Europe trip cont'd - London Calling

No, we did not go to London for the Olympic games, but we were able to see something that has not happened in many a person's lifetime.  We had originally planned a couple routes to see the city, but those were all thrown out after we were informed of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee!  As crazy as it seems, we came to London the night before the riverboat pageant and royal picnic lunch.  We made out way through down, on a double decker bus of course, towards Picadilly Street to see all the action.

 London was all decked out the morning of the Jubilee.  We had never been to London before, but this trip alone made it a very attractive second trip prospect.

These were the picnic tables that were setup for the royal lunch.  There were hundreds of chairs along what seemed like a mile long table.  People came with their kids and packed lunches for this once in a lifetime opportunity.

 

I know you can't see who it is, but Charles, his royal highness the Prince of Whales, and his wife Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, joined us for lunch!  As you can see, it was pretty unexpected because there weren't many people around when they came around the corner.  He should be in the picture somewhere.

 

After Prince Charles made his way down the long line of tables, everyone joined in singing the national anthem, "God Save the Queen."  You may have heard it sang at the olympic medal ceremonies.  Singing it live, with all these Brittish folks was very moving.  All these people who attended the lunch had a very strong sense of patriotism.

 Here is a picture of that lovely hamburger.  Again, the meat came from Prince Charles's royal herd.  It was simple with lettuce, pickle, tomato, onion, cheese and a chutney sauce from Fortnum and Mason.  Again, it was delicious!

 Here is the Fortnum and Mason department store.  After the lunch, it was teeming with people. They had a wide array of chocolates and pastries on the first floor.  This kept our attention for quite a while!  We ended up buying a bottle of the famous chutney that we had just sampled on the royal hamburger.  We couldn't help ourselves!

 

You can see how many people are crowding the streets.  It was very difficult to get anywhere.  Once you decided which way to go in order to find a spot by the river, you had to stick with it.  There was no turning back.  This picture was taken about an hour before the pageant was to start.

 

It wouldn't be photo album of London without a picture of the infamous Big Ben, right!

 

Look!  The Queen is waving to us!  

 

This wonderful shot illustrated the amount of boats and people on the river.  The London Eye in the background would have had some awe-inspiring views for sure.  

 

There is a brass band on this boat.  They are playing "Oh Brittania." This little boat was probably the biggest highlight of the pageant.  We weren't sure exactly what was going on as we heard the band playing, but soon, everybody, and I mean everybody, joined in an sang the chorus.  The whole crowd shocked us as they all joined in singing this fun little song.  Yes, seeing the Queen was a once in a lifetime event, but this was the funnest.

 

Here are some more boats.  They had flags from many, many different countries.  It would have been fun to grab a kayak and join in like some folks did, but the course was something like 13 miles.  That's way too far for me.

 

After the royal picnic luncheon and the river pageant, we headed down to Harrod's to ogle over this amazing department store.  Unfortunately, it closed 20 minutes before we arrived.  We were really bummed that we couldn't  go inside.  We had heard so much about it.  Oh well.  Lyndee says that we will just have to plan another trip back to London so we can see it.  Ryan didn't argue with that.

 

The trip wouldn't be complete without the Ferrari picture of the day.  Ryan was a little obsessed with them, but I took the picture for him anyway.