A foggy day in London town...: British Museum status: CHARM INTACT

On Monday 6^th I treated myself to a day in London. There is so much to see in London that I wouldn’t have been able to fit all of it into the weekend I was going to be there. So I jumped on the train and arrived in a slightly miserable London Euston and started to explore the big smoke.

First destination was St Pancras International. This is the train station for the Eurostar which heads across Europe. It is also the location of the St Pancras International Champagne Bar, Matthew’s second home (if he could afford it). The bar isn’t as impressive as I was expecting but still very cool as the seats are arranged like an old train coach with little booths and the actual Eurostar trains come up right next to you. The station is built underneath a giant arching roof top that seems to stretch on forever and at one end is the well-known 3 storey statue of a couple kissing.

After sending a photo of where I was to Matthew so that he felt a little jealous, I headed out to see King’s Cross station (purely because of Monopoly) then on to the British Library. The library is huge and shaped somewhat like a super tanker as the architect wanted it to be “floating on a sea of knowledge”…righto then. The King’s Library is an exclusive collection that is suspended over several stories and sits in the middle of the building under lock and key.

The big ticket item for me at the library was the original Magna Carta. This was the document that relinquished a lot of the crown’s powers to the barons. It has a rocky history starting in about 1215 where it was ratified then Pope Innocent III gave a Papal Bull outlawing the document only 10 weeks after being ratified. Then it was introduced again but modified and so on. Only four copies were ever made and the Library has two. Absolute highlight of my day. Also on display were a number of Da Vinci’s drawings, Beethoven’s tuning fork which he later gave to Gustav Holst, early draft of the Messiah and Jane Austen’s writing desk. Lots of cool stuff.

After the library I headed to the British Museum which, despite popular opinion, hasn’t lost its charm! The building is amazing with a giant frosted sunroof in the middle. I only dropped in for an hour or so but still managed to see the Rosetta Stone (only knew of it because of a Matthew Reilly book series), part of the Sphinx’s beard, the statue of Ramesses the Great and the oldest item in the library, a primitive cutting stone…it just looked like a rock to me.

After my quick dash into the museum I started wandering the streets of London…safe I know! I ended up in a lovely part of town called West End, a.k.a. THEATRELAND! I walked around trying to think if I had enough money to see everything. I’m still counting my pennies. Right next door was Covent Garden markets. I was expecting to be blown away by the talent of performers and atmosphere of the place but I really wasn’t. Perhaps it was because it was a miserable rainy Monday and the first day back at school for the country…but I wasn’t all that impressed. I left hoping that my next trip would be better!