We found $29 airplane tickets to London. So we left Spain for a week to check out this city and kind of regroup after the Camino. There was a little bit of whiplash heading from rural northern Spain to the bustling streets of London. Our siesta was suddenly gone, but afternoon tea made up for it.
We hit the museums hard. London can be expensive, but for families who are travel schooling, this city has something that can’t be passed up: FREE world-class museums. Thanks to the horrors of colonialism, England has curated an amazing collection of other people’s stuff all in one place. The English love to show it off, and we had some European History curriculum to fulfill.
The British Museum for starters has The Rosetta Stone, that is “The” not “a” Rosetta Stone. Turns out it isn’t a box set of DVDs.
Also an unbelievable collection of artifacts from the Parthenon. Charlotte read 9 books while we were on the Camino, all about the Greek and Roman gods, so she was particularly interested in this section of the Museum. Pretty cool when your kid can teach you about the different gods and their relationships with the other gods, I had zero clues.
And this guy from Easter Island, or as we know him, Night at the Museum, was there as well.
The National Gallery had the most amazing collection of VanGogh, Picasso, Rembrandt, Monet, and all the teenage mutant ninja turtles... just about THE entire Art History book was in that building.
We spent some time in the British Library which has the Magna Carta, a Gutenberg bible, the actual notes of The Hallelujah Chorus by Handel, Shakespeare’s notes, and of course a display about the Beetles. Jake found the journal page from Captain Scott when he made it to the South Pole, only to find that Amundsen had beaten him there by 5 weeks.
The Tate Modern holds Jake's favorite art. Pieces by Rothko, Richter, Nauman, Duchamp, and an interactive installation in the turbine hall by a Danish group, Superflex.
We saw the sights that you come to London to see Buckingham Palace, the Globe, Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abby, the Tower of London...
But the girl’s favorite site seeing event was Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in the Palace Theater. It was their surprise treat and turned out to be ours as well. It. Was. Amazing. Such an incredible experience, that I hope to do again.
We also stood in line for about 2 hours at Kings Cross station for this photo. It. Was. Awful. Such a terrible experience, that I will never do again.
But most importantly it was Claire’s 8th birthday. We spent the day at the Science Museum and she got to blow out some birthday candles with hydrogen. It was an experiment showing that fire doesn't have oxygen in an explosion, and will go out. Science is kind of a show-off.
Then we had a proper afternoon tea and she got her chocolate. What a party! What a city! What a girl!
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