October 9, 2022 Another after hours museum tour followed later by a a walk across the Tower Bridge, then along the Queens Walk .Still not succeeding at making these posts shorter.

More security personnel than people this early in the morning.

Just before our group entered the museum, the first group of people got in line where the two white signs on the post are. They would be the first to enter where the gates were opened an hour later, Normally we wait until 11 to go in as there is virtually no line then and it is a five minute walk from where we stay.

The line outside the museum when left about 10:30.

No lines inside the gates at 9 am when we had our before hours tour.

The line when we left.

13 in our group this morning. The small size of the tour group makes it easy to see and hear what the guide is showing and talking about.

Today’s tour was called Life and Death in Ancient Egypt. Before the Unification of Egypt under the Pharaohs the dead were simply buried in shallow graves.

Inner coffin with mummy.

A higher status mummy. The head mask and objects on the mummy indicate this.

Outer coffin, mummy cover and inner coffin of a high status burial of a man.

Paintings from the wall of a tomb.

What makes the tour better than walking through the galleries during normal hours. These rooms are very crowed them and it virtually impossible to read the plaques describing the various objects. The small coffin is one that contained a female, but it is repurposed from one that was constructed for a male. The feet are too big and the fact the bottom of the head dress was rounded off , note how the squared off area removed was painted black are two indications. The mummy to the left is of a male and note the squared of base of the head dress.

What in the world id Linda looking at.?

It is on the main floor in room 1 and is the famous Feejee Mermaid. The reflection on glass is bad, there is a floor grill reflected on the body, for example. So are mermaids real or not? Unfortunately modern scientific examination has show it to be a fake. Oh well, some day some one will capture a real mermaid.

The museum is not the only place there are lines. This place is near our apartment and is also packed whenever we walk this way.

I always enjoy the names of some of the underground stations.

The iconic building called The Shard is no the south bank of the Thames making it easy to determine which direction you are going.

The moat of the Tower of London.

It is our tradition to walk across the Tower Bridge on a Sunday morning when in London.

Easy to tell the bridge is up.

Detail of the ironwork.

We and thousands of others take a selfie with the bridge in the background.

A few years ago we walked across the top of the bridge which has a glass floor. Once was enough for Linda.

Looking at the London Bridge.

See, it really is the London Bridge.

Interesting Architecture.

Not your typical top to a building.

This one is called the Walkie Talkie building.

One of favorite places is down there.

The sign says it all.

We’ve never bought any, but maybe someday.

Pies are meat eat pies.

The tower bridge viewed from the London bridge.

The monument to the Great Fire of London that started a short distance from here back in 1666.

We just follow the signs and go through the tunnels to find the underground line we need to begin our journey back to the apartment. We have to change lines at two other stations on the way.

October 8, 2022 It is called an after hours tour even though it was before hours this morning.

No crowds this morning.

There were four different tours being given this morning.

The tour guide was extremely knowledgeable and also was a great presenter who kept the various ages of the 16 people on the tour interested in what she was saying.

The tour was titled ‘Introduction to Ancient Egypt” and was perfect for our time in Egypt next month. In the hour before the museum opened to the public we were treated to the wonders of the first floor Egyptian exhibit in ways that a normal visit would never afford. For example we learned how every item that adorned the pharaoh as well as the idealized body parts spoke of the power of the pharaoh in the statues dating from the time of the Old Kingdom.

Inscriptions on the tomb of an important person.

Hieroglyphics indicating that unlike all other person who had to kiss the ground in front of the Pharaoh, this person was allowed to kiss the Pharaoh’s foot.

The statutes of Gods were full of symbolism.

A portion of a huge statue of Ramses II.

Cats were important.

Scarab Beetles were very symbolic.

Cartouches meant it was the name of a Pharaoh. By the end of the hour we had a good foundation of the three Kingdoms of ancient Egypt and how the differed.

When the tour was over we headed over to Room 1 where there were several things we wanted to see.

Butterflies collected during Captain Cook’s round the world voyage in the 1700’s.

