Another remarkable day. We had decided to explore the local area today, so Matthew met us at our hotel at 10am.
We headed towards Buckingham Palace, which is literally just around the corner when we noticed that there seemed to be a lot of people gathering. We soon realized that there was the Changing of the Guards today. We decided to hang around a bit to see what we could see. We were not able to see the actual changing inside the palace walls, but we got a spectacular view of the guards march both in and out the palace.
Later we walked through Green Park towards Soho. Matthew explained some of the greenery in the area. The park has trees that are several hundred years old. There is one kind of tree that periodically loses its bark so it always "looks clean".
On the other side of the park, we walked down Piccadilly to Piccadilly Circus. We stopped there for a sit down and cup of tea.
From there we wandered through SOHO, a district well known for its partying and food. We walked through the gay district and on to Broadwick Street and the Broad Street Pump. This pump is a famous symbol of Public Health as the removal of the handle of this pump ended a cholera epidemic in 1854. We stopped for drink in the John Snow Pulic House located nearby.
We then down walked Berwick Market, where there was a long row of tents featuring food from any country you might want. The smells were amazing.
Next was China town with lanterns strung across the walkway. We stopped at C R Cafe for a Malaysian lunch. The food was excellent! I thoroughly enjoyed it.
We walked through Covent Garden and window shopped along the way. There were also a number of street performers to add the to atmosphere. Matthew explained the history of Covent Garden and Market.
From Covent Garden, we headed to Trafalgar Square. At this point, I was getting a little tired, so sat down in the square for a rest and did some people watching.
We walked through St. James Park on our way back to our hotel. We did some bird watching by the lake in the park. We watched swans, ducks, coots, parrots and one heron. There was even a black swan.
We got home around 7pm, again exhausted but well satisfied with our day. My steptracker said 15,596 steps.
Hotel: Resident Inn Victoria
Weather: mixed sun and cloud -high 16c
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