On Tuesday we planned to sleep late to shake off the rest of the jet lag. We have found that as long as we stay up and keep moving on first arriving in Europe, then turn in early and sleep late the second day, we are able to get on the new time zone's schedule pretty quickly.

The only thing planned for today was an inside visit to Buckingham Palace. During the late summer when the royal family is away, the palace is opened for tours of the staterooms and gardens. I had purchased tickets online through Golden Tours for a walking tour of the palace, followed by a high tea service at the Grosvenor Victoria Hotel. The tour was okay; our guide gave us a brief intro to the palace, but she didn’t go through the rooms with us. We listened to the audio guide that was provided by the palace.

The tea was nice with a choice of teas, finger sandwiches, potato chips (crisps), scones with jam and clotted cream, and several mini-desserts. Then it was back to the hotel so Phil could get some work done online.

For dinner we went looking for someplace interesting and happened on Terriors Wine Bar. I recognized it from a review I’d seen while planning our trip, so we decided to see if we could get a table. Arriving just when we did was perfect as they set a table for us right away. Another group that arrived just after us had to wait about 20 minutes for the next availability. Dinner was delicious and fairly inexpensive, and it came with traditional French service.

We bought Oyster cards today to use as subway passes. The normal fee for one-way ride in the closest zones on the tube is four pounds. The price drops to one pound eighty when using the Oyster card. We estimated how much we’ll use the card and put that amount on it, knowing that we can "top it up" later, if we need too. The guy at the ticket window who sold me the Oyster cards said that we can get a refund on any unused money left on it as well as getting the three pounds refunded that we had to pay as a deposit on the card.