Tube Travelers

Today was a lot like yesterday, a lot of sightseeing... but before today, thought I'd tell you about last night. After we posted yesterday, we went to Covent Gardens for dinner, and saw the most ridiculous crowd act ever. It was not affiliated with anything, but was just a guy who wanted some money. By the end of the show, he had striped down to his underwear, mounted an Italian man, climbed ontop of his 12ft tall unicycle, rode around while juggling knives, and then for the grand finale, he jumped off his unicycle and juggled a chainsaw (running, that had the chain on it) around his body!!! He must have made 150-200£... but really, he was nuts.

Today we met up with one of my friends from the seville program who happened to be in London still for a couple of days. First we went to the Tower of London, an old castle that used to house the royal family until like 30 years ago (so we heard). The line to tour it was ridiculous, so we didn't go it, BUT we did walk around it. Then we walked across the famous Tower Bridge (usually mistaken for the London Bridge). It was all very impressive. On the other side of the bridge, we watched the filming of some cop TV show here in the UK.

After that, we went to look for some show tickets. I guess the shows/plays here are just as big as they are in New York because there were signs everywhere. Last night, after talking to some guy who worked as a stage hand for the Lion King, he recommended that we see Avenue Q. Apparently, it was wild popular in the US, won Tonys and all that stuff. After finding out we might get student discounts, we headed over to the theatre. Turns out, with our international student ID cards, we got front section tickets that are eye level with the stage for 20£ when they normally cost 47.50£, saving us nearly $60! Show is tonight at 8pm, so we are excited. Figured that the girls and mom would be jealous...

After that, we gorged ourselves at pizza hut, eating the bufet until we were sick. It was everything I thought it could be and then some.

After all the food, we thought we'd check out Herod's, the world's largest department store. It was HUGE, 7 stories and everything from golf carts, to a toy kingdom. Highlights were as follows: a watch that costs 300,000£, a stuffed giraffe that costs 2,700£ and a go cart that looks like an H3 hummer that was 9,000£. To give you an idea of what a waste that is, a basic car costs 8,000£...

Gotta eat and go to the show. We leave tomorrow for Dublin at 4 in the afternoon. See you in Ireland!