Day Thirteen - Jun 24, 2014

London, ENG to Caledonia Sleeper

High Point: Completing Theresa's National Gallery checklist like bosses

Low Point: Leaving friends

Miles By Foot: 5

Miles By Train: 20

Today's Antiquities: Van Gogh's Sunflowers

Today's Weather: Overcast, in the low 70's

Tonight's Lodging: The Caledonia Sleeper

Touristic Events: Natural History Museum, National Gallery, Hyde Park, Piccadilly Circus

Travel Tip: Make sure the museum you are in a line for doesn't have a second entrance with nobody at it

Daily Didactic

"Big Ben" day is only properly followed in our lives by "Museum Day". After the delayed waking and breakfast that even our gracious hosts are getting used to, we caught the District Line back to South Kensington and got out nearly at the entrance of the Natural History Museum. We got in the half hour queue, a little sad about our unwillingness to get out of bed. Then, in our moment of self doubt, a museum employee told those of us at the end of the line that there was an entrance around the corner with no line at all. Moments later we were walking through the somewhat strange side entrance and peering at an escalator heading into a glowing, pulsing earth orb with loud 50's sci-fi music. The museum was fun with lots of earth sciences, but didn't really hit its stride until the dinosaurs showed up. From there it excelled. We eventually made our way on up Brompton Road, through the edge of Hyde Park, and up Piccadilly Road to the "Circus" of the same name. Brian had imagine more of Piccadilly Circus, which turns out to be kind of a smallish busy intersection area with a large video wall in one corner. Maybe it's bigger at night. A short walk took us back to Trafalgar Square for a visit to the National Museum. Theresa had a "short list" of a dozen "must sees", which we set about ticking off. An hour and a half later, completely successful, we worked out way back through the "tubes" to Kew, hit the pub for a pint, and had a wonderful last dinner with our hosts. At 9:00ish we hit the tubes back to Euston Station, for a 11:20 boarding of the Caledonia Sleeper for a very civilized night ride to Edinburgh.