I sprayed myself in the eye with aftershave today. Not the greatest start to the day, it frikking stung. But hey, at least my eye smelt good! Not sure how I didn't 'see' that coming (haha). After Dad finished breakfast (I didn't go, I'd been removing my scruffy look from my face, not sure how this relates to the story but some people might like it reading from afar), we collected our things (namely Dad and his camera, he always needed his camera) and headed out. London was calling. With the aftershave episode, I was a little 'royally' ****** off, so what better time than to go see royalty (I wasn't really ****** off, but I just saw an opportunity to make a terrible pun!). We hit the pavement and retraced our steps from last night, but instead of stopping for dinner (as it was morning), we kept going. At this point I see that I'm using a lot of brackets in this entry. I'm not sure why. Maybe I fear for this entry's length, which is silly given it was a big day. Maybe I have this thought that people love reading my waffling on. Whatever it is, please don't put this entry in the ******** 'bracket' (haha). Moving on then; my use of 'royally' above came because our first stop this morning was Buckingham Palace. Pretty much five minutes after leaving our hotel, the big wall told us we'd reached the grounds of the property, which extended quite a distance around the area. The road we were on too, Buckingham Palace Road, was a pretty obvious pointer that we were heading in the right direction, unless of course we were heading in the other direction along it. But we weren't! Another five minutes later and we were standing out the front of the massive gates of Buckingham Palace (with thousands of others). Not that I have a lot of care for royalty, and I certainly feel it's all a bit over the top and pointless, but it was still pretty amazing to be standing in front of. While it was nice, I didn't even find it all that spectacular - I'd seen much more intricate and detailed buildings in Europe so far. Still, it's place in so many historic and world events did give it this aura that can't really be replicated. After soaking that up, we decided to head further into town and to some other landmarks via St James's Park, which was pretty nice. I'm really spewing because I almost got a selfie with a friendly looking goose, which would've gone well with my goat selfie from Holland, but it moved off before I could capture the shot. Going through St James's Park got us out at the back of the parliamentary area of London. As we were close to Downing Street, we decided to walk is it to our next destination. By chance en route, we stumbled upon the Churchill War Rooms and decided to go in. The War Rooms were pretty extraordinary. Buried in a bunker under parliament buildings, and protected above by a massive slab of steel and concrete, this was the place where the Allies devised the tactics that ultimately led to victory over the Germans in World War 2. It's history defining stuff! Amazingly, despite the critical role it played, the Germans never even knew this place existed; it was never the target of an air raid. Inside it was sort've eerie too, with much of the display being kept in the exact same state as it was when the war ended. This included the very same maps that were used to devise strategies and display the fighting front. It felt like a very direct human touch to something so ultimately tragic in general. After we came back up to street level, we rounded to the front side of the parliamentary buildings, and walked past Downing Street. I'm not entirely sure how this can still be called a street to be honest - the whole front is barricaded up like its Fort Knox, not even a mouse could get in there. It was a bit of a 'down'er! I wasn't down for long though, because shortly after, outside of the House Guards Parade area, Dad stepped in horse ****. Bad luck Dad. Once he'd got most of that off (which really wasn't that difficult), we made our way to Trafalgar Square. We decided to have a coffee, and me a bit of breakfast, at a little café just opposite the square. It was pretty clear by how slow I was eating my croissant that they also had free wifi. Or maybe I just wanted to be slow enough to allow Dad time to have a second coffee, knowing how much he loves it. I'm such a loving son! We crossed the road and walked across Trafalgar Square, and got some photos (it's always plural with photos whenever Dad's involved) of the square from the steps of the National Gallery. It was pretty crowded but a complete hive of activity. After we'd finished there, we made our way to Piccadilly Circus, which was only a short walk away. I was really surprised how close everything seemed to be to each other, as we were only seemingly a few minutes walk from all the famous sights. Piccadilly Circus also surprised me with just how small it was, I expected something bigger! Still, it was completely full of energy as I'd imagined. We wandered the streets and explored the area from Piccadilly all the way back to the Thames, literally ticking off a Monopoly board in our minds as we walked; Trafalgar Square, Pall Mall, The Strand, Piccadilly, Regent Street, Coventry Street, Northumberland Avenue, Whitehall - everywhere we looked, this image of a man with a top hat and a moustache, and the