London Day 3

It's Saturday morning in London. Saturday has such a different feel than the workdays. So many people are out with their kids. But that also means SO MANY people are out. When I said it was colder than we expected, it averaged between 40-50f. That is not including the wind. When we visited Rome in December, we expected cold. The mornings were a brisk 36f and the afternoons warmed up to about 68. But it was never windy. Some days we had to wear multiple layers, t-shirt, long sleeved shirt or sweater, plus an additional jacket under our rain coats.

Our goals for the day were to walk Hyde Park, visit Kensington Palace, do some shopping then go to the V&A and hopefully make it to Harrods. I must say that I underestimated the size of London. What seems like it wouldn't take very long, took forever to get to.

Soon after this, they opened the gates and visitors were allowed to line up. One line was for ticket holders, the other for us lame-os that didn't pre-purchase tickets. It was cold and again, windy standing out in the open. We had to wait about 30 minutes for all the ticket holders to enter first, then we we were allowed in. 

When we entered we were greeted by a guide who told us fabulous stories of Kensington Palace. She was great and I wish I remembered her name. She really brought the Palace alive!

 

 We continued the tour and ended up downstairs in another quick line to see Princess Diana's clothing. I really wished the Queen Victoria display was open, but it was off for restoration at the time. 

When we left, we wandered a little around Hyde park and headed towards TK Maxx to do a little shopping. Then it was off to find food before going to the V&A. 

Hugging those trees again

First official phone booth!

Finding food in London is much harder than expected. Especially for a kid with food allergies. After wandering around forever and nearly chewing our arms off, we finally found an Italian place. The first thing we did was ordered apple juice. We were both so worn down and starving that it was like drinking nectar from the gods. Then we both got a little giddy from the sugar rush. We each ordered pizza and scarfed it down. Finally filled with carbs and energy, we headed over to the V&A.

Pizza!

So, when we arrived at the V&A (Victoria and Albert Museum). We started at the top floor and worked our way down. The top floor is ceramics. thousands and thousands of ceramics in every shape and form. I have to admit that I was acting like a 14 year old along side my 14 year old. Everything we saw was funny. Like this stoned lion.

This plate did not approve of our giggles!

And this sheep was seriously pissed off.

This monkey was just "Smile and wave, smile and wave"

This dog obviously ate some magic mushrooms.

This camel had a serious goose egg on his head. Ouch!

Onto more serious stuff. Beautiful dresses. 

Lena checked one more thing off her bucket list, trying a corset and hoop skirt!

After the V&A we decided we were done for the day and headed back to the hotel. Took a nap and went to the magnificent place called Waitrose. We decided it was just too much having to find a place to eat everyday, we lost so much time wandering around. So we bought bread, chicken, lettuce, fruits and chips to bring our own food. It was really handy to just stop and eat when we were hungry and not have to worry about finding a place. We spent an hour and a half wandering up and down the isles. It was just a pleasure being able to read each label, and have a choice in things! That evening however, we were faced with dinner... what to do. So we stopped at Pret a Manger and discovered Lena could eat the soup! I got a tuna toasty. It was a perfect end to our day.

And off to bed to sleep off the long day.

Ah yes, Harrods. We had planned on making it there, but after considering the location, it would have been an additional 30 minute walk, then over an hour walk home. We decided to skip the icon this time around.