Gwilliam Gazette : Brit Isle

Well, we were off to Europe for a 12 day British Isles cruise. Somehow, in the past 12 months, this will be the 5th cruise, with 3 being in Europe. The points hobby has really paid off.

We left Salt Lake City and headed to London where we spent a few days before heading to the ship.

For me, I needed a history lesson to understand a little of the British Isles. First of course, is London, England which is where the monarchy King/Queen live and rule from. The United Kingdom then, is used when describing the four countries that England owns and rules which is England, Scotland, Wales, and part of Ireland - the northern part only. The southern part of Ireland remains an independent country. Basically, after World War 1, Ireland was split into Protestants and Catholics, who didn't like each other. England ruled all of Ireland since, well almost forever. The northern part of Ireland soon became where most of the Protestants live (even today) and the Catholics live in the southern part.

There was a civil war of sorts between the two sides and the southern part eventually declared their independence and pulled away from England. The northern part remained, and still is, governed by England and the monarchy. As you drive around today, you see different areas and neighborhoods with flags that determine if they are Protestant or Catholic neighborhoods and there is still tension between the two. The northern part of Ireland would like to become independent and join the southern, but England won't let them go.

Each of the countries in the United Kingdom have palaces and royal houses where the royal family stays when they come to visit that country as a reminder of who is in charge and who is their King/Queen. The royals are very much aware of tradition and keep up the fancy traditions like the changing of the guard, the horse police, the grand palaces and buildings as a reminder also of who has the power. Beautiful and huge parks are everywhere which are presented by the "crown" to give back to the people and keep them happy.

It's very interesting to see how many public spaces have the crown symbol and realizing how much control they royal family has. The current King/Queen situation seems to be political and controversial. When we visited other counties part of the United Kingdom, but not England, (Scotland and Wales), the people there did not have nice things to say about England or the King/Queen. They made it very clear that since they were not in England, they could let their feelings be known and they were not shy about it. One of our tour guides lives in England, but our tour was in Scotland and she said she doesn't feel comfortable saying what she did in England, but very comfortable saying it in Scotland. Other tour guides were the same.

Political or not however, all the places we visited were beautiful, historical and amazing.

11 hours later, we arrived! The first thing we noticed was how BUSY London was! It's a big city and so much traffic and lots of people

We checked in to our hotel, Hyatt Regency Churchill

We had a special treat waiting for us in the room

About half the traffic are these busses and they are well used, and go everywhere and the lanes are very narrow

We walked through Hyde Park, which is London's version of New York's Central Park. It's a HUGE park and guess who owns it - the Royal Family. The people of London use their parks! We were surprised how many people were out and about in the park just enjoying the day

In the city, these telephone booths are everywhere. Notice the crown logo on the top - guess who owns and provides these for the people?

Big Ben was pretty big...and shiny...and gold....

I had to wait a while to get this photo of the House of Parliament when there was no traffic in front

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Of course, the tik-tockers were out in force

So I had to try it too............

We walked past this wall with so many hearts.......

And then saw it was the Covid wall. Every heart was someone in the UK that died from Covid

It was pretty early in the day when we walked by this special Instagram telephone booth and the line was just getting started. You stand next to the booth, pretend to take a call or pose and Big Ben is in the background. We passed this spot later in the day and the line was even longer

The back of the line...NO we did not wait!

We took a walking tour on the day of the changing of the guard, as they only do it 4 times a week - and it's all for show, but what a show it is. Thousands of people wait in line to watch it at Buckingham Palace but only those in the front can actually see anything. Well our tour guide took us to the place there the guards and band end. From this pretty low key building called St James's Palace. It is the oldest palace in England. The royal family still uses the palace, staying here at times, it's also where a new King/Queen is selected upon the death of a previous King/Queen. St James's Palace was built in the 1530's.
So when the changing of the guard ceremony is conducted, there is a full band, horses, soldiers, everything. It starts at Buckingham Palace and proceeds past and down the street and ends up here!
Our tour guide took us here about 20 mins early and said do not move, do not step off the curb, don't worry about all those people over there across the street......they won't be there long.

We had 5 people in our tour and were one of the first here at this spot. We were right on the curb. Within 15 minutes, it looked like this and we had a clear view right across the street. Soon, armed guards came out of the building and made everyone in front of the building, in the street, on the other sidewalk all move away.
Later, horses came down the street about 2 feet from us making sure nobody was stepping off the curb. If we put our feet in the road, another police guard would very sternly, tell you to get back on the sidewalk. One tourist riding her bike through was not paying attention and the armed guard ran out in the street, right in front of her, put his arms out, and stopped her and made her turn around and get off the street. They weren't kidding around.

Suddenly it was empty. See the guard on the far left? He wouldn't let any step off the sidewalk where we were or be anywhere on the sidewalk to down from him

Then this happened....

We were literally 3 feet away

VIDEO:

It was AMAZING!

Our walking tour then continued.....

This is the front of St James's Palace - you wouldn't think some of the royal family uses this place often, but they still do. Everything on this street in front of the palace, was high end shops where the royal family has shopped for well, probably since the 1500's. Hats, cigars, fine clothes, wines, lots of wine stores, and all of them are still used by tourists and the royal family.

This is the oldest barbershop still being used

We then headed over to Buckingham Palace about 30-45 mins after the changing of the guard. It was still busy and full of people. We couldn't believe how many people were here to watch and we had a front row, 3 feet away!

We took a boat tour along the River Thames......

and passed under the London Bridge, which is just a normal traffic bridge. A lot of people get this bridge confused with the Tower Bridge, which is the one you see in all the shows. Nobody shows the real London Bridge in shows

You have to "tap to pay" to use the restroom!

We walked by the Tower of London (owned by the royal family) which was used as a secure fortress (the Crown Jewels are still housed here), a prison and a palace. We will take a tour of it after the cruise

This large bronze sculpture was very interesting. It's a horses head drinking water, meant to bring calm and peace to a busy city

The morning of getting on the ship, we walked through the Queen's Park, which was immaculate. We were there early in the morning and it was quiet and peaceful

We then took a train to the port, which was out a ways....and made it to the Regal Princess.

Instead of a cruise card to carry around to use to get in your room, make purchases and identify you, Princess gives you a "medallion" to wear. As you approach your room, the door unlocks and is open by the time you get to your room. It was a pretty handy little feature!

OUR COZY ROOM:

Another thing the medallion did, was track where you were. We could also find others we were with using their app. There are large video screens in each hallway by the elevators, that normally showed a map of the ship, what was going on at the time and a daily planner. Well, we walked by one and it did this!!!!! It was our anniversary and as we walked by, I was very surprised to see this. It did this a few times on other screens around the ship as we were near them.