My Last Day in London...

I can't believe 6 days are almost gone! There is just too much to see and too little time to do it in. Lately, I've been visiting a lot of museums because they're free (and I'm an economical world traveler on a very limited budget), so here are a few of them:

1. Museum of London: This museum is all about how London began and its long history all the back from before it was Londonium (sp?) in Roman rule. The museum was actually kinda bland, but it did have a cool exhibit on the fire of London from 1666. Bonus* A cute british museum worker came up and explained part of the exhibit to me- maybe that's why I liked it so much...

2. The Victoria and Albert Museum: This museum is HUGE and I didn't get to see it all, but here are a few highlights: The fashion collection (extensive photo gallery on this to follow once I can use my laptop online) with amazing pieces starting in 1580 and going up to present day; Raphael cartoons (massive paper drawings) of tapestry plans by, who else, Rapael; The Great Bed of Ware- huge Elizabethan bed from the 1500s which was so famous Shakespeare referenced it; and rooms upon rooms of artifacts from British history. *Interesting sidenote: the building was built in the 1800s and actually survived the blitz during WWII- there are still pieces of the outside walls missing.

3. The National Gallery: TONS of paintings. I mean I seriously got lost in there. Some of the cooler things were biblical paintings from the 1500s, a series of pieces by Van Goh and Rembrandt. Some of the not cooler things- a sixty year old man hitting on me and asking me out to dinner. I mean, really?

4. The British Museum: They have an incredible Egyptian collection of sculptures, the actual Rosetta Stone, the Elgin Marbles (sculptures from the Parthenon in Greece...apparently those Greeks are still pissed England has them), beautiful jewelry pieces from all eras, and a beautiful collection of historical clocks. The only downside were the masses of elementary age kids running everywhere. Yuck...very effective birth control experience.

Apart from the sights, I've actual met a couple of cool people. I feel kinda bad because in one of my comments after a previous post I mentioned my two Aussie male roommates weren't nice- but they are. Scotty and Matty (yeah those are their names) roomed with me until today, were very friendly, had great travel stories, and took me out to eat one night and to a pub another. They love my accent as much as I love theirs so there's that (I'm not gonna lie, I actually exaggerated it a little for a better effect). It's kind of a bummer that they left this morning (for India. to snowboard. on the highest chairlift in the world. 20 kilometers from Pakistan. yeah.) but it's not too bad because I leave myself tomorrow...which reminds me- I should buy my train ticket...