London - Day 3

Today I was royalty, and we visited one of my many Palaces that I own. As Liz asks, "When are you not royalty?!" But first we had to stop at Liz's campus to print out her study guide for her upcoming tests, in the pouring rain...YUCK! On her campus, they have the founder of their school on display...his actual dead body!!!! WTF?!?!?!??! Why in gods name would you want your body on display for people to see?! And to make it even worse...the guys head fell off, and was sitting on the ground of the display. They eventually made a fake head, because people kept stealing it! Why would you steal a dead head?! WHY?!?!? So the real story is, is that Jeremy Bentham was the founder, and is a famous Utilitarian. When he died, he wanted his body to be on display for all to see, and so the embalmed him. During the process, his head was not done correctly and it started to rott. YUCK! So comes the story of the stolen head.

Then we hoped on a train and went to Hampton Court Palace, home to the Tudor Dynasty (most famously King Henry VIII), and the Stuart Dynasty. It is two different palaces in one palace. King Henry VIII, had added so many wings, and rooms onto this palace, and this architecture is considered "Tudor". When King William III, and Queen Mary II moved in, they wanted to rip down the Tudor Palace, and rebuild it in a Baroque style. But, without the funds, they did not and just added onto the Tudor Palace, thus making the Palace even bigger!! The gardens were beautiful, and was overall just an amazing place! There are over 1,000 rooms, and 300 chimeys which are all different, none the same! Can't wait to move into my apartment there, they are making the Queen Tim apartments.

Then the most important meal of the day, dinner! Liz took me to this amazing place called, "Gordons Wine Cellar". It was amazing!!! It used to be a wine cellar, and is now turned into a restaurant/wine bar. It is the oldest wine bar in London, established in 1890! WOW!!!!!The ceiling is really low, and curved, and just looked like an old wine cellar. It was really really really cool! We shared a bottle of wine, and a plate of cheese for dinner. It was delicious!!

A walk was accompanied by lovely conversation along to Thames, where we were able to see everything all lite up at night. It all looks so different during the day, than it does at night. We got to see The Eye, Big Ben, Parliament, and Westminster Abbey. They were all so beautiful, and so different then what we had seen before. Fun fact of the day: Westminster Abbey has these statues of 20th century marters. Here is a link that will explain it more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Westminster_Abbey_-_20th_Century_Martyrs.jpg

To be continued...