/c it definitely had ski town prices on everything. It was an adorable town though, complete with very old buildings and cobblestone streets. It was nice b/c you can only access the town via train so there were no cars to deal with.

Looking up a small street in beautiful Zermatt

We finally took a cog train up to the where we could see the Matterhorn. It, as everything in Switzerland has been, was an amazing sight. I know we were still pretty far away from the mountain itself, but it was huge and covered in snow. It was the most clear day so we could see the entire mountain. I guess we got lucky b/c I was told it is only clear only about 18-20 days a year, so I’d say we got really lucky! We ate lunch at the mountain top restaurant and got to take some time to really enjoy and take in our surroundings. I cannot say enough about how wonderful that experience was.

Me with a St. Bernard next to the Matterhorn


The beautiful Matterhorn

We ended the day with a fondue party at the city tent and some presentations of traditional Swiss celebration, complete with Alp horns, dancing, polka band, and yodeling (think European Vacation where Clark gets into the fight…just to stick with the theme of the blog). I actually got to play the Alp horn in front of about 500 people, they asked 2 teachers from the group to come up and play the Star Spangled Banner and I volunteered b/c I knew it would be a lot like playing the Horn. I totally killed the guy and beat the teacher from New Mexico, it was a great time….I knew those Horn skills would come in handy someday!

Showing off my mad horn skills on the Alp Horn

It was such a great day, I am sure I am leaving things out. Switzerland is a must for everyone who loves the mountains and this kind of culture. Tomorrow is our last full day here, which is sad, we’re heading to Montreux to visit the Castle of Chillion and walk around Lake Geneva. The Montreux Jazz Festival is going on at the same time too so hopefully we’ll get to listen to some good music too, Paul Simon is playing tonight, but we will miss him unfortunately.

Beauty is found in Switzerland

I usually don’t blog on travel days, at least not yet, but I have to talk a bit about where we arrived today. It took us almost all day to travel from Paris to Crans-Montana, Switzerland and it was worth every bit of the drive. We saw a few mountains and the kids got really excited, but once we hit the Alps you would have thought they just won the lottery. They, myself included, were so excited to seem them and they were unbelievable. I think everyone really liked London and Paris but were absolutely blown away by the sights of Switzerland, it was about two hours of oohs and aahs from the entire but.

On our way to our town we drove through Montreaux and saw Lake Geneva, which again it completely breathtaking. The hillsides are also covered with vineyards so the patterns those create are very unique.

Montreaux, some vineyards and Lake Geneva

We were greeted in Crans-Montana by three Swiss ladies in full costume and our city coordinators. Crans-Montana is based around skiing and golf so it is pretty much a year-round resort town. We checked into our hotel and the view from my room is awesome, complete with a balcony. I actually got my own room this time so it couldn’t be better. We finished the night with a walk around town to get our bearings and I settled in for a good nights sleep with my door open to bring in the cool mountain air.

The beautiful view from my hotel room

One final trip around Paris

We had an early start today because it was Eiffel Tower day. Usually the traffic from our hotel to the Eiffel Tower is absolutely horrendous but since it was Sunday, we flew through the city and ended up getting to the tower 30 minutes before it opened. Our group decided to save some Euros and take the stairs. It was a very cool morning and we started the hike a little excited so by the time we got to the first level we were a little exhausted. We took a walk around the first observation level and decided to hike to the next level. 668 stairs later, we made it to the second level for an amazing view of the city. It was fun to say that I have climbed at least halfway up the Eiffel Tower, even though my chest was on fire. My legs felt fine, just the cold air got to me a bit. We decided to take the lift back down to the bottom and took several more pictures of the Tower down there. We wandered around the neighborhoods but most everything was closed since it was a Sunday morning, good for lines, bad for shopping.

