The Thamesmen

 London - sabbatical 2, week 4

We are now all together in London.  Arriving mid-afternoon was convenient for checking in to the apartment (found on AirBNB), not so much for sightseeing right away, so we put Wimbledon on and slept (various amounts) before venturing out for sustenance.  So let's skip right to today, the 4th of July, with nary a creepy stilt-wearing Uncle Sam to be seen anywhere.

The men spent the day in and around the Thames (Craig hesitates to call themselves "the Thamesmen" because, as a drummer, he is the most likely to be found exploded).  A 25-minute walk from their AirBNB in Shoreditch, through the financial district (using the Gherkin building as their guide) brought them to London Bridge (not the one in Arizona).  They made their way along the bank where they took the Tower Bridge tour, which includes access to the upper level and a museum/tour of the drawbridge-lifting mechanism.  They then boarded the HMS Belfast, the largest remaining British ship that served in WWII.  Another engine room (somehow more complex than the one in Tower Bridge) gave them their steam engine fix for the vacation, along with exploring the various messes, gun turrets, bridge, etc. of a fighting ship.

Lunch followed then a tube trip back to Shoreditch for continued acclimatization (naps!) for a couple hours.  The whole family then repeated the walk back to the City for a boat tour.  We picked up the boat at the Tower docks, which meandered its way down to Westminster Bridge, with an entertaining audio commentary from the tour guide of course.  As always, the corner around the statue of Boudicca under Big Ben's tower was teeming with tourists.