We started our day bright and early... Or at least that was our original plan until I refused to leave the bed until 10am. Our goal was to arrive at Tower Bridge right when it opened to miss the long lines to get in, however when we strolled up after 11 we were able to go right on up without any wait.

The very top of Tower Bridge is hollow, so you are able to freely walk between the two supporting structures. You are even able to be there when the bridge is raised and watch as ships cross underneath, however we didn't decide to stick around to see this happen.

The main attraction is the glass floor that extends about 20 feet right in the middle of the pathway. Amanda had no trouble happily walking right down the middle and giggling. I... had a slightly harder go at it, though I did manage to walk across a few times... Your body screams at you the entire time telling you that this is wrong and you should probably move some place a little safer (or was that just me???) And they say that skydiving is scary...

The second half of the tour is down in the engine rooms that allow the bridge to open and close. Here they had dolled up the engines and boilers to look very pretty with plenty of things to read. In my infinite wisdom I had decided to leave my reading glasses at home, so I've been needing to skip reading exhibits since Glasgow. Unfortunately, this means I have no idea what most of it said :(

We then walked past the Tower of London north up to Leadenhall Market. This is one of the oldest covered markets in the city, however the main draw is obviously the architecture (at least for Bogert tourists). There are plenty of shops/restaurants inside, and when we were there, tons of London business people eating and drinking after their workday (or perhaps during as it was around 2pm). All of them seemingly oblivious to the awesome structure standing all around them.  

Oh yeah, and we managed to find the entrance to the leaky cauldron (you didn't think we would miss out on a Harry Potter location did you?)

Even though we were geting tired from all our walking, we decided to go across town and quickly visit the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Not reading any of the cards really does dampen my appreciation for things, so we only briefly stopped in a few of the sections to check out the exhibits. Next time, I'm definitely going to need to bring a pair of glasses... 

We poked our head into the Raphael section, and while I don't want to seem like a Debbie Downer... I wasn't super impressed. I mean, they are huge and all... And the very hall they are in is pretty large and impressive in its own right... But the actual paintings seemed just... Ok. Perhaps I need to spend a bit more time understanding the historical context before passing final judgement or perhaps I was just a bit tired and cranky. Probably a bit of both to be fair.

The next big activity we had scheduled was our Oxford tour day trip with Warwick Castle being our first stop.

We had a stroll through the main living areas of the castle, but I found that I enjoyed the outside much more. The inside is put together more like an attraction with large mannequins posed throughout the house in various scenes. It just made the whole thing feel too contrived for my tastes.

We spent most of our remaining time wandering around outside the castle and looking at the grounds. We found a path to the very top of a big hill which let us look out across the countryside for miles.

We also found a path down to the river where we found my favorite part of this particular stop.  

You look out to see a lovely garden right next to the river that is full of lily pads. Just a short distance away is a small waterfall that pushes the water through the connected water mill. That, along with the Castle walls looming above us, was definitely my favorite part of Warwick Castle. Who would have known a bit of scenery would win me over.

Stratford upon Avon is an old medival market town as well as our second stop for the day. Following typical "Sean planning", I had no idea what was here with the exception of the house where Shakespeare was born.

Not much else to write here... The town might have been more interesting if it were the first we had seen, but unfortunately we (I) may be a bit jaded having seen so many.

Oxford was our final stop and the one I was the most looking forward to. Here we were planning on going to the Bodelain Library and possibly Christ Church where they had filmed scenes from Harry Potter. Upon getting closer to Oxford the traffic had made other plans... By the time we had reached our drop off point we were out of luck to see Christ Church as it had closed.

Jumping off the bus we ditched our bus tour and made our way towards the Bodleian Library. Not fully knowing if we were allowed to be on the campus we found ourselves on, we managed to walk our way into a courtyard of sorts with different class doors on every side of it.

Here we found the ticket booth to see the library... As well as a sign informing us that tickets were no longer being sold :(

Dejected, we aimlessly walked through the streets with me stopping to take the occasional picture. We briefly popped into a nearby church to have a look around and take a few more pictures. We saw a pub that Tolkein frequented, however were too late to go view a free exhibition. All in all Oxford was quite pretty, but after the disappointment of not seeing the things we had wanted to we were ready to go home.

Bigger and better things coming up (I do hope). A few rest days and more fun things in our future.