The Allisons

London has fabulous parks, and everyone hangs out there. This is one of the entrances to Hyde Park. We passed by it on the way to Hard Rock Cafe.
I think the Hard Rock we visited was the first one ever. The gift shop was across the street and in the basement of the gift shop was the Hard Rock vault. We went on a "tour" with a crazy, enthusiastic, and entertaining tour guide. In the vault are some of Hard Rock's most prized possessions. The best thing about it was that we could touch everything. Mike is holding Stevie Ray Vaughn's guitar. In my first picture I'm sitting on a couch that belonged to Jimmy Hendrix and holding his guitar valued at over 3.5 million pounds (7 million dollars!) The tour guide said that they had had the couch cleaned to be sure that no one received an acid trip from sitting on it. (ha, ha)
This is the trumpet belonging to the legendary Miles Davis.
The other picture of me documents the single most memorable thing about my trip to London. Not only I'm I holding Kurt Cobain's guitar, but I'm wearing his sun glasses. Much to my husband's embarrassment, I shed a tear or two. It was very intense. The other picture here on the right is the snowglobe that topped Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love's wedding cake. It was amazing. Not just the snow globe, but the whole experience.
Next is a picture of the entrance to the Royal Academy of Art. In the plaza there was a giant statue of a pregnant woman. Half her body was covered with skin and the other half revealed muscle, sinew, and her unborn child. (Guess that's what I'll look like in a couple of months--hopefully with my skin on though.)
Left, is Piccadilly Circus. Fun, but much less impressive than Times Square. This is the Mall. Very much like the one in Washington, DC. At the end is Buckingham Palace.
This is Trafalgar Square. The picture shows St. Martin in the Fields church. We went and sat in the church and got to listen to a small orchestra rehearsing for a concert including Vivaldi's Four Seasons. It was free! It was quite nice. Also in Trafalgar Square is the National Gallery. Admission was free! In my opinion, that makes it the best thing to do in London. There were so many great works of art. We didn't have a whole lot of time, so we sought out some of the most famous by Van Gogh, Cezanne, Monet, Michelangelo, and my personal favorite, Botticelli.
When we returned to our hotel (which was really a dorm for King's College built in 1829), we saw a group of chaps playing cricket in the park across the street. It really added something to our whole London experience.