DAY 122: Tower of London, Churchill War Rooms, Harry Potter Studio Tour

Dad, Me, Mom and Joe at the Tower of London

Lizzy, Joe and I woke up relatively early and got ready for the day. We met my parents at the elevator and set out to find breakfast. We knew today would be a long one, so we wanted to find something sustaining. What we ended up finding was a tiny hole-in-the-wall breakfast joint that became our place for the rest of the week. Lizzy and I were extraordinarily pleased to be eating eggs that we didn't have to collect that morning. Sweet freedom.

My parents looking adorable with the London Tower Bridge

Lizzy and I had done quite the extensive research of the best sights to see in London before my family's arrival. But because this was Christmas week, many things were closed on certain days. So in order to hit every attraction, we kind of had to hop around the city, and the best and cheapest way was to take the tube. I got an app on my phone of the London Tube, and all the sudden I became the subway guru. I led the way to our first stop: The Tower of London.


FUN FACT #75: The Tower of London was built in 1066 as part of the Norman Conquest of England. It has always been used as a prison, but this was not it's primary function throughout history. It was the Royal Palace until around the 14th century when the monarchy started using it less and less. During its heyday, the Tower of London executed 112 people in 400 years.

I knew much about the Tower of London and it's significance in English history, but in my mind I always imagined it as just a tower. Boy, was I wrong. There were so many walls and gates and a moat in addition to multiple buildings and towers. The Tower of London isn't just a tower- its almost like a tiny town inside. So many people had to live there to keep it running. It's location is rather cool as well- you can see the London Tower Bridge perfectly from the ramparts.

FUN FACT #76: The Tower of London used to have a menagerie. It also has been the home to the crown jewels since the late 1200s.

Listening to the Audio Guides!

The Tower was a pretty cool place to peruse around; especially if you are a history geek like me, and even more so if you are a history fanatic like my dad. We explored for quite a while and saw everything from the crown jewels to the jail cells to the throne room. The jail cells were quite interesting as most of the prisoners had carved their names and other things into the stone walls.

Some prisoners you might recognize:

William Wallace - 1305 - executed
Sir Thomas More - 1535 - executed
Anne Boleyn - 1536 - executed
Queen Elizabeth 1- 1554- obviously not executed but held for alleged involvement in a rebellion.
Sir Walter Raleigh - 1603-1616- not executed
Guy Fawkes - 1605 - sentenced to die but jumped off the scaffolding of the gallows and died anyway.
William Penn - 1668 - held for 7 months for pamphleteering. Later founded Pennsylvania.
Lord Lovat Simon Fraser - 1747 - executed for the Scottish Rebellion to return the Stewart kings and was the last man to be beheaded in England.


We had fun reading about all of the different captives held in the Tower and some of the elaborate escape attempts. There were quite a few stories of ghosts haunting the Tower as well. My favorite part was the WWI and WWII parts of the tower that displayed the most important medals given to soldiers of the British Army. My dad and I stood there clicking on every Victoria Cross to read about the lives of the men whom they were given to.

Following The Tower of London, we got back on the tube and headed to the Churchill War Rooms. The Churchill War Rooms are a branch of the Imperial War Museum and houses the Cabinet War Rooms and the Churchill Museum.

FUN FACT #77: The Cabinet War Rooms were built in 1938 beneath the Treasury Building near Westminster. The War Rooms were an underground complex that housed the British Government Command centre during the Second World War.

The Cabinet War Rooms were SO COOL! Apparently, following the surrender of Japan in 1945, the War Rooms were abandoned. Since they were no longer needed, everyone left and the door was locked. 30 years later, they were reopened to take a look inside. What they found were the War Rooms in the exact same condition in which they were left. War maps and military strategy plans were still pasted on the walls, sheets still on the beds, cigarettes still in the ash trays. The rooms were kept this way and turned into a museum.

Lizzy at Olivander's Wand Shop

The Door to Gringott's

The museum gives you an audio guide so you can walk through the hallways and see each of the rooms- from Churchill's sleeping quarters to the main kitchen to the map room to the telegraph room. They put in some wax people to make you really see what it looked like and the audio guide would play some of the interactions that happened here.

Half way through the War Rooms, we came to the Churchill Museum created to explore and commemorate the history of Winston Churchill's life and accomplishments. I won't go into too much detail here, after all, you can always read about Winnie anywhere, but it was a very detail museum. Apparently Churchill was quite the letter writer. There are hundreds of his letters all over the museum- some from long before he was a Prime Minister or even a Statesman.

This was, and is, by far my favorite museum. It was so cool to walk around in the rooms where the biggest decisions in WWII were made from Britain and it was also fascinating to learn so much about Winston Churchill's life. I had such a good time reading everything.

After the Churchill War Rooms, we headed back to the hotel. We all took a brief rest and then headed off to our next attraction: The Harry Potter Studio Tour.

Diagon Alley

WANDS!

As I have said before, Lizzy and I really enjoyed the Harry Potter series. And we weren't the only ones. My father, mother, and brother all read and watched the movies as well. So we took the train out to see the Warner Brother's Studio Harry Potter Tour. It was really cool to see every room in Hogwarts and see how the movies were made. Everything was so unbelievably detailed- and most things weren't actually computer generated! They actually built most things as machines that really worked. Like Buckbeak, the Hippogriff. He was sitting pruning his feathers as we walked by him. Pretty neat.

FUN FACT #78: All views of Hogwarts itself were done using a miniature model. I mean, it's not that miniature- it's still probably 10 yards by 10 yards, but it's still fairly small!

We were able to see the model of Hogwarts and take pictures in front of it as well as go to Number 4 Privet Drive, sit in Ron's Dad's flying car, ride in the Night Bus and walk along Diagon Alley. It was a really fun night and day! Our feet were hurting by the time we made it back, so we quickly grabbed some grub at a pub around the corner and hit the hay.