Getting in the Map - Day 2 in London

Saturday arrived and it was still a little rainy, so we got off the tube at Marylebone Station and started looking out for "Monopoly Roads and Stations" while we walked to Oxford Street. Marylebone Road was our first one! We found quite a few but I won't post them until we have them all!!

Mick's iPhone was taking us to a Mothercare Shop so that we could purchase another one of these rain canopies for the 2nd pram. We spent a bit of time looking for this shop and it was a little frustrating because I was only in the one in Taunton the day before we left. But it was well worth it because knowing the kids were warm and out of the rain meant we didn't have to worry about looking for cover.  Here is little miss reader with her book!

Walking down Oxford Street & Regent Street was SO much fun. We didn't really go in many shops as we had so many other things to do and see and you would really need a good week to get in all of them, not to mention a lot of cash!!! So it was fun just looking THIS TIME!!! 

Two of the shops we did go in were The Disney Shop and Hamleys Toy Store, here are the girls meeting Mickey and Minnie...

And this is outside Hamleys, which was the most crowded part of Regent Street. Hamleys gets 1000s of visitors everyday and is one of the worlds biggest toy stores, with 7 floors of toys! It was great- there were things to play with and demonstrations everywhere.

This is Lani standing in front of the Bratz dolls - hence the cool pose I guess!

We bought some Moon Sand for the girls and Mickey bought me my very own Paddington Bear, holding a Hamleys Bag!!! I was very excited!  Leilani and I are currently reading the original full length book of 'The Bear From Darkest Peru', which I just had to get from Paddington Station!

This is me heading down to Piccadilly Circus, another very crowded spot. 

People seem to just stand around in Piccadilly Circus - acting cool! Nothing really happens, I think it's just one of the many places people 'have to go while in London!' Okay, it is the spot where 5 of London's busiest streets meet and the commercial and entertainment hub of London's West End. It is also often compared to New York's Times Square so I guess it was pretty cool to be there and take a photo for our Monopoly collection! But we didn't stay long!

Here are the girls playing with the water fountains outside The Royal Academy of Arts. I found that there are so many places in London where it is just packed full of people, but there are also lots of little quiet spots around.... or not so little, like Hyde Park!

The Ritz didn't really look all that ritzy.... but I'm sure it was inside!

Late in the afternoon we headed to Buckingham Palace, lots of people here just hanging out waiting to see Queenie pop her head out of one of those many windows, but not today! You can go inside and do some sort of tour, which I'm sure is probably only of about 1/10th of the place - but we would like to do it anyway, not this time though. 

Thought I had better add some photos of my camera man, so that you know he does exist! He choose to stand in front of the big gold gate!

It's such a wonderful time of year here, first with all the daffodils out and now all the tulips and blossoms - along with all the other spring flowers. Everywhere we have been so far has its grounds well looked after with lots of bright coloured flower beds, whether it is a small village town or outside the Queen's residence, it doesn't seem to matter - I have been quite impressed.

Don't know much about this arch way but it is quite significant to us. It is at the start of The Mall (one of the roads leading to Buckingham Palace) and where we took a wrong turn!! Instead of heading straight through the arch we turned right and ended up walking a very long way in the wrong direction... it didn't really matter as we weren't really heading anywhere in a hurry, but the look on our faces when we got to Trafalgar Square and realised that we could have just walked straight through there would have been quite a sight!!!

Just after our decision to turn right - who gets asked for directions!? Yes, me... and I gave some out too.... but I did admit that I had no idea at the same time!! lol I wonder if they are blogging about me... the lady who had no idea!! 

On our long walk looking for The Strand we saw quite a few sights... Downing Street (home to the Prime Minister) 

Another red telephone box

Another Tube sign.... this one had an extra nice background though!

Another look at Big Ben

London is just full of statues - it's hard to know and remember what they are all of, this is one outside the Houses of Parliament.

A little girl that wanted to walk along the whole fence like this!

And we finally made it to Trafalgar Square!! This is where our day ended! We did so much walking and were pretty tired once again!!