Castles to Cruises to Cheese

For the fifth and sixth days of my half-term break. My family and I visited Windsor Castle, took a River City Cruise on the Thames River, and toured Tower Bridge.

Ready to explore the castle!

On November first, we visited Windsor Castle. Finding our way to Windsor was a mighty

challenge. Ironically, it was quite close. The castle was actually so much larger than I expected it to be. I know it was a castle, but they really are so much bigger outside fairytale books. Besides being a bit chilly, we had beautiful weather that day and  were able to capture some really awesome pictures. The Castle was the most unique experience. We walked on the cobblestone paths and into the state apartments which are the intricately designed yet incredibly grand rooms such as the King and Queens reception rooms, and the dinning room. They were so ornate and beautiful. We even saw the dolls house, an enormous dolls house complete with a jewels room (made with real miniature jewels). We arrived home early after the castle, but the family and I really needed it. It was already a long week!

On the next day of half term, we went on a River City Cruise and toured Tower Bridge. My friend Matt met up with my family and I in Central London that day. The river cruise was nice. We went early and had the afternoon sun on us during the thirty-minute ride. We were able to get unobstructed views of a lot of the major architectures of London, and we even had a speaker guide us through the history and significance of many of the landmarks. The boat dropped us very near to the tower bridge entrance, so we went up and toured the beautiful bridge that day as well. Kristi, Matt, and I decided to take the stairs instead of the lift and it was a great workout getting to the top of the bridge. The bridge exhibition showed a lot of photographs of famous bridges. This was cool for a few photographs, but it got boring pretty quickly actually. The best part of this was the view. It was slightly obstructed by the beams of the bridge structure, but, if angled correctly, we could get some nice panoramic pictures of Central London. My favorite part of the tower bridge exhibition was seeing the steam engine at the end of the tour. I can't recall ever seeing a steam engine as large as that (to lift the drawbridge).

Matt, Kristi, My dad, and I happy to go on a cruise! A river cruise anyway.

The view of Tower Bridge from the Thames

After we did our bit of touristing in Central London, Kristi, Matt and I went back to Kingston so I could take me sister out and show her a bit of how I spend my weekends in Kingston. We went to the club Hippodrome. It was Big Cheese night, which means the DJ plays a lot of classic favorites and he even takes requests. My sister and I jammed to Barbie Girl, The Spice Girls, McFly, and a lot more great music.