September 9 London

Well it's hard to beat chauffuer driven Rolls Royce and the Ace Cafe.  The Ace Cafe was quite the experience.  all those old mods and rockers and teddy boys.  The women were pretty interesting too and bikes - oh my god!  there were bikes of every description.  I would never have dreamed there were so many different bikes.  It was a lot of fun.

Today we went to Greenwich (Grenich)  where the world is divided in two to form the Prime Meridian.  Wish we had stayed in Greenwich and commuted to the city.  So calm and quiet.  We might have done better for hotel and prices.  Anyway Greenwich was a fascinating place.  We visited the Royal Naval Museum - really well done.  You could spend days there and still not see it all.
Then we went to the Royal Observatory and wished we had gone there first.  Again you could spend a long time - we were on the late side so didn't see it all.  Roy and I lined up to have our picture taken on the prime meridian with many, many others.  Must have taken 20 minutes to half an hour to get our turn.  We were entertained in line by Mr Airy, alias Scary Airy.  He is known for making the first spectacles, pea shooter, the meridian and he made the trains run on time. 

We had lunch in a place suggested in Rick Steeves book, the Brewery.  A great lunch in very pleasant surroundings.  Good for people watching(and a little eavesdropping).

Back to our room around 8:00.  We are sitting in the very hot lobby to do our blogging.  I am turning into a sweat blob - probably lost 2 pounds just sitting here.

Good night and God bless and over to Roy

Not much to add.  They had John Harrisons clocks which were the first clocks to work accurately in ships.  Built in the 1700's they were amazing.  He built 4 prototypes, each one better than the one before and each one took years to build.  He was a joiner by trade and taught himself clock making when a 20K pound was offered to build a working ship clock.  Up till then most were pendulum clocks.  They made navigation of Longitude possible and save many a ship from running aground at night and in foul weather.  The maritime museum had dozens of brass instruments and globes which are over 300 years old.  Very intricate and its amazing they had the technology a nd ability to make such precise instruments for the day.  We also got to see the largest working telescope in Britain.  Its a 28 inch and still used today.  Very interesting.  Weather is finally starting to cool off, it will be welcome.