Surviving Mai Tai Tom’s “Royal” Blunder: 2022 England & Scotland

CHAPTER TWO: A Whale Of A Day In London

Day Two: Tap and Pay, St. Paul’s, No Whispering, The Real Christopher Wren, Tracy’s First Garden, Examining London’s History, London’s Oldest Surviving Church, Virgin Mary Meet Benjamin Franklin, Great Scot, Are You Sure It’s Only Half a Mile?, Shake It Up, Okey Gnocchi, Tom Pays A Price, The Great Hall, A Whale Of A Tail, A Real Gem, Mozart Lived Here & Old School French Dining

The Bailey’s location meant we could just hop across the street to the Gloucester Road tube station and head to an old favorite London attraction. Of course, first we had to remember how to use the tube, and more importantly, how to pay for it.

Last time we were in London, we purchased Oyster Cards loaded with a finite number of pounds that we would carry with us, then Tap and Pay both entering the tube and exiting at our destination. If we used all the money we loaded on the card, we could just replenish the card at any tube station. As we got in line to purchase a card, a transit employee told us instead of purchasing a new card, we could now use our credit card as long as it could be tapped (and you must use the same credit card to tap in and out). Some people still like using the Oyster card because it has that finite amount in case it is lost or stolen, while if you’re careless enough to lose your credit card, your wife will kill you. In a moment of bravery (or stupidity), I decided upon the credit card.

                                                   

As we would find out, the United Kingdom either doesn’t believe Covid exists or doesn’t care. My guess is that less than 10 percent of people riding the tube donned a mask. Because of Kim’s weakened immune system, he always wore a mask inside, and in an abundance of caution, we always wore one in very close quarters, such as the tube. Getting Covid once was enough for me.

After exiting the tube and walking past a few of London’s unique buildings …

                                                               

… our first stop of the day was St. Paul’s Cathedral, where we had booked advanced online tickets for the earliest admittance time, between 8:30 and 10 a.m. When the four of us visited the cathedral in 2013, we climbed the 528 steps to the top.

                              

Since the Whispering Gallery was closed we decided not to make the climb to the top. OK, it was really because we were nine years older. We’ll just have to assume it has the same view as we experienced then (photos below).

   

Speaking of photos, I remembered reading before leaving home that photos are now allowed to be taken inside St. Paul’s. I still wasn’t convinced until we were inside and Jesus gave me the “ok.”

Sadly, there was also construction going on when we there (an ongoing situation we’d encounter throughout the trip), but I guess when a building is more than 300 years ago, it’s to be expected.  Even with scaffolding the interior is something to behold.  The font dates from the 1720s.

 

                                                      

The dome is one of the largest in the world at 366 feet, and gave Kim and Tracy the chance to show off their neck-craning techniques to get a couple of photos.  Chiropractors throughout the UK were on speed dial as we visited several cathedrals.

              

 

Walking through the St. Paul’s, you just can’t have enough ceiling shots.

                 

The quire is considered to be of national, historic significance.

                                 

The cathedral was damaged in a 1940 bombing by the Germans, and after the war a new altar was constructed, enclosed in a gorgeous Baldacchino.

                                

The chapel “commemorates sacrifices of the British and American peoples” during the World War II. 

Now it was time to descend into the crypt.  As we would find out on this trip, not all crypts are created equal, and this one is purported to be the largest in Europe, containing more than 200 memorials to not-so-famous people and a few big ticket names.

The chapel in the crypt is dedicated to the Order of the British Empire. The OBE Chapel was designed by Wren in the 1670s.

                                   

In the center of the crypt beneath a dome, lies the very large black sarcophagus of Admiral Lord Nelson. We learned that after his death at the Battle of Trafalger, Admiral Nelson’s corpse was transported to London in a keg of brandy (there is proof), and that his coffin (made from a French vessel he defeated at the Battle of the Nile), is inside the sarcophagus which was originally created for Cardinal Thomas Wolsey.

                                    

I can’t see the Duke of Wellington having a beef with his final resting place.

         

We also stopped by a memorial for Florence Nightingale. If Florence thought being a nurse during the Crimean War was difficult, she should have tried traveling with our group.

When here nine years ago, we thought we saw the tomb of Christopher Wren, a man who seemingly designed every building in London including St. Paul’s. We were wrong. We’d actually been looking at a stone bearing the mark of Wren.

Here’s his actual tomb.  I never knew he colored his hair, however.

                                                 

Since Kim and Mary were extending their trip and would stay in Kilkenny, we took this photo for them.

