The End to my Weekend in London

Goodbye dearest London, for alas, I must leave thee for a week. Tomorrow we have midterms and a show, then Wednesday through Friday we go to Stratford-upon-Avon and then Saturday through Monday it's Dublin. Busy week, eh? So today was spent getting ready for midterms and the trips. This evening, after dinner, I decided that I was sick of sitting inside and I wanted to enjoy the gorgeous day, so I went for a walk. I kinda wandered the direction of Buckingham Palace and this is what I found.

The Westminster Bridge + Parliament Building + Big Ben + Thames River + little bit o' Westminster Abby + sunset = amazing photo:
Continuing on to check out the Abby's opening hours (for those not fluent in English, that's "hours of operation" in American):
Then I found myself in St. James Park. It is beautiful.
I decided to wander the long way around the park to get to Buckingham Palace, as I saw there was a fountain on the map, and I was in no hurry. In walking around the park, I found this little house thing. It's just labelled as "Private Property" so I've decided that fairies live there. It's seriously gotta be a 4 foot door and 8 feet to the roof. And there's a cool garden in front of a little cottage in the middle of the park. So obviously that means fairies.
In continuing to walk around I found an exotic garden (all the plants are labelled):
And some "wild" life.

Then I found the fountain! It was beautiful. And If you look at the shiny rainbow in the background, that's the London Eye. That's approximately where the University is, just to show you how far my walk took me (probably half an hour away, if you walk directly) At this point in my journey I thought, "Hmm. I could really do for a cup of tea right now. That would really put me in the relaxing mood." And suddenly, an Inn appeared in front of me! I took that as a sign that I needed to get a cup of tea, so I went in and got some. I was right, a cup of tea was exactly what I needed.

After the detour through the park (that was actually the most direct route) I found Buckingham Palace. It actually looks cooler in the picture than in real life.

And this is some statue thingy out front. If I had my map on me I'd be able to tell you what it is, but that would involve climbing 4 flights of awful stairs, so just admire it and move on.

To get back I figured I'd take the Tube. To get back to the station I had to go back through (or at least past, so why not through?) the park. So I did. And I had the need to take off my shoes and walk barefoot in the grass. So I did. And I was right- exactly what I needed. I came back to campus relaxed and ready to study.

And thus was my last adventure in London for the week. Hopefully I will have time to write one more post tomorrow before we leave on Wednesday, and hopefully I will be able to update on Friday as well. There will certainly be enough to talk about.