The view from the bottom

Making my way up the 668 stairs to the second level

We then made our way to Sacre Coeur and Mont Martre, which are both on a hill over looking the city. Sacre Coeur is a basilica that is gigantic and white and sits on a huge hill. There were many more stairs to climb to get there and I think my kids were a little bit over climbing stairs by this point. It was worth it though because the view was breathtaking. It was a little bit stressful getting up there b/c we had to keep 300 kids and staff together all while avoiding con artists and gypsies that would approach our kids for money or put rings on their fingers that they had to then buy. We made it through and were able to break down to our small groups at the top.

Looking up at Sacre Coeur

We traveled through the church, which was packed. It is pretty amazing inside and those large churches never cease to amaze me in their grandeur. We then headed to Montmartre which is an artist colony with a bunch of street artists and cafes. We of course had crepes for lunch and walked around looking at the artwork. My goal was to by something an artist had done, but one tiny paining I liked cost 180 Euros, or about 270 US dollars. A couple of kids had their portraits done by a corner artist so some of us took advantage of the available artists.

the top of Sacre Coeur as seen through one of the streets of Montmartre

We then headed back to the buses for a bus tour of the city. This was nice b/c we got to see some of the sights that we didn’t get to see before. The landmarks in Paris are a little too far to get to by foot, it could be done, but we didn’t have a lot of time. This bus tour was great to get everything in. Unfortunately our guide had the perfect voice for an NPR host and pretty much everyone ended up falling asleep during the tour. It didn’t help that we had been running from place to place for two days or that I can’t stay awake on a bus.

One of the sights on our city tour the Arc de Triomphe

We had dinner and headed back to the hotel a little early. This gave the kids some pool time and some much needed time to decompress. We have been running full speed for almost a week so the kids were grateful for that time.

Tomorrow we’re back on the bus and heading for my most anticipated part of the tour the Alps region! We’ll be in Switzerland tomorrow for a few days and I cannot wait. I hear the bus ride can be a bit scary in the mountains but we have the best Austrian drivers and if they can maneuver London and Paris with ease, I’m sure the mountains are a piece of cake for them.

Crazy Paris

Today was one of the craziest and somewhat worst days I’ve had so far. I knew it would be like this but little things kept happening that didn’t help out the situations. We started the morning going to the Louvre after a light breakfast of croissant.

We had a special staff meeting about the procedure to enter the Louvre, they warned us it would be crazy, and it definitely was. Getting into the museum wasn’t too bad (it was supposed to be the worst part) as long as the kids paid attention. We decided to hit the “big three” pieces in the museum before we saw anything else. It actually wasn’t as hard to get through as I thought it would be, we saw Winged Victory, Mona Lisa and Venus di Millo in about 20 minutes time, which I didn’t think was bad at all. We next headed to the French painting section because the kids really wanted to see some impressionism. I guess the impressionistic era was a bit too late to be included b/c there were only about 10 pieces of impressionism. The kids were bummed but we managed to see some great artwork in our quest.

Madness at the Mona Lisa

This is where the day starts to head a little bit south: some of the kids were a bit perturbed that there was not much impressionism so they began to walk ahead (which usually isn’t a big deal) well since I’m sure you can see where this is going, the kids got way ahead while a few of us lingered on some really neat paintings. The group got split up and needless to say I was furious. If you have been to the Louvre you understand how insanely big and moderately confusing it can be. The kids really haven’t proven their map reading skills to me so I was doubtful they would make the meeting point on time, if at all. We managed to waste the last hour trying to find them, luckily they found another staff member while they were looking for me and stuck with them so they made it back to the busses safe and sound….and a little freaked and sorry. We had a good stern talk and things are ok, Dr. Speck even gave me a great compliment on how I handled the situation.

Under the Pyramid at the Louvre

After that fiasco, we took the kids on a walk to Notre Dame and on the way, I stepped off a curb, sprained my ankle and ended up splayed out in the middle of a crosswalk. I hurt myself pretty bad, I’m pretty prone to injury so this is nothing new to me….just need to get some pain killers in me and hopefully it will feel better tomorrow. I think my body is just rebelling against all this walking and lack of sleep. I kept slipping throughout our walk b/c the sidewalks were wet from rain and my flip flops have absolutely no traction left on them. It came to the point where one of my moms grabbed my arm and walked me to the restaurant to make sure I didn’t fall again…not one of my finer moments.

