I woke up on the ninth day of the trip at 8:30 AM with feelings of sadness, for this would be the last day before we hopped back on a plane to the states. It had already been such a memorable experience, and leaving just did not feel right.
On this final day we were allowed to tour on our own in order for everyone to check out the things that they had wanted to see, but had not had time to see in the previous eight days. Amber, Jill, Kristen, and I used this time to see the Tower of London. As usual, it did not go as planned as our tube passes had expired, and our new passes did not become active until 10:00 AM. We then tried taking a bus to our destination, but the traffic was so congested that we were continuously being passed by pedestrians (It reminded me very much of the opening scene from “Office Space”, so after much debate we decided to walk the remaining four miles to the Tower of London.
The Tower itself was an enjoyable experience. It was very similar to Windsor Castle in both function and design. The inside walls were covered in guns and suits of armor and the outside contained some aesthetically pleasing architecture. The highlight of the tower was getting to see the Crown Jewels. They were massive, ornate, gemstones on crowns that have been worn for about five hours total in the history of England because each monarch wears the coronation crown for only 3-5 minutes! The other cool site at the Tower was Traitor’s Gate, which is a gate going out to the river. This was only cool because we had learned lots of gruesome facts about that spot on our Jack the Ripper Tour. It is also of note to say that I felt the urge to sit on King Henry VIII’s personal shitter, which was a hole in the tower that dropped 30 feet down to the ground.
I did a little bit of last minute souvenir shopping, before switching up groups and going to check out the National Science Museum with Chantel, Tiffany, and Kristen. The museum was not especially interesting with the exception of the Spitfire, and the space exhibits.
After the museum we went to the London Eye, which is the world’s tallest ferris wheel, with Kristen, Chantel, Tiffany, Jarod, and Angela. The ride took a half hour to complete and the view from the top, overlooking nearly the entire city of London, was astounding. Unfortunately, it was not an experience that really translates very well into words, but is something that must be seen for yourself.
We ate for a final time as a group at ASK, an Italian restaurant which was very tasty, and then we made a trek over to the pub where I made an ill fated toast and enjoyed our last night together.
The next day we flew across the ocean, and took connecting flights from Detroit, to Minneapolis, and finally back to Sioux City where our journey and this series of blogs will end.
