Last day in London—Really?!? (25 July)

What a day it’s been. A long one, but a good one. I’ll do a quick recap:

I woke up at 4 to finish studying for finals. At 6:30 I went to start my laundry. At 7 I had my finals. After that, I worked on laundry more. Then we had our last classes. After class I went running in Hyde Park for my last time. I love that place. It was a great run. Afterwards we were doing situps and stuff in the grass. We all felt so good and happy after exercising that we ended up doing handstands and cartwheels, too. It was fun and some people even stopped to watch us [embarrassing]. I guess it’s a sign that it’s time to leave London: we’ve gone from being the tourists to being the tourist attraction.

After getting ready and making a grocery store run, Lori and I went to the National Gallery. We ended up only having 45 minutes there, so I tried a new museum technique. I took my time on the 18^th-century part of the gallery because I wanted to appreciate it and learn from it more. I saw works from Cezanne, Gaugin, Van Gough, Degas, Pisarro, Monet, and more. I tried to pay more attention to the ways they applied paint, the types of marks they made, and the way they used layers. All of these things create areas of varying interest that contribute to the entire composition. I really enjoyed this section of the gallery. Other than that, I tried a new museum technique. I buzzed through the rest of the museum, merely looking for pieces that caught my attention. If they caught my attention, I’d stop and look at them and try to figure out why they stuck out to me.

I also hunted down another da Vinci painting: The Virgin of the Rocks. This one is pretty famous. I enjoy seeing his works, not necessarily because I like the work itself, but I like the place they hold in the history of art and I like the story of the man behind them. I also ran into the original portrait of Erasmus, which I wasn’t expecting. I’ve seen replicas of that picture a lot and it was fun to happen upon the real deal.

We rushed to St. Paul’s Cathedral for the evening prayer. This way we could get into that beautiful cathedral again without paying a pence (it’s an expensive tourist site). It was lovely.

Next we headed across the Thames to the Globe Theater. We started standing in line at 5:45—we wanted to get tickets to Much Ado about Nothing. We got tickets! The play didn’t start until 7:30 and since we had the standing tickets (the groundling tickets for only 5 pounds), we were standing the whole time until 11:00. Wowee . . . it was tiring by the end. But I’m so glad we did because the play was awesome. I think I’m spoiled and will never be able to watch Shakespeare again because I have such a high standard of seeing it performed. The actors were top notch and it’s so cool to literally be at the foot of the stage (I was leaning on it the whole time) and feeling like a part of the performance.

This was a perfect way to spend the last day in London. I did a little bit of everything and the weather was even beautiful. This really is a great city with a lot to see and do.

Waiting in another line outside the Globe. We all matched on accident. Precious.

Inside the Globe Theater

On the underground on the way home. My last tube ride!