First Full Day in London!
- Margaret Raabe
- Dec 29, 2017
- 4 min read
We started the morning by going to the hotel’s breakfast in the lobby which consisted of coffee, potato’s, eggs, a crescent and a banger.
After breakfast we loaded up three coaches and headed out for a coach tour of London! This was the first real view we got of the city of London. We saw the Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, Westminster Bridge, Saint James Cathedral, Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, Old London, the London Bridge and River Thames and so much more. At a few places we got out for short photography shots, but the majority of the 3 hour tour was done from the coach with an awesome tour guide.
The worst yet most insane part of the day happened right by the London Eye. The bus was sitting in traffic and all the sudden the tour guide gasps over the microphone and pulls it away from her mouth so we couldn’t hear her. She then comes back on and apologizes and said she was watching this stupid man on the poll on the bridge. So naturally everyone begins to look for him…
This man…had climbed up a poll on the bridge, on top of the cluster of flights at the top and was trying to balance. There was a huge crowd of people on this bridge and the streets by as well. The whole bus is watching this man in panic. He tries to stand and take a video of himself, but the light he is on begins to wobble. The whole bus is watching in fear. As the police start making their way through the crowd toward him, the light he in on starts to wobble even more. The man proceeds to throw his phone into the crowd and fall/jump into the River Thames. The whole tour bus gasps.
To put everything into prospective, lets recap. Bridge on River Thames, near the London Eye, extremely crowded, man on extremely high up poll. Huge tour coach watching. Our group leader later told us that the water there is very shallow and the current was very strong. He didn’t think he would make it. We would spend the next 30 minutes thinking he died yet continuing the tour. Later on Twitter we found out that he got pulled out by police and taken to the hospital. That it.
After the tour Amelia, Erin and I went to our rooms to download some pictures and freshen up before our Photography class in the bottom on the hotel in a conference room. Rachael walked us through some class details, the upper division (myself, Amelia and three others out of 13) chose their 10 picture editorial topic. There was a list to choose from and I chose Public Art.
After class we tried to find the tube to a restaurant we found online. However, we went the wrong way, were cold and hungry and tried so we grabbed food at the first walk-in place we saw – Fifty9 Bar. We sat in the windows at a high table and got some food and made plans for the rest of the day (it was almost 3 at this point). I got my first plate of Bangers and Mash and loved it.
After linner, we went back to the hotel to gear up to go across town on a self-guided walking tour we found online. After waiting at least an hour in a very crowded and full tube platform. We finally jammed ourselves on the tube and rode to the next stop. We took three lines and finally got to North East part of town. We started the walking tour and it took us to some cool places to begin with and it progressively got shadier and shadier so we quit the tour. The worst part is we decided to quit in the dark shady part of town. Don’t you fret however, we found a tube.
But not without a story. Not only did we get off the tube we were on an exit early and have to try and get back on..but when we tried. After waiting 15 minutes, we were told there was a man in the tracks and all tubes were canceled until further notice. We had left the tube and were trying to decide how to get back, when he came back over the mic and said the man was gone now and the tube was on its way. Not only did that happen, but in the meantime we wait across from a group of men in lederhosen cut offs wearing scarecrow makeup.
After making it back to the hotel, Amelia and I ordered pizza delivered out of exhaustion. It proceeded to become an ordeal. We wouldn’t decide where to get it from, so we asked the concierge for suggestions. We took the advice and proceeded to get an hour and a half cold pizza from a guy on a bike, after I called and reminded him we existed.
Yet, the adventures in London are just beginning.


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