First, I am not doing too hot with the whole maintaining a blog and living in a blissful, Cloud 9 state with the long lost hubby thing. I imagine once we get settled back into a normal routine (or when he goes back to work after leave, wahhhh) things will smooth out and this little blog won't be neglected anymore.
The past two weeks have been full of traveling (England! Scotland!), kisses upon kisses, and not really living in the real world. And I have treasured every last second of it.
A week after Zack came home, we packed up our suitcases (I've pretty much become a professional packer...I am that good.) and flew on over to Ol' Blighty.
I am not sure what can be said of London that hasn't already been said a thousand times over, but it really was an amazing city. I had a pretty extensive list of things I wanted to see & do while there, and we only got through half the list in four days. There is just so much there. History, beautiful things, interesting things, gorgeous accents, any type of food you could want, the Queen, lovely buildings...just, everything. Plus, I got to demonstrate to Zack that I can straight murder Kanye's rap in "American Boy." I think I obnoxiously sang, "JUST TOUCHED DOWN IN LONDON TOWN" at least 12 times that weekend.
We got in on Thursday morning, and after spending a good chunk of the day trying to find the hotel Jamie booked (for the record, Milford Road is not the same thing as Milford Street...I kind of got the feeling we were in the wrong area when I saw Maseratis casually parked on the street), we finally reached our hotel and took a quick nap. For dinner that night, we ate at a traditional little pub and had delicious pies. Mine was Guinness & steak with the most incredible phyllo mound topping. I washed it down a few pints of some English beer, which was slightly disappointing. I swear, German (and Belgian!) beer ruins you for life. It's so delicious, and strong, that anything else seems sub-par.
The next day, Jamie had to go to a Zumba conference, so Zack & I explored London with Nick. We took a walking tour, which was excellent, and saw lots of the important stuff. Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, and the Houses of Parliament. Although I'm sort of an undercover nerd about history, I learned loads on the tour, and would definitely recommend it to anyone visiting London. After the tour, we played around in Piccadilly and I got to obnoxiously sing that One Republic song, "WOKE UP IN LONDON YESTERDAY, FOUND MYSELF IN THE CITY, NEAR PICCADILLY.." (I annoy even myself at times.) I finally got my beloved fish n' chips for lunch that day, and mushy peas which I am undecided on. That night, we went on a pub crawl which is always so hit or miss in my opinion. I have been on some incredible ones (Amsterdam) and some downright sucky ones (Munich.) I feel like pub crawls are great if you're traveling alone or with a group of your boys or girls, but when you're married and with another couple, you really don't need it. I'm certain we could have had just as much fun finding bars on our own, and saved £15. We skipped out on the crawl early for two reasons. The Tube stops running at 12:30 and I was in no mood to figure out how the night buses worked, and we could smell Burger King while in line for a club. (The latter was reason enough for me to duck out prematurely.)
On Saturday we caught the last bit of the changing of the guards at the Palace, which was an absolute mad house. It was late February, hardly tourist season, yet the crowds were a little ridiculous. I shudder at the thought of what it's like in the summer months. We also went to the Tower of London, Tower Bridge, the London Bridge (naturally, I sang Fergie, would you really expect anything less?), the London Eye, and Tate Modern. At the recommendation of a friend, we ate lunch at the Borough Market which was incredible. It was packed full of people, mouth-watering smells, and just so much to look at. I definitely want to go back and explore on an empty stomach.
Our flight home was not until Sunday evening, so we had almost the entire day to try to cram in more sight-seeing. Zack & I paid £19 a piece to get into the Tower of London, which I'm not sure was worth it. I was expecting more grisly, horrific stories about torture and death (I will readily admit to how weird I am), but all I really got from it was a funny picture of a raven, some stories I think I learned in Goosebumps A Night in Terror Tower, and an absurd striking of jealousy upon looking at my diamond ring beside the Crown Jewels. But the guided tour by a Beefeater was pretty neat.
(Fun facts: 1) Zack's English accent is absolute rubbish, mine is brilliant. 2) While in London, Zack developed a downright bizarre obsession with Queen Elizabeth. He is currently reading a disturbingly thick book on her.)
In all, London did not disappoint. It was every bit as wonderful as I'd dreamed it would be, although the company could have had something to do with that.
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