We ate lunch in a little café and ordered crepes. This was a challenge for the kids and myself, it was our first experience in a non-English speaking environment without a guide. I tried to use what little French I actually knew and used context clues to decipher the menu for the kids. The waiter finally ended up just talking to me b/c the kids were too nervous to get the communication done. We survived and ate lunch, by the way if you order apple cider with a bunch of kids, keep in mind that it will probably be alcoholic….at least in Paris.

We played a concert after lunch that went pretty well. We had a good crowd and got a standing ovation with encore of Stars and Stripes Forever, the Europeans just love that song for some reason, I don’t really know why but they really get into it with the clapping and standing during the final strain of the trio.

We ended the day with a quick dinner and then a boat cruise to see Paris on the Seine. That was one of the most fun parts of the day, well considering my day it was the most fun. It was really neat to get to see the sights in a relaxing way. Paris is known as the city of bridges and we traveled under many of them, some of which were built during Napoleon’s reign.

Notre Dame from the boat

Looking back on the Seine and Notre Dame

It was definitely an exciting day, tomorrow will be even more chaotic and fun.

My Own Tale of Two Cities

Today wasn’t our most exciting day, but it did manage to wear us out just the same. It was a travel day from London to Paris. It took about two hours to get to the English Channel and then our coach drove right onto a ferry which took us across. The neat part was the port was in Dover, England so we got to see the White Cliffs of Dover. They were neat, but more impressive as you got further from the coastline, the stark whiteness of the cliffs against the ocean was just beautiful.

The famous White Cliffs of Dover

Dover Castle in the distance from the back of the Ferry

Our first moment in France!

We got into France in the early afternoon and then got ready for the four hour ride to Paris. I didn’t see much of the French countryside because my old drum corps skills came out and I could not stay awake on the bus to save my life! Every time I was on that bus, even if I wasn’t tired, I was sleeping.
We finally got into Paris around 5pm but it took us about an hour and a half to get through the city to the restaurant, the traffic was absolutely crazy! We had a nice dinner and the kids were excited because those who were approved could have a glass of wine or beer with dinner. This was exciting for them but not the staff who had to keep a watchful eye on kids trying to either drink more than they were allowed or steal some drinks from the table. They’ll try and get away with anything I guess.

We checked into our hotel and had a brief orientation to the city and our plans. We are doing the Lourve tomorrow and that sounds like quite the experience. We should be whisked by all the crowds and get right in which will be good, but the size of the Lourve is overwhelming, I know I won’t get to see even a good chunk of what is there.

It has been interesting getting used to a new city and how much different is it from London. Tomorrow will probably be a hectic and stressful day (we perform again) and the schedule is really tight, hopefully everyone will be on the same page so it can be a positive experience for everyone.

Performance, Piccadilly and Peter Pan....

Today was our first performance day. The band and choir were both performing today, the choir first at Wesley Chapel (the first Methodist church built in England) and then both performed at the Victoria Embankment Gardens, next to the Thames. All of the performances were pretty good, but you could tell we hadn’t played together since Sunday. Also we had 137 band students crammed onto a very tiny stage, I don’t know how we did it, but we made it work and the kids played pretty well.

After the performance we were left again to tour the city in small groups for the rest of the day. We had a few things to get off our checklists so we really had to keep moving to get everything done. Our first stop was at Westminster Abbey to see the Evensong service. The main goal of this visit was to hear the choir sing, but the Lay Vicars were the ones performing instead of the full choir. At first it seemed disappointing, but they did not disappoint in their performance. Their sound was so pure and the acoustics in Westminster helped to make that musical experience defy comprehension. There was a full service and the kids did not really expect that, but I do think they enjoyed hearing that group of men sing.

