Seeing London's sights (even when you have been to London before) are such a pleasure .

We chose different sights this time, but all around are the key elements, the much remembered monopoly street signs, the London Eye and "Gherkin" visible from just about everywhere, red double decker buses and phone boxes, black square taxi cabs, and the unfailingly polite and ever helpful English people.

You never feel out of place in London. It has the feel that it has been a regular place you have visited many times, just by the familiarity of the sights.

With Rupert Murdoch and his newspaper phone bugging scandal causing an uproar in British parliament, our friends Graham and Rachel, who we are staying with, suggested a trip to the House of Commons in Westminster, to see if we could get into the visitor's gallery. What a buzz that was! A couple of cheery, wisecracking bobbies sent us to the right entry and before too long we had been photographed for our official visitors passes and were in the hallowed halls of British Government . We caught the end of the Opposition Leader's speech, saw the Prime Minister below us and then listened to some fiery debate that followed. As there were so many wishing to speak, a time clock was set at 8 minutes. We learnt that this was a special extra sitting of parliament due to the current controversy, as summer recess should have already commenced.

Other sights we enjoyed this time was a trip to Greenwich, where time is measured from, a boat trip on the Thames, the Tower of London where the crown jewels are displayed, and a fabulous day out in the amazing Kew Gardens including sharing a picnic lunch with our good friends Graham, Rachel, Elliot and Evan.  

One evening we met up with another good friend, Philip, and had dinner in the Soho district. We'll be catching up again with Philip, and his wife Linda in France in August.
 
We also managed to achieve some much needed catch up jobs while staying with Graham, Rachel and family . We finally managed to have our broken computer screen replaced and so now we have two computers, stretching our seven kilo limit to the max. I managed to get a zip fixed in my one and only fleecy jacket, and we caught up on all our washing and mending. Most important of all, I applied for and was granted a new passport, as it was so close to being full, it was not going to last the rest of the trip. Avan was also pleased to be Graham's assistant in erecting a garden shed.

Time to now move on and see some sights in the North of England, Ireland and Wales but we will be back to London again before we leave UK.   

Footnote: Westminster Palace, Westminster Abbey and St Margarets Church, Maritime Greenwich, and Royal Botanic Gardens Kew are all UNESCO World Heritage protected.