fights that Daniel and I had to be the 'car' piece on the board (I was bigger back then so I won), constantly came back to me. It's just a real shame I never got to collect $200 every time I passed 'go', I really could've used that money! Dad and I reached the banks of the Thames, and decided to cross to the south side to continue our exploring. Our intention was to follow the river around till we reached the Tower Bridge. Along the way, we were sidetracked into a riverside bar, as the sun had finally burnt through the cloud and it was pretty warm, and we could use a refreshment. We also ordered a share plate of English foods to enjoy, which we did over a couple of pints. Thoroughly rested and refreshed, we continued on our way to the Tower Bridge. And lucky we were rested and refreshed too, because I called it a little early when I said 'how close everything seemed to be' before - the Tower Bridge was a bit of a walk! But it was a walk well deserved, because on a perfectly sunny day in London, we rounded the bend in the Thames and there it was, the Tower Bridge, standing out like a postcard. We approached it, took an epic load of pictures (remember I had Dad with me), and then crossed it. It was an amazing piece of engineering, more so considering it was built in the 1800s! Right next to the Tower Bridge was the very historic Tower of London, but as it was getting late in the arvo, we weren't going to get the chance of seeing that today. It has been a long day and Dad and I decided to head back towards the hotel - Liverpool were playing tonight with Daniel being there, so we wanted to go and watch it! As it was such a long way home we decided, with London speaking English and all, to take The Underground back to our hotel. En route to a station, we came across The Monument, a tribute to the Great Fires of London in the 1700s. It's 61 metres high, and we decided to climb it via 311 stone spiral stairs. The whole thing's only a few metres wide, so it was very dizzying, claustrophobic and a hard slog up, but once up top the view was amazing. After an equally hard slog down (spiral stairs are hard when they're half as long as my shoe!), we finally headed to the station across the road and purchased our Oyster Cards to get on the trains. Now THAT was a hard slog. The line? Short! The process? Easy as can be! The ticket attendant? So friendly! Dad? ******* confused! Here's how the conversation went: Me: "Ok Dad so you'll want an Oyster Card that'll cost £5, and I reckon maybe £15 credit, so £20 all up" Dad: "So it'll cost me £15" Me: "No Dad, you want £15 credit, but the card will cost you £5" Dad: "Yeah, so £15!" Me: "Oh yeah of course, 15 plus 5 equals 15, you get that" Dad: "You get it for me?" Me: "Nah you're capable" Sheesh! Good news is we got the cards! Better news is that transport in London is like a well oiled machine! Signs directed us exactly where we needed to go, the train lines were set up to easily follow, and trains ran literally every couple of minutes so there was barely any waiting. You can see why they call it 'the tube' too - the circular tunnels are so tight there are mere inches between the train and the wall. You and feel the train coming long before you hear or see it, with it pushing air through the tunnels making the stations windy, despite being underground. Funniest of all, don't dare stand to the left side of the escalator if you don't intend on walking up it - we saw one person do that on our exit near the hotel, and the death stares from everybody else could've killed him one thousand times over. The left is for walking, the right for standing! After a lengthy day, Dad and I both freshened up before once again hitting the streets to find somewhere to watch the soccer. We figured we'd need to find our way back into town to watch it, and were going to use our new found tube skills to achieve this. As luck would have it, we got a little lost in Victoria Station, and stumbled upon a sports bar right there. It was a bit of a bonus too because if we didn't find it, we'd have missed the start. The pub was packed, but we found a place at the bar and settled in to watch the game and have a few pints. And we did! Sure sign that Dad's ****** 1: He gets loud! Sure sign that Dad's ****** 2: He swears! Luckily for Daniel, Liverpool actually scored this time (though they left it late), and they won the game 2-1. Afterwards, myself and a loud and sweary Dad headed back to the hotel. Despite his protests, Dad was ******. We FaceTimed Mum when we got back, and the first thing she said was "You're ****** Johnny". Yes you were Dad. Don't tell me loudly that you're "******* not" - that very delivery tells me you are! But that's ok. I pass out on toilets, Daniel spews a lot, so you've got a bit to go! Dad fell asleep, but before I did I was so overjoyed I kept my instant noodles that I purchased in Dublin, because I was hungry. I cooked them up, then realised they didn't come with a fork, and the hotel didn't have one either. Displaying the skills that made me an engineer, I procured two coffee stirrers and expertly crafted them into a fork / chopsticks arrangement, managing to easily consume them. Yum. And people don't think I'm an engineer. Pfft. After that I too fell asleep, our first full day in London, done (you could say Lon-done)! (Haha)