Troy’s Random Ramblings

Another day of walking.

Where’d I get to today …. First off was the Wellington Arch and Aspley House. The Wellington Arch was commisioned by King George IV in the early 1800’s. In the late 1800’s the arch was moved about 500 metres or so to where it is now, to ease traffic congestion. Here’s some useless information .. in the 1800’s traffic moved through London at about 9-11 mph, at the beginning of the 21st Century traffic moves through London at, yep, 9-11 mph. The more things change the more they stay the same. Apsley House is the home of the Duke of Wellington, and also home to an impressive art collection with the first Duke being an avid collector of portraits. The Duke also didn’t mind the odd banquet or two, every year hosting a dinner with his fellow comrades from the Battle of Waterloo.

After wandering around some of the Duke’s house (part of the house is still used by the current Duke of Wellington and his family) I strolled down to Buckingham Palace, unfortunately the Queen wasn’t in today so I didn’t get a chance to have a cup of tea with her.

After looking around Buckingham Palace and the gardens nearby I wandered back towards the Thames and through the Admiralty Arch and then on to the Cabinet War Rooms and the Churchill museum. The Cabinet War Rooms were very interesting, a snap shot in time of what it was like during the height of WWII. The rooms have been preserved exactly as they were during the war, with the exception of the cigarette smoke. The Churchill museum was also extremely interesting, detailing the life, both private and public of Winston Churchill from his birth to his death.

A couple of hours later I resurfaced and wandered past Big Ben, Westminster Abby and the Houses of Parliment before strolling over the Thames for a ride on the London Eye.

All in all another fairly busy day with plenty seen and a few photos taken. Tomorrow, more tourist things.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 26th, 2007 at 06:08 and is filed under holiday, london. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.