DAY 4- London

Well we lasted until 8pm last night before eyelids kept falling down on their own like we had been anaesthetised ! (the 2 beers probably didnt help) so we crashed and woke once at the usual 3am, but a really good sleep last night overall. Check out the photo of the view out of our bedroom window at dawn this morning- the rows of chimney pots are great! (Broke out in a sweat twice in the night it was so warm too!)

We got up and walked around to the hotel for the lovely breakfast and had a call from Dad and Danni which was great- long gone are the days when there was a huge lag on the line between the countries, which would see you talking over each other- it sounded like they were just down the road! Dad, you sounded like you would be happy to be here right now and we know Danni would too!!

Walked just up the road to Victoria coach station to suss it out for our bus ride to Birmingham tomorrow. Looks easy enough. It is really noticeable tho how many public service front people are either terribly disinterested or just plain rude- bus drivers, check out operators etc. Some seem very, very impatient with the general public and are quite arrogant to a lot of the customers- think they should change their jobs in this case- being in the hub of London with so many tourists!! Never mind, dont have to live with it.

We went to the imperial war museum this morning and decided to walk there. Doing this we have seen so much more of the back streets of London and we are happy to walk fairly long distances, just seeing the 'real London'. On the way we passed the Westminster Cathedral and went in. What a fantastic church it is- free to go into and at least on a par with St Pauls we both felt, which was about 20 pounds for us to enter. The cathedral reminded me of the huge ones in Istanbul, beautiful and elaborate. Managed to get photos again (no flash used!)

Spent a good couple of hours or more at the war museum after the cathedral, looking at displays on all the wars. Note the pic enclosed of Graeme standing next to a copy of the first atomic bomb 'little boy'- amazing something so small could cause such devastation.

Was a really good museum if not a stark reminder (we both left the halocaust display as the photos were so painful to look at). There was a lovely big park next door with huge old trees in it that we sat in afterwards in the sun.

We caught a bus back to Oxford St and wandered around with thousands of others, looking at the shops. Check out some of the shoes on sale in the pic today- wild!

Wanted the loo and after standing in a 15 min queue to get into a disgusting airless Mc Donalds one, I left and we went to a pub. Graeme felt he could buy a beer so I could use a clean loo (!) Such consideration lol!! But at the cost of $14 for a bottle of Sol, he said he will be getting whatever is on tap from now on!

We bused back to Victoria station as we were shattered again! still not quite over the jetlag/time change. Went to my beloved marks and spencers and bought a salad for me and 3 pizzas that came together for dinner-for him. Graeme has managed 1 1/2 of them on his own!! Not sure where he is putting it all??

A tidy up tonight and then off to stay with our friends Matt and Michelle in Worcester for a couple of days from tomorrow and to meet their new addition since our last visit- Jack, then back to London for a couple of nights.