The actual Rosetta stone was not on display, but this room had an exact copy.

The top two sections are different types of Hieroglyphics while the bottom is in Greek.

She found some fossils.

She’s big on feet.

Especially great big feet.

Back up the second floor for another look at the Lewis Chessmen.

Better photos of the Sutton Hoo Helment.

Off to see another play, this far enough away that we opted to take the underground.

This one should be different.

Selfie as always.

The set.

Linda’s G&T and a scotch and water for me.

It being 5 o’clock when the play ended and knowing what the underground trains were going to be like, we opted to walk back to the apartment. Passing by a certain restaurant and noting it was very busy we stopped for a taste of our former life in California.

The sign says it all, and it was really good food too.

Our travels took down Demark Street once again.

What can i say, I like taking photos of the guitars in the windows.

October 7, 2022 The highlight of the day was visit to a most interesting museum.

Another day, another amazon package.

In the US we have detours, over here they are diversions.

The title of this book of poetry nails what the Soane Museum is all about. We had visited many years ago and decided it was time for a return visit.

The entrance to the museum which was the house Sir John Soane lived in. It was willed to British government with the proviso it be kept exactly as it was at the time of his death.

While Linda, of course, is the best thing about this photo, the use of a thistle anywhere you can sit in the museum goes along with the somewhat oddball nature of the museum.

Sir John Soane used his collections in his residence as a teaching tool for his students.

I remembered this missing weapon display from the last time we ere here. I likely took a similar photo and posted it that time. The pistol was stolen by robbers in 1969, but the joke was on them as the pistol was actually a fake.

A gallery of a few of the things we saw. Think of a maze on multiple floors and you get an idea of what it is like. The portrait is of Sir John Soane. Ad the museum is free of charge so even if you visit and don’t care for it, you are out nothing but a little time. Plus nearby is another interesting place to visit.

The museum faces Lincoln’s Inn Fields, the largest public square in London and dates from the 1630’s. We walked through it to see if we recognized where Time Team dug a trench in one of their episodes. There is a lot of history that took place here in the past.

A gate to Lincoln’s Inn. Think Barristers (lawyers), Judges and all things legal. Below are a few photos of some interesting details.

Then there those interesting beasts I really like.

It takes a special person to wear a hat like this.

We are staying in an interesting neighborhood.

Real women wear hats that are practical.

Look like what I found just a couple of blocks away. One for him and one for her. Just kidding, really, just kidding. One is what happens to him if he calls her the other.

October 6, 2022 Another day, another play, plus an unanticipated, but great meal. Still working on making these posts shorter.

My conscience has gotten the best of me. Yesterday I chose not to write about something. The fact I made a complete mess of our journey to the theater where Come From Away was playing. My sole job is to get us to the theater on time.. It was another short easy walk to the theater, or at leas it should have been. It was a case of going left when I should have gone right, not once but twice. Let me just say that when I realized we were almost to Leicester Square, when we should have been a long way from there, Linda let me know just how unhappy with me she was. In the end all was well as far as I was concerned as we arrived with plenty of time for Linda to get her gin and tonic.

The photo is not from yesterday, it does however illustrate how easy it is in London to always know where you are. Up above each of the red trucks is a sign, note the red bas and black lettering in the white background. That is the name of the street heading off into the distance, and every intersection has those signs. I had no excuse. According some of the words Linda was uttering when we were approaching the theater it is obvious if I value certain parts of my anatomy, that situation will never, ever occur again.

Today, for the first time, we used the underground to travel to the theater. Of course I had to once again incur the wrath of she who has put up with her idiot husband for almost 55 years. I got off at the wrong underground station even though she was telling me it was the wrong station. For the life of me I can’t explain why i did it other than I had a death wish. Since I am writing this, obviously that did not come true, But for a few minutes standing on the platform, I made sure to have my back up against the station wall so there was no chance of anything happening. A happy camper she definitely wasn’t., but a very lucky man I was.