Before exiting, we remembered we hadn’t seen the Monument to the Duke of Wellington. It isn’t hard to find because it takes up most of the central bay of the North aisle. Wellington is on top with his horse Copenhagen. I thought he should have had a great Dane, too.

                                     

Exiting through the gift shop we ran into Queen Elizabeth’s Jubilee companion Paddington Bear and a card game that obviously must come in a tube.

                         

We started walking toward our destination, the nearby Museum of London, when Tracy got her first taste (well, should I say smell) of the numerous UK gardens she’d see.

Located on the site where the Franciscan Church of Greyfriars once stood, these gardens which are laid out in an interesting manner. Four queens were buried in the old church that was decimated by the Great Fire of 1666.  The newer church, designed by, who else? Wren, in 1704, was nearly completely destroyed by bombs. In 1989, a rose garden was planted “matching the floor plan of the former Wren church,” with the rose beds representing where the pews once stood.Tracy said it was “underplanted with blue catmint,” which made us wonder how Jack was doing at kitty daycare.

                     

There is a 2017 sculpture (by Andrew Brown) commemorating 350 years of service of Christ’s Hospital School (1552 – 1902).

Another short walk took us to the Museum of London, one of the city’s numerous free museums, and with the amount of money we spent on this trip, “free” was good.

The museum is chronologically set up and very well done. It takes you from 500,000 years BC, all the way up to present London.  It contains the first licensed petrol-driven taxi from 1903 (someday they’ll have the last one, too) and street scenes from Victorian London (photo on right from museum since ours lacked quality).

 

An album by McCartney and the lads demonstrated “Swinging London,” while McCartney’s daughter Stella designed these swim trunks for a British Olympic diver.

                                       

We thought the most interesting section of the museum delved into London during the two world wars.

                              

It was an under ten-minute walk from the museum to the oldest surviving parish church in London (located in the Smithfield district), which perhaps was the last view William Wallace ever witnessed. St. Bartholomew the Great has survived The Great Fire of 1666, two World Wars and the filming of Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.  Wallace was executed (among many other unfathomable things) nearby, and there is plaque in the courtyard commemorating his funeral here in 1305.

       

It was founded as an Augustinian priory in 1123 and will celebrate its 900th birthday next year.  Watch out Methuselah, here comes St. Bart’s!

        

We admired the interior of the church.

   

The church was established by the courtier, jester, minstrel and cleric (depending on what you read) of King Henry I. After falling ill in Rome, he promised to set up a hospital for the poor if he lived. He survived and saw a vision of St. Bartholomew, and a church (and eventually a hospital) were born. His tomb is inside St. Bart’s.

                                      

When you enter St. Bartholomew, one is greeted by a statue of St. Bartholomew entitled “Exquisite Pain.” St. Bartholomew was flayed alive and then crucified upside down, and this statue, like the one we saw in the Milan Cathedral, shows him holding the knife that tortured him.

                 

This font dates from 1405.

Since it was May 16, we walked by the tomb of the aptly named Sir Walter Midmay, a 16th century politician.

We didn’t know there was a Benjamin Franklin connection to the church. In the 18th century, The Lady Chapel was utilized as a printer’s workshop, and it’s where Benjamin Franklin was employed in 1725.

The Lady Chapel was restored in 1897. In the 12th century, according to a church sign, The Lady Chapel held the distinction of being “the site of the only visitation of the Virgin Mary in London.”  

    

A quick look at the Oriel Window, and it was time to move on from what Tracy called, “a jewel of a church.”

   

We had one more Braveheart moment after exiting. Nearby St. Bartholomew Church is the William Wallace Memorial, located near the spot he was executed.

Our first error of the day occurred while deciding on a lunch destination. The group chose Covent Garden and were going to take the tube, but Mary looked at her phone and insisted it was just a little more than a half mile walk. It was a warm day (by London standards), so we agreed to enjoy strolling in the sunshine.  We passed by a colorful building that reminded Tracy of paint samples that she constantly puts on our kitchen walls.

                     

Turning on to Fleet Street, we walked by Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, a 17th century pub whose regular patrons were authors. Right now I could have used a pint, because I was tired as the Dickens.

                                 

Continuing along Fleet Street we passed The Temple Bar Memorial (1880), which is situated opposite Streets Law Clerks. I thought that ironic since we’d past Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, the first time I’d passed the bar. Just like the statue, we were all dragon a little bit by now.

By the time we’d reached the Royal Courts of Justice (which we visited in 2013), we knew Mary had slightly miscalculated our mileage. Sure enough, we had walked 8/10 of mile and still had nearly another mile to go.  There outta be a law.

Next we passed the nearly 100-year-old Bush House, the former home of the BBC. The 1925 statue atop it signifies the friendship between the United States and Britain.

