BM, V&A and Mind the Gap

We stayed up until 1am London time watching Star Gate:Atlantis, trying to beat jet lag. I think it was efficient, although DeAnna woke up and couldn't fall back asleep. We came back from London today and I crashed...I only meant to sleep for a little while and have them wake me, but they didn't! And they went to sleep as well. It wouldn't have been a big deal if it hadn't been 7pm! I woke up after my "nap" and probably won't go to sleep till 1 or 2....just about the time they wake up from their naps. Nasty jet lag! Messing with everything....

Despite the jet lag, today was a great day! We walked to the tube station and rode all the way in to Holborn, where we took another walk to the British Museum. The British Museum was actually founded in 1753!

The British Museum houses so many treasures from not only Great Britain, but from around the world! Excavations from Egypt brought quite a few such treasures into the hands of Europe and the English.

One of the most interesting treasures brought back from the excavations is the Rosetta Stone.

The Rosetta Stone was key in learning Egpytian hieroglyphs. As you can see in the picture above, there are three different languages. The first is Anicient Egyptian hieroglyphics. The second, Demotic Egyptian and finally, Greek. Each section contains the same text, only in a different language. Using the Greek to translate the Demotic, and then using Demotic to translate the hieroglyphs, the code was cracked and the rest is history.

There were so many things to see at the British Museum! From Egypt to Assyria, from Mummies to Norse Swords it took us 4 or 5 hours to get through the museum!

Another interesting thing we saw was the wrapped mummy of a young woman named Cleopatra. Although she wasn't THE Cleopatra, it was still interesting to see! Because of CAT scans and X-rays, British scientists were able to determine how old she was at the time of death. She was 17.

One last AMAZING thing we saw at the BM.

This is one of two pillars that are called the Gate of Nimrud, built by Assyrian king, Ahsirnapal II (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashurnasirpal_II). They are GIGANTIC!

After the British Museum, we grabbed a bite to eat from a nearby TESCO (small-ish grocery store) and walked to the Bloomsbury Square Gardens. We loved eating in the open air! A pigeon came waddleing by, so I threw a piece of bread at him. Then another pigeon came by...and another! Before too long there were 5 pigeons in front of me! Just when I thought I was going to have to hide my lunch, a little old man came walking into the park with a bag of bread crumbs. He dumped them on the ground and pigeons came from EVERYWHERE!!! It was funny to watch...

After lunch we took a tube to St. James Park and went to see Buckingham Palace, but unfortunately, it was closed today!!! So we had to walk back to the tube...but we decided to hop over to the Victoria and Albert Museum (commonly referred to as the V&A)! It was fantastic! What gets me the most about London Museums is that the buildings are phenomenal! And even better than that, they were built to house museums!

One of the highlights of the V&A was the Raphael Gallery. Raphael was a famous Italian artist from the late 15th century-early 16th. His work is PHENOMENAL. He was a contemporary of da Vinci and Michaelangelo. When I walked into the gallery I had no idea what to expect. What I saw floored me.

Huge paintings! Room sized, at least! They actually weren't meant to be paintings, but cartoons for tapestries! Artists would paint a "cartoon" or a guide for weavers as they worked on the tapestries. Fantastic!

Well, after looking around at the V&A for a couple of hours we decided to head back to the hotel. It has been an awesome day!

For anyone who is still curious about the title of this post (and for those of you that actually scrolled back up to check the title :D ) here's an explanation!

When riding the tube, there is a recorded announcement made for every station you come to. A lovely British woman's voice says "The next stop is Charing Cross" or "Please step away from the doors". My favorite however, is, "Please mind the gap between the train and the platform". Mind the Gap!