Mummy says that if you're walking down Cheapside, you must stop at St. Paul's. I think she's right!
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| This is us just before we got on the train, and then me and Mummy on the train in our Christmas jumpers! |
Yesterday, we took the train down to London again. We visited
St. Paul's Cathedral, which was really cool. We didn't spend a whole lot of time in the main part of the cathedral, cause Mummy and Daddy had been there before. But we did climb up to the top of the dome!
To get up to the Whispering Gallery, you have to climb 257 steps. Whew--that was a lot of steps! Luckily, Daddy carried me in the tummy pack, so it wasn't any work for me! The Whispering Gallery is really cool. They call it a Whispering Gallery because you can hear someone whispering from the opposite side the dome, no matter how big it is! In St. Paul's, the Whispering Gallery is huge and decorated with beautiful gold mosaics. I wish we could have taken pictures inside.
After the Whispering Gallery, we climbed up 119 more steps to the Stone Gallery. This is outside of the building, right at the base of the dome. I loved that part! The wind was blowing my hair all over the place, and we could see all of London from up there! It was also fun to look up at the dome. Did you know, that when Sir Christopher Wren first presented his idea of the design for St. Paul's in 1673 they told him he couldn't do a dome? So, he built things around the middle of the building while men were working on it, and built it in secret! Then when they were all done, there was nothing they could do!
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| Here we are on the Stone Gallery. Whew so windy, but so much fun! Can you spot the London Eye? |
Mummy says a lot of people won't believe that, so I need to tell you where I learned that (she says that's called "citing your sources"). It's from a letter that Christopher Wren's son wrote. I think that is really cool, though.
Anyway, after the stone gallery, we climbed 152 more steps to the Golden Gallery, which is at the very top of the dome! I was amazed at everything we could see from there. We saw the London Eye, The Globe Theatre, the Houses of Parliament, the Gherkin, The Shard---lots of things! London is really a HUGE city.
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| On the Golden Gallery at the top. Do you see the London Eye again? |
After we went to the tip top of St. Paul's (528 steps in all!), we went down to the very bottom: the crypt. They bury people in the crypt! I thought it was going to be creepy, but it wasn't--it was actually very beautiful. There are some very famous people buried in St. Paul's Crypt. Their graves in St. Paul's are really big and fancy. There were two that Mummy and Daddy told me about:
1. Lord Admiral Horatio Nelson
2. The Duke of Wellington
Do you know how they are? Well, Lord Nelson was the man that beat the French and Spanish Navies at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. He was injured in the battle, but kept on fighting--until he died in the middle of the battle. Mummy said that he is a great hero in England. Mostly, I think he's cool because he only had one arm and he was still fighting!
The Duke of Wellington is also a special guy--he defeated Napoleon! He is another important British Hero, that Mummy says I better not ever forget (I won't!). ***
After the Crypt, we bought some souvenirs, then headed out the door to the Museum of London!
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| The Lamp in the Victorian town. |
The
Museum of London is seriously just down the street from St. Paul's. It is seriously an amazing museum! It tells you all about the history of London, the city, from before humans lived there, until today. I asked Mummy and Daddy what their favorite parts were:
1. Daddy: His favorite part was seeing a
Roman Eagle that was recently discovered in London, in September actually! A lot of people say it is one of the best pieces of Roman art ever found--it's in almost perfect condition. (I wish we had a picture of it, but you can see it and read about it in the article I posted on here)
2. Mummy: Her favorite part was walking through the Victorian Street. The Museum set up a part to look just like a city would during Victorian Times! They had all different kinds of shops, a pump for water (that told you all about the gross things that were in it! EW!), and they also had a real lamp from that time. It was really cool.
3. Me: My favorite part was definitely the model of London's streets. They had a bus, a taxi, and a horse drawn carriage that you could drive along, and underneath they had a tube! It was so cool. I played with it for quite a while before Mummy and Daddy said it was time to go. Oh! And I also really enjoyed listening to the stories of people who lived in London during the Blitz, when the Nazis were bombing it. They had a big room where you could go and sit and watch a video, see pictures, and listen to the people tell what it was like.
By the way--another funny thing they had in the Victorian City part (Mummy's favorite part) was a urinal from the Victorian Times. Daddy explained what a urinal is to me.....huh.
So the Museum of London is definitely on our list of "best places in London." A lot of people don't go there, because it's not very well known outside of London. I Loved it!!
Anyway, after that, we went over to Harrods to see the lights and their Christmas windows. It was so crowded! We didn't stay very long before Mummy and Daddy decided we should go home. Which was good, because I was exhausted!!
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| Harrods all lit up for Christmas |
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| Here we are on the Tube on our way home. |
***Mummy's note: We didn't get many pictures of us outside of St. Paul's, because it was getting dark by the time we left the Cathedral (it's pitch black outside by 4:30 p.m now) and we wanted to get to the Museum. Daddy promised me that we would go back and get photos outside of the Cathedral another time---we better!!!
