Day 29 - London Eye, Dungeon & Thames Cruise

Today we had to get up super early - 4.00am! We had to leave at 4.45am to catch our flight to London! We got ready quickly and then used our phone torch to walk through the forest to get to our car. Berend and Amie joined us at the car and we left to go to Amsterdam.

At the airport, we wanted to grab some breakfast but security took quite a while so we had to go straight to boarding. When we arrived at boarding the line was huge so Auke managed to grab a muffin from a nearby shop.

We were sitting separately from Berend and Amie as we had booked our tickets at different times. The plane trip was uneventful - the plane taxied for about 30 minutes and then the flight time was 40 minutes. It felt weird travelling on a plane without kids so we made the most of relaxing!

Once at the airport we went our separate ways - Berend and Amie were off to a business meeting and we were going to fit as many London sights into one day as we could. It took a while to get out of the airport as Auke’s passport wouldn’t work through the E-Gate so he had to join the long queue to get out.

We had to catch a shuttle from the north terminal to the south terminal, and then we had to catch two different trains to get to Waterloo station. We were very surprised to find it cost 40 pounds just to get to Waterloo! The prices of everything here was crazy.

Once in Waterloo, we finally had a chance to get some breakfast. We went to McDonalds as it was the closest thing we could find and we were excited to find out they sold a bacon burger for breakfast - just a burger packed with bacon! It was great.

We walked to the London Eye to try get tickets to go on it. The soonest available time was 1.45pm. We also booked tickets as part of a package for a boat cruise along the Thames, and tickets to the London Dungeon. We had no idea what the London dungeon was but it sounded interesting so we bought it.

While we were at the London Eye ticket place, we decided to do their 4D London Eye experience straight away as it was already open. It was really great, they even had fake snow falling when it showed winter time in London.

The boat cruise was booked for 10.45, and the London Dungeon for 11.45. As it was about 9.30am at this stage we decided to go for a quick walk while we waited. We saw the Westminster Palace and Big Ben. Big Ben was completely under wraps, apart from the clockface, due to renovations.

There was also protests going on outside of parliament - some for Brexit and some against. One of the ladies had a European Union hat on which looked absolutely ridiculous. We tried very hard to get a photo of it but the roads were so busy that the buses kept blocking the view.

We walked back and got to the boat tour at 10.30am as we had to be there 15 minutes early. We eventually boarded and sat on the deck. There was also a school group on there so it was quite noisy!

The boat tour was fantastic, we got to see so much more than we would have if we had been taking public transport. It was also freezing cold! In fact, London was really cold until about 3.00pm when finally the sun came out.

On the boat cruise we saw London has the most interesting shaped buildings. It looks so much nicer than the usual shaped skyscrapers.

We saw London Bridge which is just a boring bridge, and we saw Tower Bridge which everyone thinks is London Bridge which looks amazing. We got to see St Paul’s Basilica, The Shard, The Florence Nightingale Hospital, Westminster Palace, one of the oldest pubs, the old London Studios, an old castle, the royal airforce monument, the obelisk that was gifted to London by the Egyptians, a famous art museum and many more things.

We got back at 11.40 and had five minutes to run to the London Dungeon. We got there just in time for our booking. Once inside there was creepy music, it was all dark and there were warning signs on the walls. As we had no idea what we were actually doing, Ali asked Auke if we should quickly google what we were about to do and Auke said no, let’s go in blind. We both had guessed that we might be going into a dungeon and looking at old torture equipment or something.

We were finally allowed inside and a creepy looking lady greeted us. She explained we were traitors to King Henry 8th and now we were to be punished. We all boarded onto a log flume and we went through in the dark until eventually the log flume went backwards and we all got wet.

When it was time to hop off, we were inside another themed room. It turns out the London Dungeon is sort of like a fun interactive history lesson with actors about the worst of London’s history. Every room we went in, there would be a new theme such as the Black Plague, Jack the Ripper, Sweeney Todd, the London Fire etc.

The actors would do things like lock people up, interview people in a stand, all in the theme of the person they were acting. Many times all the lights would turn off and when they turned on somebody creepy would be right in your face. There was also a lot of special effects, for instance in the London Fire there was smoke all through the room. Some rooms you had to sit in seats that moved or you got water sprayed in your face when they were dissecting a body. At the end we had another ride which was a bit like the giant drop but obviously not as tall as it was inside a building.

It was really well done and we absolutely loved it. Unfortunately, no photos were allowed, but as it was very interactive we wouldn’t have had time to take photos anyway. It made it even more fun that we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into as it probably would have ruined the surprise. At the end we had a cider and a beer at the gift shop/bar. We had only about fifteen minutes before the London Eye.

We arrived at the London Eye just in time. We went inside our capsule with about ten or fifteen other people and we started going around. From up here we had fantastic views all around. We made sure to take photos of the brilliant views. It took about 40 minutes to go around once.

We got off and we walked back towards Westminster Palace as we had run out of time to get to Westminster Abbey. We didn’t have enough time to go inside but we managed to see it. Around here, there were heaps of the cute red telephone boxes!

We still hadn’t had lunch and by this stage it was nearly 3.00pm so we stopped in and had some lunch at a nearby restaurant. We are quickly because we still wanted to see the palace before we had to catch the train back to the airport at 4.00pm.

After lunch we speed walked to the palace. On the way we saw a few nice old buildings such as Westminster Chapel.

Once at the palace, we quickly took some photos, and then nearly ran to the station to catch our train back. After another 42 pounds, we got onto our train. This time we had the option to get a direct train so that helped.

After about an hour, we arrived at the south terminal. We got a shuttle back to the north terminal, and then went through security straight away as we didn’t know how long it would take.

Once through, we saw our plane had been delayed by about 40 minutes, so we had time to look in a few souvenir shops. Auke even managed to buy some new shoes!

Eventually it was time to head to the plane where we met up with Berend and Amie again.

We were once again seated separately so we boarded the plane, and met up with them again when we were back in Amsterdam.

We drove home and got home at about 11.00pm.