Hello and welcome to the second blog on our adventure with my special guest Mahina who has come all the way from Australia to see the UK for the first time.
Some things you might have seen me blog about before and others are completely new! So stay tuned and let's see what we got up to!
If it seems like we got up to a lot of stuff, it is because we did, and I can tell you that I now need another holiday from my holiday!
** Note that this is going to be another co-author blog so sit back and enjoy the adventure
So after picking Mahina up from the airport and then doing the whole Harry Potter thing the first day, that brings us to day 2.
Day 2:
For Mahina's Second day in the UK of course we are heading into London.
As it is her first time in London and her holiday time-frame is very limited, we had to put as much as possible into one day.
To get to London from my house it is a one hour train ride straight in to Waterloo.
From there I just had a list of places to go and limited time to see them all. So we decided to head out to Greenwich first as it was further out of town and it would be good to get it out of the way as soon as possible.
Something that I had learned from when my cousin Sarah came to visit is that there is a city ferry that runs from any of the river stops in the centre of London straight out to Greenwich.
The trade-off is that the ferry is expensive but that you get a good transect of the city on your way out. This worked for me both times (With cousin Sarah and Mahina) as we physically didn't have time to see everything so seeing things like the Tower of London, London bridge, Tower bridge, the Shard, and the London horizon/skyline in general was all possible as we ferried out toward Greenwich.
So we disembarked in Greenwich (Red dot below on map) and the Cutty Sark (red circle below on map) is the first thing that you see off to your right. I always like to take a left at this point and walk along the riverside so that you get the full reveal of the grandiose architecture of the University of Greenwich.
Above: A view looking through the University of Greenwich to Greenwich lookout in the background.
Below: A map of our Greenwich part of our adventure the dots represent stops that were made.
Tudor Palace of Greenwich
The University of Greenwich stands where the Tudor Palace of Greenwich once stood.
It is the Birthplace of King Henry VIII and his daughters Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth. Built by King Henry VII.
Once we were in the Museum we ended up getting a little carried away and Mahina stumbled upon a display that really hit home to her.
Mahina did you want to tell us about that?
I got to see for the very first time artefacts and history right in front of my eyes on the discovery of Australia, New Zealand and our beautiful Pacific Islands.
I loved seeing the school groups there learning about Samoa, Tonga and The Cook Islands. It is not something that we learn about in our own countries back home so to see them learning about our history millions of miles away was amazing.
Mercedes told the tour guide I was from The Cook Islands that he was teaching about and he asked me how to say 'Mangaia' so I taught him how to say it properly.
One thing I live by is that no matter where in the world I end up, I always take with me and represent my heritage.
The history of the place was amazing!
***
After we pulled ourselves away from all the interesting displays we still needed to head to the observatory and it was already nearly lunch time.
Below: A photo of Mahina sporting her BTS hoodie in the corridor to the Queens house. She had just found out that they were in London the day before.
So I am a major fan of KPop group 'BTS' and had I known that they would have a concert at the same time I was in London I would've made every effort to go! But nevertheless I wore my hoodie in support for them and had a bunch of other BTS fans from Germany (I think) come up to me while we were in Greenwich and starting chatting with me! Poor Missy (Mercedes) was just there thinking it was a lot similar to that of a cult haha.
So we actually did make it to the observatory in the end.
Here are Mahina's thoughts on the ordeal!
Royal Observatory Greenwich and the Meridian Line.
I did not know Greenwich was located on top of a hill until we got there!!
I whinged and moaned the entire time. Until I saw my first squirrel here, I named him Squizz (miss ya mate).
Once I was successfully on top of said hill, had taken off all the layers and calmed down.
I realised we were on the meridan line! '0' The Meridan Line in Greenwich.
A (geographical) meridian (or line of longitude) is the half of an imaginary great circle on the Earth's surface, terminated by the North Pole and the South Pole, connecting points of equal longitude!
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meridian_(geography)
So you're in two parts of the world at the same time!!!
Picture stolen from: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Longitude_(PSF).png
Also got to see this awesome ship (Cutty-Sark) for more information see https://www.rmg.co.uk/cutty-sark .
Back to me:
Once we had seen what we came to see in Greenwich we had to get a move on and back into the centre of London.
