Two days in one?!

You know when you have such a busy day, you fill the entire morning with amazing things and experiences, sit down for a long meal, then proceed to fill the rest of the day with so many more amazing things and experiences that you forget that the morning was actually part of the same day? Today was one of those days: as we sat eating delicious hand-pulled Biang Biang noodles at the restaurant around the corner from our apartment, I reminisced on the art we saw at the British Museum, and then had the sudden realization that this was all the same day. Now if you think that experiencing double the fun in one day is something, try to image having to recount it all! I'll give it my best shot - here we go:

After a decidedly English breakfast(that's right, I bought crumpets and scones at the grocery store!), we hopped on the tube to the British Museum, where Rick Steves was waiting with a great tour for us to follow. Of course, Rick Steves wasn't actually waiting for us, we just followed his great audio tour through the many, many halls of the many galleries of the museum. It's good to have someone to point us in the right direction of the most interesting galleries - this museum has 80,000 pieces just on display at any one time, and if we were to spend only 30 seconds per piece, we'd be here for almost 28 days! Thank you Rick Steves for condensing it into only a few hours instead! Plus, did I mention the museum is free to visit?

Like any good museum dealing with the history of civilization, this one covers all the main players: There are entire wings dedicated to the Egyptian and Greek empires, but we find the Assyrian galleries particularly interesting as their culture is one we have not had the pleasure of learning about during our past travels. We saw an entire library's worth of cuneiform tablets, dealing with everything from orders from the king, all the way down to recipes for making red glass(with forged dates!) are recorded here, and the entire catalogue is even digitally scanned and available for perusing. 

Speaking of tablets, one of the main draws at the British Museum is the Rosetta Stone, a giant fragment of a stellae that was the key to deciphering Egyptian Hieroglyphs, as it contains portions text transcribed in Greek, Hieroglyphs and Demotic, an ancient Egyptian language that was almost exclusively written. I remember having seen it on that trip back in high school, one of the memories that seems to have stuck with me, and so being able to get a better look at the stone, appreciate the intricacy of the carvings and the importance it has on our understanding of Egyptian history, was a great moment. And it was the same for apparently everyone else at the museum today, given the people crowding around the glass encasing the stone!
Other highlights of the museum, since there is just too much to talk about all of it: The hall of marbles from the Pantheon, stolen from Greece and likely never to be returned, the great court in the centre of the museum with its magnificent glass ceiling and central reading room which made for gorgeous architectural photographs, the roman and north African mosaic floorings that were so overlooked by everyone else, given their location in the outer stairwells, but were just as impressive to us. And a special mention goes to the food truck outside the front entrance, where the delicious cappuccinos and triple chocolate muffins were energizing enough to get us through the second half of our museum visit. When the museum is free, you realize you can come and go as many times as you want, so we took advantage of that fact to have a brief intermission and not overdose on the art.

The glass ceiling of the Great Court	Roman floor mosaics
Assyrian "Gatekeepers"	The Pantheon Gallery

Once we had had our fill of all the wonders of the museum, we crossed the street to a little tearoom hidden away in the basement of a bookstore, the Tea & Tattle, for a delicious(a rather filling!) afternoon tea. Actually, I had spotted this place while doing research for the trip, and it had always been part of my plans for the day when visiting the British Museum. So when we walked up to the door and were presented with a sign stating "reservations only", I was disappointed. As we stood outside, trying to figure out a plan B, two women entered, likely to make reservations themselves, and upon exiting, mentioned quite casually that there were still a couple of tables left! And so Mario and I ventured inside, and to our delight, there was still place!

Along with teacups filled with brewed loose leaf tea, we ate bites of scone smothered in clotted cream and strawberry-black pepper jam, sandwiches of roast beef and horseradish or cucumber and cream cheese with chives, and perhaps one too many pieces of cake. Honestly, it was maybe a little too much for an afternoon tea, as we both rolled ourselves up out of the basement and back onto the streets of London to walk it all off!

Our evening's entertainment(because by this time, it was evening!) consisted of following another of the wonderful Rick Steves audio guides, this time walking about the City of London and learning all about the history of the rebuilding after the Great Fire of 1666. In true London style, we donned our raincoats and cozied up under an umbrella as the grey skies above us began to dispense their contents on the buildings below. As the rain fell, we wandered along Fleet Street, past the Royal Courts of Justice, stopping in at the 300-year-old tiny Twinning's Tea Store just to inhale the intoxicating aroma. We ventured off the main and down narrow laneways into hidden courtyards, discovering arcades and churches and little parks containing fountains and benches and statues of cats. We relished in their closeness to the noise of the big streets, while still remaining hidden from view, and thanked Rick Steves for leading us into these unknown corners of London.

The Royal Courts of Justice	Twinning's Tea Shop

As dusk fell, and the street lights turned on, some still running on gas, we were treated to an especially magical scene. The light rain on the cobbles and stones on the sidewalks were reflecting the light everywhere, and suddenly everything became that much more beautiful to discover. Down the end of Fleet street, now Ludgate Hill, stood majestic St. Paul's Cathedral, and an exact duplicate on the roadway below it. Alongside, Temple Bar Gate glowed yellow in the darkening light as we passed underneath to Paternostre Square and beyond. We moved onto Cheapside, though only in name, as the street itself was lined with some of the most posh boutiques I know. And in the distance, we could spot the top of the monument to the Great Fire, standing 202 metres tall, just above the top of the surrounding building, as we walked out onto London Bridge to take a look at the Thames in the dark of night, grey of the rain, and lights of the city. One of the more uninteresting bridges to look at, it at least offered good views of the Shard, a pointy tall skyscraper across the river from us, and the Tower Bridge, lit up in a rather regal purple tonight, likely in honour of the Queen.

View from our neighbourhood	Tower Bridge and the HMS Belfast
The "Walkie-Talkie"	Reflections of St. Paul's Cathedral

It was still raining as we headed underground to board the Tube back to Aldgate East, where we finally succumbed to the appetizing scents coming from Biang Biang, the noodle place around the corner from our accommodation, which we had be walking past every night we've been here. The service was fast, the price cheap, and the food was absolutely delicious. It certainly did not let us down. Now the question is, how will we possible convince ourselves to eat anywhere else this trip?!