The side entrance of Westminster Abbey

After Evensong we walked to Covent Garden to find some shopping and some dinner. We ended up eating at a small snack stand to try and save some money. The food was not good, but it kept us going for the rest of the evening I guess. The store we were looking for ended up being at Piccadilly Circus so we had to book it there before it closed. We were on a mission to find Wimbledon and Formula One items, both of which went unfulfilled. It was a bummer but we enjoyed the walk getting there.

One of the sights on the walk....Trafalgar Square

a Royal Guard on horseback

We had two final stops to make before the day was over and these would prove to be the most challenging both mentally and physically. The kids really wanted to see the Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens which was not very close to Piccadilly at all, the other was the original Hard Rock café, which is close to Kensington, sort of. We had to walk pretty quickly to get there before sunset and had a bit of trouble finding it once we were in the park. If you haven’t been to London before, Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens connect to make one gigantic park. We asked several people how to get to Peter Pan and even the Police didn’t know what to tell us to help us get there quickly. By this time, everyone was exhausted and we just wanted to find the statue. After another 30 minutes around the park, we finally found it. It was worth it because the kids were really excited to see it. I wanted to get them out of the park before dark so I hustled them 30 min back out of the park and on to Hard Rock.

The ever elusive Peter Pan Statue in Kensington Gardens

We just went to the store, but no one really ended up buying anything because everything was so expensive. I had a hard time justifying a $30 US tshirt….there does come a point where you have to stop doing the conversions, but $30 for a tshirt is a little too rich for me.

We ended up taking a cab back to the hotel because we were so exhausted and had done so much walking in the last two days. Some of the staff and I met some guys from Scotland and England and we met them again for a beer and had a good time talking about our different cultures and our views on the world. It is really interesting to get another country’s perspective on America. It was a good ending to my time in London, Paris tomorrow!

Mission: London

We had an early start to the day today, breakfast at 7am and left the hotel at 8:30am. I felt much better today after a good night’s sleep, the super strong coffee provided by the hotel was a big help too! Our goal of the day was to tour most of greater London with an official “Blue Badge” guide and to see the Tower of London.

Our tour guide’s name was Nigel and he was quite the character. He used to be a London police officer so he had many great stories and an interesting perspective on the city. He works a lot with bands so he made sure to incorporate musical themes whenever he could. Our original plans of seeing Tower of London first had changed a bit because of a truck driver strike in London, Nigel wanted to get all of the city driving done before the trucks drove through the city and created havoc on the roads. We missed most of the commotion, but did get to see some of the strike, which was pretty interesting. Our coach driver drove us all over London, we saw the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, complete with watching the band play at the barracks and learned just about everything you could about the city from the greatest tour guide ever!The new guard going to change out the old guard

The old guard back at the barracks going off duty

Next was Tower of London where we saw the Crown Jewels and all of the neat stuff surrounding 12c. London and the monarchy. I really wish we had more time there b/c we didn’t get to cover everything, it was actually one place I didn’t see the last time I was in London. I guess I’ll have to come back then….. Our coach dropped us off at the Victoria Embankment Gardens where we had the rest of the evening to see London on our own with our small group.

Outside Tower of London

Inside Tower of London the site where Anne Boleyn was beheaded

My group chose to ride the London Eye, which was very cool. It was erected for the Millennium and had a great view of the city through these pod like structures that you ride in. I got many great pictures here and it was a clear day so we could see most of the city. After we rode the Eye, our mission was to find some fish and chips. We were kind of silly b/c we ended up finding a place to eat near Westminster Abbey, the opposite direction of the hotel. Some of my kids didn’t have cash for a taxi so we had to walk all the way back to our hotel in Barbican, it was about a hour and a half walk and both the kids and I were exhausted when we got back.

Big Ben and Parliament from atop the London Eye

the London Eye