Day 4- London

Day 4 19 August 2008 Today we saw the Changing of the Guards at Buckingham palace. The crown was massive and the band came marching through the street with the guard and entered the castle. After having a great view of the procession i could not see anything going on in the grounds so i made my way along the fenceline and after squeezing my way in i found myself i prime location to see the band playing may different songs such as themes from disney land, abba and various other crowd pleasers. After 30 minutes the procession continued out of Buckingham palace and back to their barracks. This is amazing to see and there is lots of pomp and ceremony. We then headed to Buckingham palace tours and had a tour around the palace. The thing you come to realise is that they must have spent a packet on this place, gold trim everywhere, very expensive and interesting artwork and the amazing ballroom with a full dining setting in place for over 100 people with every knife fork, glass and serviette in perfect alignment and measured from the base of the table. We also looked at the Royal Mews which houses the Queens carriages including the massive gold carriage and the carriage provided to the Queen by Australia. We went past the horse guards and saw the two horse guards (soldiers on a horse) out the front. They stood very still and it would be a really boring job, but a nice photo opportunity. We walked past the famous street which has 10 downing street (the PMS residence) but the entire street is blocked off and has scaffolding throughout which inhibits any view of the famous doorway.

We also went to Winston Churchills bunker where the cabinet war rooms were during the war. I also checked out Westminster Abbey which is one of the most amazing places i have seen. Its memorials, tombs and architecture is so intricate and impressive. We had a look at Big Ben then met up with Hans friend Zoe who gave me a fantastic and very informative tour of UK Parliament. It was amazing to see that the two houses are very small and have about 100 seats even though they each have approximately 600 members of parliament. We then headed to canary wharf for dinner on the docklands light rail with some nice views of the waterfront.