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London Travel Pictures

I promised I would share some pictures of my Europe Grad Trip, so let’s finally begin. The journey begins in London so that’s where the pictures will start.

After arriving in London around 7PM we made it into town and wandered with our bags until we could check in. Our first stop was at Piccadilly Circus:

004 Simon at Piccadilly Circus 2.jpg

We then moved onto the Big Ben where I observed how the clock was a few minutes fast.

015 Simon Checking His watch with Big Ben

Wandering along the waterfront we were able to see what the London Eye looked like, we didn’t actually go up.

019 London Eye

From here, we continued wandering through St. James Park and made our way to the front of Buckingham Palace where we watched the guards changed. This is an hour long event and not a 2 minute job that I thought it was!

029 Changing of the guards part 1 photo 3

By this point it was approaching noon and we had been up for most of our flight and walked around for a few hours with our bags. After a quick lunch at Cheers we checked into our Hotel – Hilton. Outside the hotel was this yellow Lotus so I took a picture.

035 simon by a car outside the hilton

The next day we went down to the Thames Rivers and checked our the Tower Bridge, Tower of London, looked at HMS Belfast and a random piece of artwork in the area.

040 tower bridge 041 HMS Belfast 048 close up of art 051 tower bridge 052 tower of london

We also walked to the Globe Theater which we went back to later in the evening to watch King Lear from the 5GBP standing area.

057 shakespears globe theatre

On our way to dinner we passed by the Court house.
064 court house 3

Our on next day we went to Regents Park.
073 regents park 075 simon at regents park

We also stopped by at Camden Market and picked up panoramas of London.

Here’s a view looking down one of two elevators required to get to the tube from our station.

083 looking down the escalator from the top

The day after that we went to Hyde Park, the Orangerie (where I stole an orange off their tree) and the Science Museum.

111 simon and the orange

Early the next day we made our way out to Stansted Airport and flew with Ryanair to Venice.

125 our plane to venice

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. 03 Jul 08 | Photography, Travel | Comment (1)

Europe Trip Planning – Where We’re Staying in London, UK

The booksing for London are nearly done, of the four nights we’ll be in the city we have 3 taken care of.  We’ll check-in to the Hilton London Islington Hotel on May 8th and check-out on May 11th.  We made the booking through Priceline for 83USD/night + tax.  A great deal considering the Hilton averages $304.09 per night for a double room and the total we’re paying including tax is $305.31! The hotel is located near the city’s financial district, not too far from the major attractions and very close to the Tube.  Click here for a google map.

Here is a picture of what there rooms might look like:

hilton

The hotel offers a terrace with a great city view.  We’ll definitely be grabbing a drink there one night! The dress code is smart casual, which won’t be a problem.

2

For the final night in London, we’re hoping to find a cheap place closer to Stanstead, Essex.  We’re catching a Ryanair flight out of the city to Venice.  Departure time is 11:25AM and that means we’ll need to be at the airport by 9AM or so.  The Hilton and Holiday Inn by Stanstead can be had for about 110-140 but we’re obviously looking for to do better.

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. 19 Apr 08 | Travel | Comment (1)