London truly is a great historical city going places. We only had a week or so there this time and crammed in so much. The science museum, always a great place to start. Jam packed with tourists all wanting to see truly historic inventions.

So let me tell you about just a couple of things that caught my eye . The first, I'll mention is colloquially known as H4. What can that be I hear you saying; well, back a long time ago there was a carpenter called John Harrison. He heard about the King offering £20,000 to the first
person to build an accurate timepiece that could work on any of the navy's warships. It completely fired his imagination and probably became his life's work.
The first one he built, (H1 the prototype) was huge, clumsy and not completely accurate. So he set about building his next one, H2. (Harrison 2) much smaller and more accurate. Not totally happy, he set about his next one, H3, (now you can see why it was his life's work.) Much more accurate and yet still slightly too bulky. Then H4 came along. A perfect piece of timekeeping. Tested by a naval sea captain on his voyage to the West Indies and back. He is known as the
true father of timekeeping and as a direct result, the father of Longitude for mariners. If you want to read more, an author called Dava Sobel has written a book about him and simply called it Longitude . She describes the shenanigans and political going ons trying to thwart him so that the politicians of the day could gain the prize instead of him. So what's changed? Here is a picture of the actual H4. And finally on this subject, in my opinion, it is the invention of this particular instrument, giving the British the ability to navigate accurately because of longitude that made them a worlds seafaring power.

So another of the fantastic inventions that revolutionised the entire world was the steam locomotive. Designed by an engineer called George Stephenson in 1829 and made its début on the world stage travelling between two towns, (Stockton and Darlington), in the North of
England. Fare paying passengers started about a year later in 1830 between the larger cities of Manchester and Liverpool. And this picture is the actual locomotive, 'The Rocket.

And finally while we're on old things; probably the worlds oldest, and still working clock, from Wells Cathedral is dated at 1392 . Well over six hundred years and still going strong.

Now on to Buckingham Palace. Millions of tourists come to stand simply gawking at the outside of this building. They also come to watch what is known as 'The Changing of the Guard' which is where the British completely excel in pomp and ceremony. The Cold Stream Guards march down the Mall towards Buckingham Palace in perfect precision. Their ceremonial bright red tunics; black buzzbee's, (tall bearskin headgear) making quite a spectacular sight. Once a year for a couple of months they open the actual Palace up to tourists. We booked the tour and they make sure you keep to the allocated walkways. And of
course; definitely NO PHOTOS allowed inside. It's OK inside, but in my opinion not great. I think we've been into more spectacular palaces around the world. Hope you like the photo of the gardens at the back. This is where, if you are amongst the chosen few, you get an invite to have tea on the lawns at one of the garden parties .

London is not all old fashioned and fuddy duddy. It is slowly transforming itself into a modern city but still retaining its traditional façade. For example, in the actual city itself, (the one square mile), they've built a garden in the sky. It sits on the 35^th floor of a building overlooking the Thames and is fast becoming a great attraction. From up here, you can see most of the landmarks which make this such a great city. And talking of the sights, there are of course the river buses. By far and away, definitely, without a shadow of doubt, the best way to see all the great sights without millions of tourists jostling you this way and that. For example, hopping on at the Houses of Parliament and going up to the world famous observatory at Greenwich where you can have one foot in the eastern hemisphere, and the other on the western side. Anyway on the way up to Greenwich you get a fantastic view of Parliament, London Bridge, TheTower of London, Tower Bridge, St. Paul's Cathedral just to mention a few famous sights. And if you do the trip as dusk is falling, all the lights come on; just fabulously magical. Please
click the picture as it turns into a short video showing the actual river bus.

This is a short blog as we're off to Canada on our way home to St Maarten and we're really excited about this. Speak to you soon.