Around London: a continuation of the trip to York only now we're in London on our own.

 Around London...

I'll start off with the most wonderful sight I've seen in London in all the times I've been there - the recently restored Big Ben aka the Elizabeth Tower and the Great Bell of the Great Clock of Westminster.  It's always been covered with scaffolding. The chime testing is going on with 'silent testing' but no announcement has been made for when it will be back in full operation. It will be open to visitors in 2023.  

It took my breath away as it looked like a tower of gold standing out against a sky of puffy clouds. You have to see it to believe it. 

 

Parliament Square contains 12 statues of people who symbolize freedom, statesmen and other notable individuals.   It is a beautiful green space surrounded not only by statues but also by famous monuments. I would have liked to get photos of all the statues but it wasn't to be.

Millicent Gerrett Fawcett - British Suffragist Leader

Mahatma Gandhi - Anti-Colonialist, Political Ethicist, Nonviolent Civil Disobedience.

Nelson Mandela - Fought Apartheid and other human rights violations, Won Nobel Peace Price alongside So. African President, F.W. de Klerk for having led the transition in South Africa from apartheid to a multiracial democracy.


My next stop, once I could get going, was the British War Museum. (I was still weakened from being ill the day before.) It used to be called the Churchill War Rooms. After having read so much about this place in all the books I've read on Churchill and WWII, I finally got to wander through, unhurriedly, and enjoy the life-sized dioramas in which the actual rooms were populated by amazingly life-like figures. It really looked as if there were people working in there. 

As I approached the entrance to the museum, I recognized the concrete reinforcements that were added during the war. It's interesting that they remain. So much history. 

The entrance.

Another level below the main underground level!

I don't know what this award is for.

By the time I got out of the War Rooms, Westminster Abbey had closed except for services.

I did, however, get into the gift shop. Yay! I had fun in there as you might expect. There were a few things I am sorry I didn't pick up but who knew QEII would die in 2 days, while I was on the British Air jet, over the Atlantic, going home? Our pilot announced it. It's not that I thought she would live forever but it came as such a shock.

My favorite collectibles were the embellished pillow-like ornaments.

See those rows of queens?
I'll be back.