The architecture... Review on London

It was my first group trip and on a trip with many peoples is fun as well as a little time consuming. Well, London was beautiful but the trip wasn't much of a success and also, spending 12 hours on-air is way too tiring.:P

Day 1

Flying from Delhi and changing our flight at Abu Dhabi, we reached the Heathrow Airport by 1 pm. After waiting for the passengers arriving from Mumbai, we left airport by 3:30 pm. It was cool outside, somewhat cloudy. The day has almost ended and the heavy traffic on roads made pretty sure, we wouldn't be able to do anything that day. The feather-in-the-cap was added by rains. The city orientation tour was cancelled.

While other people went for shopping at the nearby shopping centre, I spent my evening, sleeping. Getting plenty of rest on a tour, is a tour well completed.:P

Day 2

After lunch, we left for Tower of London, the next day. yeah, tour started:P

Queen's various costumes and crowns were on display there along with the koh-i-noor. Then we photographed the Tower Bridge. Our next stop was the British Museum and due to lack of interest, I waited inside the bus while others went ahead. FYI it is a personal collection of lakhs of things, put on display after his death. Next was London Eye, the giant observation wheel, from where you can watch whole of London. The view of the river Thames* with establishments on both sides was something new. Adding to the beauty were the dark clouds overhead at a distance.

Then the bus took us to the restaurant booked, fighting with the traffic and the maze of roads. It took us good one and a half hour to hotel after the dinner. London has lots of streets and traffic lights, uncountable.

Day 3

After the English breakfast, we headed towards the Buckingham Palace. It was quite a beautiful place to live, just saying.;)

Upon reaching there, we were given audio guides to each. Roaming and listening to the corresponding audio clip, we came out to the lawn and then a good half mile walk through the greenery towards the exit. After that, we had a quick lunch and one hour spare time for shopping was allotted.

Next in the list was Lords, the famous cricket ground. Apart from the ground, we saw the museum, where the 1983 world cup was kept and then the Indian dressing room. The guide also told how unfortunate it was that Sachin has the highest score of 37, only. Not only this, Shane Warne, Muthia Muralidharan, Anil Kumble never could take 5 wickets in an innings here.

Then we visited Madame Tussauds. Not all the wax statues were lifelike, but most of the British and American were and a few Indian ones too. What was interesting was the Sherlock's adventure. and then the 4D shows. There was a Black Cab ride too. Then the dinner and back to room. The restaurant that day was near to our hotel.

Day 4

Something like The Secret happened on this tour. During the tour preparations, I wanted an excursion to Stonhenge and Cotswolds(countryside) and Bath(which would fall on route) but the tour itinerary that we received at home said Windsor Castle, Cambridge University and Cotswolds. However, we were going to Stonehenge, as confirmed by our group leader upon London arrival.

After breakfast, it took us a little over 2 hours to Stonehenge. Riding through the rural areas of London was simply awesome. The weather was pleasant for an outing. There was nothing fascinating with those stones but just a day away from the hustle bustle was a stress-reliever. Then we had lunch at Amesbury county. While going for the Roman baths our bus had a flat tyre and the entire group had to adjust in the second bus. By the way, Amesbury was beautiful too. After visiting the ancient Roman "swimming pools", we proceeded back to London.

Day 5

Before checkout at 11, few people went on a shopping spree. And then we left for airport, taking with us the memories of the beautiful Victorian architecture.

As our tour guide Martin said, almost 80% of the London was destroyed by fire in the 1600s. After that the architect planned the city and the entire city was made by stones. Every building in the city of old London looks almost the same and are of same height. There were made purposefully as such just to make them look as if its one building, adding to the elegance of the royal kingdom. We also saw the original London Bridge(not to confuse with the Tower Bridge), which has fallen 7 times until now.