Our second day trip was only a boat-ride down the Thames to Greenwich. The seats were really wet since it had been raining before we went and would rain later, so eventually we went to the lower level of the boat, napped, and made up a to-do list for the rest of our time in London. Once there, we wandered around looking for the National Maritime Museum and saw a very intricate and decorated church in what used to be the Naval Hospital. Eventually we found the museum and headed almost immediately into the Queen’s House, which is only technically part of the museum. It was a house built by the wives of Charles I and Charles II and the only problem I had with it was that they had essentially turned it into an art museum and I really wanted to know what the uses for each room had been. I found out later where the Queen’s bedroom would have been but there were a lot of rooms in that building. After we were done there, we were left alone to eat lunch and explore the museum. The only thing I really felt like seeing was the coat Horatio Nelson was shot in and it took a good long while to find. The bullet hole is also really difficult to find too, it’s up on the shoulder but really just blends in. There’s also a lot of blood on the uniform but apparently it isn’t Nelson’s blood, it’s the blood of Nelson’s secretary who was shot an hour before. While we were up there, who should we hear, but a familiar voice from our first walking tour of London. We peer around the corner and lo and behold, it’s Simon! The fantastic tour guide we had our first real day in London is here with us in the museum. We tried to follow him and hear some of his tour but they headed into a movie where he didn’t have to speak. We started to walk away, we had to go meet up with our group, when Simon came up to us and told us not to wander too far away from the tour. We tried to explain that we weren’t on the tour but he must have recognized us from our tour last week and reminded us again not to stray. We had a good laugh over this and went to go meet our group. It was then we walked up to the former Royal Observatory (it’s in Edinburg now) and boy was that a walk. It wasn’t far, it’s just that the Observatory is on a hill, the path to get to that his is incredibly steep and any picture I took could never do it justice. Once we got home, birthday celebrating commenced. Today is Amanda’s birthday so I decided to make her a chocolate cake from a box. I quickly discovered that, not only did we not have a cake pan; we didn’t have measuring spoons or cups at all. So, I approximated and used the baking pan that we use for everything else. It worked out fine for the most part, I cut it in half, realized I didn’t have a spatula either, and the cake didn’t really come out all in one piece. I slathered it with icing and it was good. There was half a cake left too so, desert tomorrow! Now we get to the adventure portion of the evening. Ryan has a friend who goes to the Imperial College of London who he wanted us to go hang out with. We rode the Victoria line to the end, got on a bus eventually, and at the end of the line was assured that her house wasn’t that far away, lets just walk. He lied. We walked a good 1 ½ - 2 miles for about thirty-five minutes. Eventually we made it, cursing Ryan the entire time. What we had been told would be a party, ended up being her, two of her friends and us. The boys indulged in the drinks she had provided, and James seems to have found love with a certain whiskey he met but did not get the name of. Alice, Amanda, and I just had water, being as dehydrated as we were. We did not stay too long since Alice is going somewhere early tomorrow. Needless to say, we caught a bus back.