With all the recent scuttlebutt regarding Monkeypox, we scurried quickly by these two murals touting gin.

             

Finally, about 1 1/2 miles into our walk we came upon hopping busy Covent Garden. All the restaurants were packed, so Kim and Mary decided to go to the Shake Shack. 

Since we have one of those about a mile away from our home, we backtracked a short distance to an Italian restaurant we had seen on our march through London.

I believe San Carlo Cicchetti is a small chain of restaurants. The interior was well-appointed and we got the last table available in the bar area.

                     

Everything here was great, especially sitting down.

Tracy liked her tomato/avocado salad (the tomatoes tasted like candy, they were so good) and lasagna …

                                                                               

 

… while I enjoyed a beef carpaccio starter and gnocchi Gorgonzola.

                                   

Then came my first big mistake (but certainly not my last) of the trip. We were going to meet Kim and Mary at the Natural History Museum as we all wanted to see the renovated Hintze Hall, which was closed on our last visit. They had finished lunch and were already on the way to the tube. Meanwhile, lazy Tom stupidly said, “Let’s just grab a taxi.” Unfortunately, I didn’t inquire into the price. Along the way we’d see banners for the upcoming Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, whose price tag was slightly more than the cab ride.

The meter kept going and going while the traffic kept slowing and slowing. By the time we reached the museum, I realized I would pay for my mistake. Seeing Kim, I asked how his lunch tasted. He said it was good, and that he needed the calories to gain back some of the 50 pounds he lost. I quipped, “Just think, it took you six months to lose your 50 pounds, while I just dropped 22 pounds in the last 15 minutes.”

                                   

We entered Hintze Hall, which has been described as a “Cathedral of Nature.”

Floating above the hall is Hope, a blue whale skeleton, who replaced the beloved Dippy the Dinosaur, who returned to another part of the NHS in late May.

                 

I had visited some other dinosaurs at the museum on my last visit, so we skipped them, plus it was getting later in the afternoon, and the renovated hall was something to behold.  I think that dude in the red shirt is a goner.

These two guys stuck their necks out to say “hello.”

                                        

With all our walking, it certainly proved to be the survival of the fittest, so it was appropriate we paid a visit to Charles Darwin before leaving.

Mary said she ran into a “not-so-wooly mammoth.”

We did make on final stop in “The Vault” to the Ostro Stone, the world’s largest treated intense blue, faceted topaz. It has 9,381 carats and weighs nearly 4 1/2 pounds. I thought it must come from the Kardashian Collection, but it’s actually from Brazil.

Back at our hotel, we cooled our jets for a while before heading out to the ritzy and chic looking Belgravia district to a quintessential French restaurant, La Poule au Pot, which has been serving French fare for more than half a century.

                           

It’s located on the corner of Orange Square. I was admiring a statue of Mozart when a gentleman sitting on a nearby bench starting telling me about how Mozart lived in this neighborhood for seven weeks when he was a kid. He wrote his first symphony here when he was eight years old. I think this gentleman would have gone on for hours, but he had to leave to go sing at a nearby church.

The interior of La Poule au Pot is straight out of a French movie. Dimly lit with rustic furniture, I half expected Catherine Deneuve to pop in for a bite and champagne.

     

The meal was quite good. I loved my onion tart and Tracy enjoyed a rocket salad with mushrooms. We both had the Beef Bourguignon.

The best part about dinner was when Kim told us his quiche and steak frites tasted good. He said it was the first time during his recovery he had been able to eat salad without a bitter taste to it.

We walked through the Belgravia neighborhood afterward that has a number of antique furniture and textile stores. Tracy had fun taking photos of flower planters that she said were “bursting with alliums, lupines, foxgloves, thistles and iris on the verge of blooming.”

     

Good weather was forecast for the following day, so we planned to hop a boat and explore Greenwich.

We’d stop by the only remaining clipper ship in the world, the Painted Hall at the Old Royal Naval College, see a summer retreat for Charles I’s wife, take a spiral staircase downward and finally survive a long, uphill walk to the Royal Observatory and straddle the Prime Meridian … or did we? Then it was a train back to London, where we would end our three nights in London at a famous pub … eating Thai food.

Next – CHAPTER THREE: Greenwich … It’s About Time

Day Three: The China Syndrome, Tower Gets Ready For The Jubilee, “They Aren’t Personable,” Missed It By That Much, Thames Cruise, No Not The Scotch, Painted Hall, The Queen’s House, Spiraling Downward, A Hill Of A Walk, Out Of Time, London’s Manhattan, Quays To The City, Flower Power, Fit To Be Thai-d & Where’s Our Train?