London 2014 - Part 2

Photos are not allowed in the palaces, and rightly so. Just accept the tour is worth the memories.

Welcome to Kensington Palace. Not overly imposing from the outside, but it's a nice little cottage.

Then you look to the side & see the impressive gardens.

She tells me "it will do, I guess". Anne was in her element. Inside, we had just viewed formal gowns of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth, along with those of Queen Victoria and Princess Diana.

At age 18, a young Victoria was informed of the death of her uncle. In her upstairs quarters, she was told she would become queen.

A common sight in London. Near the Albert Memorial. Dr. Who? Superman? Your choice.

If one were to tell you the Albert Memorial were grandiose on a huge scale, believe them. It's truly imposing.

This building does not look out of the ordinary. But, this is the home of the Royal Geographic Society. Forerunner of the National Geographic Society. From this building, adventurers and scientist have been sent to explore our planet.

It's easy to say our hotel was in the safest part of town. Take note of the neighbors across the street.

Looking down Broadway. Westminster Abbey in the distance. This was the view coming out of the tube station behind our hotel.

You might recognize this. Note the round thingy off to the left. We'll take a ride on that in a few posts.

A part of Westminster Abbey you never see on TV. The back side, Henyy VII's Lady Chapel.

London 2014 - Part 1

Sometimes the Travel Gods smile graciously upon us. We were able to visit London this spring. This is the first of several posts from our travels. Each post will contain around 10-12 photos to keep the page load times as short as possible.

It's a direct flight from RDU to Heathrow. Red eye flight with tube transportation to the hotel (during the morning commute).

St. Ermin's Hotel, our home for the stay. Built in the 1880s. I recommend staying here. Excellent dining, great staff and beautiful building.

It's a five minute walk to Westminster Abbey, a 10 minute walk to Buckingham Palace.

Hotel lobby from the second floor.

First floor view.

These green spaces at the hotel entrance were formerly car parks.

I could get used to this level of opulence.

We used the London Pass for transportation and access to the sights. With the London Pass, you bypass the crowd waiting in line and go directly in.

London transportation by bus, tube and train is extremely efficient. The trains run on time & are well kept. The U.S. could take lessons from the British in this arena.

 Proof that I really was there. No idea why I was squinting, being a bit overcast. The Royal Albert Hall in the background.

Kensington Palace from far away. Photos there in the next post.

Getting The Image Sizes Correct

The images in the last post were smaller than I prefer. Experiment time.

Size of the above: Large

This photo: X Large

A Google search offers numerous suggestions for consistently getting the image sizes correct. Some work, some don't. A suggestion using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) was less than optimal. Experiments continue. I'm looking for the html code to create a consistent image size for every post, but have not found it yet.

Photo Testing

In preparation for using the blog as a location for photo essays, this is an experiment on using images.

Above is Ikaros, a 170 ft. cable layer. Build in 1975, she was converted sometime in the 90s.
IMO: 7411820. Google this IMO number for more information on the ship.

 Anina, formerly Trinwillershagen. Presently laid up off St. Georges, Grenada. IMO 7023831. 

Looking south toward Douglas Island, Alaska. Photo taken from atop Mt. Roberts. Juneau is off to the far right.  



 

Learning Mode

After using Picasa intermittently for several years, it's time to try Blogspot. May be a bit messy at first, but should become something useful as I learn the application. OOL