This morning we started with touring Westminster Abbey. We took the tube to Westminster station, just a couple of stops from Victoria Station, and popped out to go to the Abbey. We had a set time for our tickets and got there in plenty of time to take a look around the site before going in. This is a very large church a BAC once again.
Once you enter the abbey you notice just how large it is and at the same time how closed in it is. The Abbey has multiple sections, each unique in their own way. There is a naive, then a pulpit, then a choir, then another pulpit, and then a smaller choir. Its like there's a church within a church here. The first naive is very large, but I noticed that there is not a ton of seating, beyond that is the choir, which for commonwealth countries have dedicated seats including Canada. Within the abby a number of past kings and queens have their tombs, these are all ornately done up, and take a lot of space some are placed beyond the choir before the main pulpit. Then there are a number of areas on either side of the naive where prominent people have tombs including some queens.
There are also prominent figures from the military, science and literature with tombs here as well, including Newton, Maxewell and Faraday on the science side and Thomas Harding, Charles Dickens, Henry James, Lewis Carol and a host of other well known British writers and poets. Along the wall of the entire Cathederal there are tombs for a large number of military men who served the British Empire from as far back as there was a British Empire.
Once we completed our tour of the Abbey it was close to lunch time so we walked around until we found a nice little pub, Fullers Pie and Ale. We wanted to try some of London's pub pies and were not disappointed with what we found here. Pies were a good size and came with chips (fries) perfect with a glass of wine for Krista and a London Pride beer for me.
Next stop on our walking tour of the town is Churchills bunkers. This is where Churchill managed the British military during WWII. Located not from the Parliament building the bunkers where Winston operated as not only the Prime Minister but also as Minister of Defence (A role that he created during the conflict so as to remove any roadblocks).
The bunkers were used for storage of documents and the such for parliament but when England declared war on Germany they were converted into a fortified bunker for the goverment and military to manage the war effort.
For six years the men and woment who worked here lived here, slept here and did not speak of what they were doing just so they could keep the location away from the Germans. The bunkers had a large map room, communications rooms, a room for the BBC to house some equipment, a power room to keep the lights on down there. Rooms for the ministers, including the prime minister as well as key officials and advisors. There was also a small room, with a telephone directly connected to the white house, so that Winston could talk directly to Roosevelt.
The tour also had a huge exhibit of Winstons history from the point where he entered into the military to his years in politics, through the second world war and into his final stint as prime minister just before he passed in 1965. The exhibit demonstated his life through time lines, displaying personal effects including all his hats, This tour took about 2 hours.
At this point it was time to head back to the hotel so we could get ready for the show tonight, we're going to the Kit Kat Club to see the Cabaret.
We got to to the Playhouse theatre on the tube, just a couple of stops from Victoria Station. We got in line and soon were allowed into the club. We were taken down stairs well within the buildings basements, past the heating and electrical infrastructure as if we were going into an underground and possibly illegal club. We were served a drink on the way into the club (theatre) and then lead to the first bar, where we were entertained by live music and some of the actors putting on a show. We were waiting to get access to the Green Bar. Once we got to the green bar we were escorted to our reserved seating where we had someone serve us with drinks and a bit of food before the show. We had about 45 minutes to enjoy some meats, cheeses and crackers with a nice cocktail.
The show was spectacular. It was not what I was expecting as I had no idea what the story of Cabaret was about, which is about a writer from Pennsylvania looking for inspiration for his next book in Europe. Landing in Berlin just before WWII he falls in love with a player at the cabaret but looking for a way to make money he starts smuggling for a friend. What he finds out is that his friend is a Nazi and that puts him off and stops smuggling, the side story is that the persion he is renting a room from is falling in love with a Jewish man.
The story is quite sad as Cliff's (the writer) relationship with Sally, the cabaret player, falls apart as Sally does not want to leave Berlin but Cliff just wants to go home, and the boarding house owner breaks the engagement to the Jewish man as she has befriended the Nazi that Cliff had smuggled for. Really everyone leave everyone, Cliff runs home Sally is left in Berlin and the Nazi party takes over Germany and the rest as we say is history.
After the show we took a walk along the Themes to parliament square to get a few pictures of Big Ben all lit up at night. We then took the tube back to the hotel to get some rest.
Tomorrow we take in the changing of the guard and the making of Harry Potter at warner brothers studio.