Hello, all! Started our day by heading over to the palace to see the changing of the guard. Apparently, one should arrive there fairly early if one wishes to see anything, especially if one is a bit short. This was our view to start with:
Then a nice young American woman (or probably girl, she looked about 12) let us perch on her shoulder for a better view.
And we could actually see things! It was quite impressive and a much longer ceremony than I was previously aware of.
We lunched again in St. James's Park. Much nicer day than two days ago when we did the same! We didn't have crisps this time, but we did have some chocolate digestives to round out our meal.
Then, two young women walked by and asked if they could take a photo of us! I laughed and said of course, and then explained about our little blog and asked if we could have one with them. They were so nice and wanted one on their own camera as well. They were here on holiday from Germany, so we were a bit sad that it didn't happen tomorrow instead when our good German friend, Janine (no, not that Janine) will be here! Anyway, they said it was alright to post their photo here on the blog. Girls, if you happen to find this and read it, it was lovely meeting you today!
After that, it was time to queue for our tour at Buckingham Palace. Sherlock wanted to be sure to wear something the Queen would recognise him in.
The palace tour was beyond brilliant; even if you're someone who isn't a fan of the royal family (or perhaps even if you're someone who doesn't know if there's currently a king of England), the amount of history and art there is incredible. Sadly (but totally understandably) there is no photography allowed in the palace, but we were allowed to take photos again as soon as the tour was finished. Here we are right afterwards, on the bottom step:
And then...we splurged (who knows if we'll ever get back to London? May as well go all in!) on afternoon tea at The Ritz. It was quite fun to pretend to be well-off for an hour or so! The decor was gorgeous, the staff incredibly polite and pleasant, and the tea was unbelievably delicious (Sherlock had some special Ritz blend, while I went for the orange passion something-or-other). We felt a bit self-conscious, but we had a delightful meal, and our waiter (Envoi? Anvoy? I was too embarrassed to ask another time) was a good sport. He even allowed us a photo and told us we should send it to The Ritz!
That's it from here for today! Tomorrow we get to meet our good friend Janine (still not that one), who's flying in from Germany for the day! Plan is to get a solid night's sleep and meet up with her in the morning!
I'm posting this without proofreading as I'm so tired, my head feels like it's stuffed with cotton! Sweet dreams, lovely readers!
- JW