London again

I also went to the Winston Churchill and War Rooms Museum one day.  It is the secret underground facility where Britain held its strategic command center throughout the war.  Along the way I came across a massive crowd and the changing of the mounted guard within the complex of governmental buildings near Big Ben.

The museum was extremely well done and worth the visit.  I particularly enjoyed finding out more about Churchill's life apart from his rousing speeches and cigar habit, which was about the extent of my knowledge before visiting the museum.

Churchill was a big fan of writing history, and even got a Nobel prize for it:

He also had a really long career.  This painting was all of the different "Winston Churchills" wishing him a happy 200th birthday.  It shows his army days, wartime days, artistic days, etc.

The museum also included an interactive timeline of Churchill's life during wartime, which included artifacts from 20 years of political activity.  It was interesting reading the letters he was sending and receiving from different world leaders as well as people within his own government.

The other part of the museum was the War Rooms, which included a great audio guide explaining every little detail of events.  I thought the map room was the most interesting, because it was how the British kept track of all of the fronts of the war as well as their troops.

It also included information from the time when Germany almost overran the UK.  Here is a list where the British tried to keep track of violations of their airspace as well as casualties from V2s.

They kept all of the rooms preserved from wartime and even included some wax Brits to help our imaginations out:

The War Rooms were completely secret and had a staff that spent almost everyday of their lives underground.  Here is Churchill's room, which was the biggest by far.


And, they had a poster store at the end.  This one was made before feminism:

After the museum I met up with Russell for one last 12 mile stroll through London:

I bet whoever did the Bearing Calculations was very nervous and mad at the architect.

Not the best picture, but the london skyline is a nice mix of old and new.

Russell stopped for lunch at "the Monger" or something, which was a giant food flea market.  We ate samples for lunch.  My favorite was Nordic smoked salmon because the fish-monger was nice enough to really explain a lot about the smoking process and how to pick the right cut of meet from a salmon.

You said this is.. Cheese? never heard of it... do you mind if I have a piece? I may invest heavily.

We are almost certain this is not the original Shakespeare theater:

Later, we found a full size replica of the ship Sir Francis Drake used to circumnavigate the world.  I appreciated that the description explained how during his time, "Privateer" was British for "state-funded pirate".  Sir Francis Drake did a pretty good number on the Spanish back in his day.

We also visited the Tower of London castle. From the outside. It was late and we were tired.

This castle used to have a very impressive moat and the river extended all the way to one side of its walls. It also had prisoners from Norman Invasion through 1952.

And then the northern sunrise was very pretty.  Tower of London bridge: