Touring London

The past couple of days have held great beauty, amazing history, and the story of a city that I find to be absolutely fascinating. I find myself so thankful to be here, to soak in once again the magic that is England. Yesterday, Cathleen and I spent the late morning and afternoon touring London on The Original Tour Bus, driving by and stopping at such greats as Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and the parliament buildings, London Bridge and Tower, Piccadilly, Oxford Circus, the London Eye, and Buckingham Palace. Though I had been on the bus tour before and seen the sites that we passed and visited, there is much to be said for watching the enjoyment of another person who is seeing these things for the first time. Not to mention the fact that you hear information or see something tucked away that you somehow missed the first time.

After the tour, we again tried unsuccessfully (though given directions by two people at this point) to locate the supposedly nearby grocery store. No luck. We did however find a convenience store where I was able to introduce Cathleen to the joys (or not) of roasted barbeque chicken, cheese and garlic, and prawn cocktail chips, or rather, crisps. :-) We later found ourselves on the search for the elusive grocery store again, but I am sad to report the lack of discovery remained the same. After this second try, we gave up our search (ONLY for the time being! Persistence will pay off! :-)) and decided to eat dinner at the truly nearby Indian restaurant.

Today was another day, filled with adventure and excitement. Cat and I woke up, ate our complimentary breakfast of hot chocolate, croissants, and cereal and made our way to church near Oxford Circus at All Soul's Church. For those of you that recognize the name, it is the church of Mr. John Stott, one of England's truly great preachers. Church was cool and it was neat to see the body of Christ represented in a number of ethnicities, all within the same building. I'm looking forward to seeing even more of that in Africa! *crossing fingers* After church, we headed off to Piccadilly in search of theatre tickets for tonight. The first two ticket booths left us feeling like it was another night of book reading (don't get me wrong... I love to read, but I also need variety!) as they delivered the information that there were no shows showing tonight. After I had given up hope and resigned myself to another quiet night, a poster appeared that advertised a showing of the Lion King at 3 pm today! Praise be to God, we managed to find tickets and make our way to the production following a yummy lunch at Bella Italia! The show was fabulous and the music and costumes made me excited to see Africa! After the show, we took a long walk around that area of London, took a bus home, and that was the end of our two days of tourism. Tomorrow, we are off to my dear friend Tricia's house to hang out and hopefully help her family/church with some projects!