It seems that most of the Internet cafes are gone now due to wi-fi access at so many places in the city. Since I did not bring a laptop and have promised to share e-mail updates with family back home, we ask around and discover that the local library has Internet access and lots of computers.
So we begin our day there, and then take the Tube to Westminster Abbey which has a great audio guided tour (narrated by a dryly witty Jeremy Irons) and WAY more to see than I imagined.
(he must have grown tired of waiting in line)
Next we have lunch in the crypt at St. Martin-in-the-Fields
where people are simply dying to get in (crypt humor)!
I have now decided that it's time to locate souvenirs for family members, so we walk for what seems like endless miles to find the elusive London Hard Rock cafe (which no locals seem to know or care about), Beatles t-shirts (even though we are nowhere near Liverpool) and London trinkets.
Eventually, with feet swelling and aching (still not right from the long plane ride and lots of walking in inappropriate shoes) we find ourselves at the infamous Harrod's department store.
(check out this fun Harrod's 360 degree video)
the unimpressive entrance belies the ostentatious excess within.
the opulent Egyptian escalator
And then we arrive at the slightly creepy memorial to Princess Diana and Dodie Fayed
In the little pyramid is a dirty wine glass and the engagement ring Dodie purchased for Diana right before they died in a car crash in 1997. Initially, my morbid mind assumed that the glass was recovered from the crash scene (the glass has brownish splatters on and in it), but as it turns out, it's supposedly Diana's used glass from their last meal together.
There is quite a crowd gathered around this memorial which is positioned at one of the escalator landings, so not much room to gawk and take photos. A couple of women are quietly weeping.
I find the whole thing strange.
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