Adventures in Europe; Day 3

Running, Beheadings, & Foodie-Fun


Friday was our final day in London and I knew I had to get a run in.  I'd made a goal of running in every country that we visited, so today was the day!  I knew from our first two days that running in our neighborhood was pretty popular.  We were right off the Thames where I knew there was a nice path with lots of runners.  I wasn't sure how far it would take me, so I just set out without any goals in mind.

Crossing Tower Bridge.

What I didn't realize is that the Thames connects most of the sights in London.  It was so cool to see London while running!

Close up on the Eye.  I'm clearly impressed.

I had been a wee bit bummed the previous day about not being near enough Big Ben to hear him chime on the hour.  So imagine my overwhelming joy when it struck 8:00 and I got to hear the big guy sing.  This combined with my runner's high was almost enough to put me over the edge.

Ding Dong!

What was even better, the path along the Thames had tunnels going under all of the streets so I didn't even have to wait to cross a street.  Except for when I hit a tunnel that was full of sketchy looking fellas.  Then I decided to cross the street.

This Lion is not as scary as the homeless people under the street.

I'm not exaggerating when I say that this was the best run of my life.  By the time I got back to our hotel I'd put in 8 miles and fallen in love with London.  The sights, the river, the enormous amount of runners.  Love love love.

I quickly got cleaned up and we headed out to start our day.  Our first stop was for breakfast and coffee. 

One of the first things we learned in Europe is that coffee is tricky.  I'm used to drinking almost a pot of coffee on my own most mornings, and ordering a big ol' cup when I'm out and about.  Coffee in London came in a much smaller cup.

Teeny Tiny Coffee.

If you go to London, you will see more Pret A La Manger shops than you will see hot dog stands in NYC.  Pret is literally on every corner.  And I loved it!  They serve coffee plus ready-made sandwiches, salads, and baked goods. 



I ♥ Pret.

After a quick Pret breakfast, we headed down the street to visit The Tower of London.

 

Off with their heads!

I am absolutely fascinated by The Tower of London.  This is where the kings and queens used to live and where all of the beheadings took place.  The green space behind us used to be a mote.  A mote! 

Throw him in the dirty mote!

The thing that's so interesting about London is that they have all of these crazy-old sites like castles and churches with all this history... sitting next to these crazy-modern buildings.  It's very odd. 

We bought our tickets for the Tower and then waited around for a tour with one of the beefeaters.  Fun fact: Beefeaters were the guards for the royal family.  They were called beefeaters because part of their pay came in the form of large quantities of beef that other civilians didn't have access to.  Plus they got to wear really cool uniforms.

Our Beefy Tour Guide.

Our guide shared ridiculous stories about all of the crazy things that happened within these walls.  The thing I find so cool about England is that their history sounds more like a fairytale.  Kings, queens, beheadings, knights, missing princes.  It's so crazy that those things really happened.

Another fun story about the tower; ravens live there.  There is some old superstition that if the ravens ever leave the Tower, the monarchy will crumble and England will fall.  So they clipped the ravens' wings so they can't leave.  Genius.

Poor little Raven.

After getting our fill of gruesome stories at the Tower, we walked across the bridge to my most anticipated activity of the week; the Borough Market.

The Borough Market is like the farmer's market on crack.  Literally, I think they might be putting crack in the food.  It is a world famous market where you can buy almost anything; fruit, veggies, baked goods, booze, cheese, eggs, oil, jelly, art.  I was immediately obsessed when we walked in.

Meringues the size of your head.  Meringues on crack.

Guys with tattoos serving up all-vegan fair.

Unlike the farmer's market at home where you can usually find one, maybe two varieties of a fruit or veggie, at Borough you could find a million different kinds of everything.  I didn't even know this many varieties of mushrooms existed!

Magical mushrooms of every variety.

 There were all your normal goods, but also tons of exotic varieties all mixed in too.



Mangosteen anyone?

Yes, you can buy watermelons; whole, half, quartered, by the slice, or in a cup.  Watermelon for all!


This makes me so incredibly happy.

In addition to the fresh produce there were stands selling typical British fair.  This one was selling meat pies.  Any kind of meat pie you could imagine.  Not that you spend a lot of time imagining meat in a pie.



Meat pies.

There were also British delicacies such as wild boar wrapped around scotch eggs, breaded and fried.  Yum!

Who's ready for lunch?!?

 I completely lost it over the stands with enormous pans of paella cooking up.  Love!

Paella for all!

We each grabbed some delicious looking grub (paella for Drew, Dahl for me) and hunted down a table to dig in. 

Drew Loves Paella too!

Pre-sliced watermelon.

We weren't done there though.  We hadn't had our fill of market fun.  So we headed out again to choose some dessert and drinks. 

What to choose?!?

There were several fun wine stands around serving different drinks.  I chose a Prosecco punch made with raspberries and mint.  Drew ordered a Prosecco and it came in this charming plastic champagne flute.  He's so fancy!

Prosecco for all!

I never want to leave.

Eventually Drew was able to drag me away from the market.  If it were up to me I would stay there forever.  I can't imagine a happier place in the world!  Okay, now I'm being a bit extreme.

 

Our next stop was Covent Garden.  I wasn't sure what to expect at Covent Garden besides having been promised some great people watching.  It did not disappoint. 

 

Covent Garden is a part of town with lots of shopping, theatres, eating, and tons of people.  We walked around and took in the sights and I freaked out when I saw the name of this restaurant!

Punch & Judy?!?!

Gone Girl anyone?!?  This photo is blurry, but it totally put into perspective what the puppets look like.  They were so much sweeter looking in my head.  These puppets look mean!  I guess that makes sense for the story line.

Mean ol' puppets.

Covent Garden was full of street performers.  They didn't seem to do much though.  We watched this guy prepare to do magic for like 15 minutes.  But he never actually got to the magic.  But at the end of each performance, the performers would send their hat around and demand that you pay them for having entertained you.  It was bizarre. 

No magic.  Just a lot of talk.

We stopped at one of the many open-air cafes hoping to grab an open seat and some drinks.  Our hostess sat us at a 4-person table which already had 2 people sitting at it.  No biggie, right? 

Wrong. 

I didn't have the nerve to take their picture, but this lovely German-speaking couple literally smoked a pack of cigarettes between them in the time it took Drew and I to drink our wine.  Every time they would put out a cigarette, we would count the seconds until they lit up another. 

Selfie taken, hoping you could see all the smoke.  You can't.

What this did do was squelch my overwhelming desire to smoke in London.  Everyone smokes here and I kept telling Drew I wanted to because, "Smoking is cool!"  Smoking is not cool.  Hate to break it to you, London.

The up side to our smoky table was that we had a fantastic people-watching spot.  There were tons of people out; tourists, theater-goers, and people heading out for the night.  I snapped the following pic with Trophy Wife in mind.  This gal was meeting friends and walked around with the greatest of ease on the biggest damn heels I've ever seen.  I'm sure she and TW would be friends.



Dang girl!

We ended the night early because we had a RIDICULOUSLY early wake-up call the next day.  London was amazing.  Such a fun few days!

 

Lessons Learned:

1.  The Thames is the best running route ever.  Do not miss it!

2.  Friday morning is field trip day at the Tower of London.  Maybe choose another time to go.

3.  Drinking in the streets of London is cool.  Especially during the day.

4.  Smoking is not cool.  Ever.