London - Day 1

London - Day 1. Yesterday we traveled to London via the Euro Tunnel, it was sad in a way leaving France, as there was just so much we would have liked to do.  It was such a beautiful country and Paris was crying out to be explored more!  We have a feeling the same will probably be said for London.

The trip through the tunnel was an experience in itself, and a marvel of modern technology.  The "quote" of the day would have go go to Annelise who rather loudly exclaimed that the British border control man sounded just like someone from the Paddington movie.

Our first day in London did not disappoint, after organizing "oyster travel cards" for everyone, we took the train into central London.  Once again we were awestruck by the grandeur and immensity of the buildings, we visited a number of landmark buildings such as Westminster Abby, Parliament buildings and Buckingham Palace.

Our last stop for the day was Harrods department store.  We were astounded at the price of the goods on display - the boys found a suitcase for sale for a 'mere' 99500 pounds!! A lot of goods had no price displayed, basically if you need to know the price then you can't afford it. We were impressed by the way goods were displayed especially the food items, everything looked so enticing and delectable.
The toy department, even though not as ostentatious as the rest of the store, was a delight for the children to explore, in kiwi terms they "had a blast" 😍😁  There were quite a number of staff who were having great delight in exhibiting the various toys they had for sale. Samuel thought demonstrating toys would be a great job to have!

In the train carriage, which you drive into, for the trip through the Euro tunnel - maybe the Cook Strait in NZ next?! A fantastic way to cross the channel which took about 35 minutes.

The Westminster Cathedral and the Westminster Abby, often confused by visitors to London, we really wanted to go inside the Abby but at a cost of $180 for the family we thought we might give it a miss. Maybe on Sunday we will make it for the evening service, which thankfully has no charge.

Amazing buildings everywhere, the skyline is dotted with cranes with new buildings being worked on all over the place.

Parliament Buildings - just stunning and sooooo big!

Buckingham Palace and gardens surrounding - just majestic and beautiful.

Quintessentially British !!!!

Even a Kiwi and a Aussie flag at the St James Park

Harrods department store, a shopping experience (or rather sight seeing/window shopping!) that will never be forgotten, an unexpected highlight of the day. We had so much fun looking around (it has 7 floors & 330 departments!).