I had never been under the Thames through the tunnel bridge yet so we opted to do that on out way back to the centre.
I found it quite surprising that we did not have to go down too far to go under the Thames. So it is a wide river but not so deep!!
There was even a section of the tunnel that was narrower then the rest of the tunnel as it had been damaged in the war and had just been repaired/patched up and left like that see below.
"The northern end was damaged by bombs during the Second World War and repairs included a thick steel and concrete inner lining that reduces the diameter substantially for a short distance. The North tower has 87 steps, and the South tower has 100!"
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich_foot_tunnel)
Buckingham Palace
Next thing to see was Buckingham palace, I couldn't let Mahina come all this way without going to visit the queen.
Problem is that once we got there and took the appropriate selfie, Mahina was more excited about the fountain out in front of the palace.
Mahina:
I was more amazed by the fountain. Like WOW that fountain was amazing! Love my photos here #CedesPhotography.
The gates were also open but we missed the changing of the guard. Flag was also up so does that mean Queen is inside? But yeah... Bucket list item achieved. Who would've thought I would love the fountain more?
With all the emotion of seeing the Queen out of the way and the long trek out of Greenwich we were buggered. In fact it was so nice sitting in the sun by the fountain that it was hard to get up and get on with the rest of what we had to see!
But up we had to get and so we zombied off in the direction of Trafalgar Square and the National Portrait Gallery. Once we got there it was a bit of: take a photos and lets get moving.
I did not know the relevance of this place. But everyone kept telling me it was a must see. And it was on my bucket list as well so yeah I guess I had to add it in for the photos and memories.
What were my memories of this place? Being absolutely fried, knackered, buggered... all the above. We were about 20k steps in and my poor legs wanted to hack themselves off my body and fall onto a seat to rest. I had on too many layers but whenever I took the layers off it was cold... so the struggle was real by this stage.
But boom, done! Would I go back? Probably wouldn't go out of my way. But would stop by in passing. I will have to read Mercedes part to learn what this place was all about.
Back to Mercedes...
- INSERT -
Trafalgar Square is a public square in the City of Westminster, Central London, built around the area formerly known as Charing Cross. Its name commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar, a British naval victory in the Napoleonic Wars with France and Spain that took place on 21 October 1805 off the coast of Cape Trafalgar.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trafalgar_Square)
Trafalgar Square is owned by the Queen in Right of the Crown and managed by the Greater London Authority, while Westminster City Council owns the roads around the square, including the pedestrianised area of the North Terrace.
***
I guess it is important to mention that we had not had lunch yet and it was long past lunch time. So with Mahina threatening to go on strike it was time to go off and find some grub. So we walked up around the portrait gallery and headed to Leicester square and ended up at a little Italian joint out in the 'fresh'(London) air and watched the world walk by... after all we were on holiday!!
After that we checked out M&M world and the giant Lego store
LEGO!! WOOT WOOT!! Actually this was a good visit to the store as every other time that I have been past the store it is always crowded with lines out the door.
With all that said and done, we were feeling.... to say burnt-out doesn't quite feel like a strong enough word! We decided to muster the strength to get to Westminster Abby and see 'Big Ben' (it was still under construction/refurbishment, so big whoop!) but when we got to Westminster Abby we had an hour to wait if we wanted to go to a church service - basically, get in for free - so we just sat in the park/small green space opposite and waited for the time to go in.
Well of course we took photos too!
Below: I think that this photo is Mahina's all time favourite!
While we were at the Abby Mahina decided that she didn't come this far to not have a good look around so we were actually lucky enough to be there on a day where they open in the evening for a discounted price.
So we paid to go in! I was actually secretly excited to see where they had put one of my heroes Steven Hawking and Charles Darwin.
While I was at it I had to find my Mother's hero David Livingstone and well I also stumbled upon o'l Winston Churchill.
Fun Facts:
David Livingstone was taken to England without his heart...
"Livingstone's heart had been buried under a mpundu tree but his faithful attendants enclosed his embalmed body in a cylinder of bark which was wrapped in sailcloth and carried it to the coast and then sailed to London, arriving the following year"
Well that brings us to the end of our London adventures with Mahina! next up we are off to Stone Henge, Bath, and to see the 'final resting place' of King Arthur
Thanks for reading!!
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