Today’s play. We later decided this was our 5th time seeing it over the years.

Just as almost always, 6th row back from the stage, and near the center. We know the seats we like.

I know what long time readers are thinking. That is Linda’s double gin and tonic she always has, but what is that other drink and who is drinking it. After today’s near brush with death at the Covent Garden Underground station, I decided I needed something to “calm me down”. For the life of me I can not say why I ordered something I have never had before and didn’t even like when I tasted it, a double Jack and soda. Oh, I do know why I ordered the double, I don’t really like Jack Daniels and I absolutely don’t like soda water. I can only chalk it up to the recent near death experience still affecting my cognitive abilities. All I can say is, Never Again. For messing out our travel to the theater and drinking that awful concoction.

Selfie. You can tell I am still in shock. Linda has that twisted evil smile knowing the next time I do it will definitely be the last time.

The stalls bar. I should have gone with a double, double Glenlivet. A note about the play. This was a revival of the original play we had seen of previous trips to London. Trying to be kind I will say it wasn’t very good. The actor playing Frankie Valli was okay singing with the group, but by himself, and especially acapella it was bad. The female singing “My Boyfriend is Back” was to put it nicely, atrocious. We’ve seen some bad plays during the years and this one was up there among them due to the actors, not the play itself. I must say the band did an excellent job, to bad the singers didn’t match them.

The theater was just off Trafalgar Square. If you don’t know why the square is so named and a statue of Admiral Lord Nelson towers over it, those two name are worth looking up as the history of the world might have been completely different. Parlez-vous français ?

Nothing special about this photo other than there is just just something about London that reaches into my soul. It is truly one of the world’s great cities and we love every minute that we spend here. (Even if I do sometimes get us lost.)

I think in these posts I failed to mention our Life guide, Sara N. Dippity. Walking back from the theater ( took a wrong turn and we missed the Underground station, but actually walking was just as quick as taking the Underground) we passed a Pizza Hut and Linda said we should have a pizza for dinner. We both agreed the garbage Pizza Hut serves was not what we had in mind, when just a few doors later we happened on an Zizzi’s. Zizzi’s is one of those places that grew from a single pizza place over twenty years ago to some 130 restaurants in the UK and Ireland today. It is the only place we eat pizza in the UK because they do pizza right.

Crispy thin crusts with a good helping of toppings. No deep dish or thick crust crap here, Linda went vegetarian, I went goat cheeses with caramelized onions and we both went out the door and back to the apartment very, very happy. By the way, their pasta crisps show in the first photo are out of this world.

October 5, 2022 Of course it only took a day for me to backtrack on my attempts to slim down my posts. Certain things we see will do that.

We usually try to go The Museum an hour or so after it opens, but today we joined the throngs in the long line on the sidewalk to get in.

It truly is one of the world’s great museums.

And it is great in more ways than one.

You can’t just walk up all 72 steps at once as there are exhibits everywhere in the museum.

Someday, somehow we will get her one.

With our upcoming trip to Egypt, we spent some time in the Egyptian rooms.

Containers that held the internal organs of the mummies.

The vessel with the conical top is an Egyptian wine “bottle”. The marks on the conical top are the equivalent of today’s wine labels. Grapes did not grow in Egypt, so the grapes/wines were imported.

We walked through several over rooms on our way out of the museum.

The world famous Sutton Hoo. We have watched several YouTube videos over the years produced by the museum, so this was a real treat to see it in person.

The Lewis Chessmen hold a special place in our hearts. The first learned about them several years ago during a trip to Scotland where they were discovered in 1831 in a hoard buried in a sand bank.

She who walks up 72 steps must also walk down.

Back again to see this wonderful play.

The set may be minimalist, but the play delivers maximum impact.

A good selfie on my first attempt today.

We call it guitar street, but actually is Demark Street.

It’s not just looking at the classic guitars in the windows, it’s also hearing the sounds of guitars being played before buying in the different stores. To us it not just a street, it is an experience, which is why we travel.