We woke up at 9am. There's nothing like 12 hours of sleep! Brian went out to check out breakfast right away,there's no getting between him and his tummy! Turned out it's really nice. Breads, cereals, eggs, cheese and fruit. Works for me.
Off we went to catch the sightseeing bus. No problems with the tube this time, unfortunately, I can't say the same for the batteries. I'd bought a set of 8 rechargeable batteries and charged them just before we left. After less than 10 photos, the low battery light came on. Not good. Switched to a new set and the same thing. So we saw lots on the tour, but I don't have many photos at all. We did stop at one point and pick up one set of regular batteries at horribly inflated prices (3 pounds = 6 US dollars = 2 AA batteries!). Unfortunately, there're not a lot of places open on a Sunday morning to pick up cheap batteries at! We had a really nice time and saw loads. The weather was beautiful and clear. The tour finished off at Picadilly Circus, where we found a Boots that was open and picked up loads of cheap batteries. So we will have photos from the rest of the trip afterall!
Lunch was at the Sherlock Holmes pub for Brian. It was fun, and the food was good. Brian bought a pub glass there that I hope makes it through the whole trip. We then walked down to the Embankment for the boat tour that was included in the bus tour. While waiting for the boat, we checked out the Egyptian Obelisk, which was really cool, and the statues in the area. Took a cute photo of Brian on the waterstairs. Finally found an actual Diet Pepsi (my one addiction) at the little souvenir stand near the boat tour. The lady who owns it brings it in from France!
The boat tour runs all the way out to Greenwich and back, and was really fun. I'm glad we did it. It certainly gives a different view of London than what you see on the normal 'tourist' bus. Took loads of photos, including the pub where Dickens lived while he wrote two novels. It's now called "The Grapes".
Got off the boat tour at the London Eye hoping the lines wouldn't be too long. They were HUGE! I think we'll probably pay for the fast track tickets tomorrow to skip them, it was just nuts! We walked back to the other side of the river along the foot bridge there, but it wasn't the Millennium Bridge which had the vibration problems when it first opened. Grabbed another Diet Pepsi and took the tube back to the hotel for a fairly early night.
Got back to find the M&S store was closed (dinner plan #1). The local pub we'd found was PACKED (dinner plan #2). You couldn't really get in the door. The Tesco Express down the road was also closed (dinner plan #3). We ended up having dinner at a Pizza Hut! At that point we were just tired and hungry. It was actually really good, and I wish they had the same pizza crust here in the US as we had there! Brought home the leftovers to snack on later.
Had another long soaking bath, followed it up with the TENS unit and went to bed. Both of us have sore knees and calves!
Total miles walked: 15 Not bad for having done a boat and a bus tour!
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