London

From Nottingham we took a train to London, where on the first day we saw Big Ben, Parliament and Westminster Abbey (where Queen Elizabeth's tomb was!). We then took a boat ride along the Thames river.




The next day we went to a recreation of Shakespeare's Globe theater and saw Romeo and Juliet. It was SUPER awesome, and despite being a tragedy, the actors were really funny.



The next day we went to Bloomsbury and saw the British Library, which holds the Magna Carta, the Gutenberg Bible, a piece of paper written by Shakespeare and one of Virginia Woolf's handwritten notebooks containing Mrs. Dalloway. After that we went to the location of my favorite British show ever, Black Books. Then we went to the British Museum, which among a million awesome things had the Rosetta Stone. NUTS!



The next day we went to Buckingham Palace. After that we mostly milled around.


Here's a helpful sign to remind tourists which way to look when crossing the road:

Nottingham

After Paris, we flew to Nottingham, which is in central Britain, mostly to see the birthplace of one of my favorite authors (D.H. Lawrence) but also to see a bit of smaller-town, country-ish English life.

Nottingham, home to Robin Hood

Grayson had a traditional English breakfast (blech!)

We read some funny Brit papers

Went to the town of Eastwood to see some DHL stuff, including his birthplace museum:


and went to my first ever Ikea, where we ate some exotic Swedish cakes.

You'd think our first time in a country that speaks English would have been a little less foreign, and it mostly was, but around Nottingham, which is in the Midlands, the accent was so thick I sometimes couldn't understand people!

Overdue/unsorted pix, Part 3, Paris

Holy crap, I don't even know where to start. Paris was AMAZING. We had the most number of days there than any other city and it still felt like too few. We even got to meet with a friend of Grayson's and some of his friends and family, we talked politics, living in cities, and ... children! It was actually pretty funny because we got to play with his very young son, and his French was running circles around me. AND he could speak some English! Quelle tristesse! (How sad!)

One of the cafes that cool people hung out in during the 30s, including Einstein!
Grayson looking existential in front of Albert Camus' favorite cafe in Paris. I ate a croque monsieur here and a seven-euro soda!
Shakespeare and Co., the bookstore started by an American in the thirties where Hemingway and James Joyce, among a million other amazing writers hung out.
The green boxes belonging to the left bank booksellers, they had amazing old books and postcards.


Notre Dame!Me as Quasimodo in front of Notre Dame!

Awesome metro stop, one of the few remaining originals.
Grayson got his haircut in French!

The Amelie cafe in Montmartre!
Moulin Rouge!
The view from Sacre Coeur!
Sacre Coeur itself, atop the Montmartre hill...

The Seine!
Napoleon's tomb!
Banana nutella crepe at a cafe!
A new view of the Eiffell Tower!
Space Needle wannabe!

Grayson has a head growth!
The Louvre!Lady McLadington
The obelisk that stands where Marie Antoinette became a head shorter on the top! :O


We walked from the Louvre, through the Gardens, past the Obelisk (at Place du Concorde) up the Champs-Elysees to the Arc di Triomphe,
Where we saw them rekindlee the flame of the unknown soldier...
Grayson's friend's kid, with boundless (even the camera couldn't stop it) energy!

Overdue/unsorted pix, Part 2, Rome

Outside the Vatican

Entry to the Vatican Museum, so much crazy art in here, I can't begin to post photos. Also, it's blurry because they don't allow flash, so I'll fix it in photoshop one day :)

Spanish Steps
Pantheon
Trevi Fountain, from La Dolce Vita!
Roman Forum
Lounging on the Palatine hill, like the wealthy Romans of old! ;)
Inside the Colosseum
Outside the Colosseum, as soon as we got into the Rome train station, we hopped a Metro (subway) and went a few stops, leaving the station to walk a couple blocks to our hotel, as soon as we came into the daylight outside the station, there stood before us this HUGE, ancient thing! Too insane.