London in 48 hours

Having a great time in London. Arrived here Wednesday afternoon and met up with my buddy Bruce outside his office after taking the overground train from the airport. As he finished up work I re-entered tourist mode and visited St. Paul's Cathedral. Absolutely beautiful, and there was a choir singing when I arrived which helped the hairs on the back of my neck stand up even further. And to think of how old everything here is is crazy - the sign at the entrance of St. Paul's said that a church has stood on that site continuously since 600 AD.

Wednesday night we went out in Fulham/Chelsea area where Bruce lives and watched the first half of the Manchester United - Arsenal game. Saw the only goal of the match, then met up with our friend Carl and had a pretty big night. Was glad I didn't have to get up for work in the morning.

Yesterday I did the standard tourist circuit in the City - hit up Big Ben and Parliament, spent an hour in Westminster Abbey (incredible), and saw Buckingham Palace. Very cool. Big Ben is gorgeous and so detailed, and Westminster Abbey has a mind boggling amount of history inside of it (as does the rest of London). There are graves or memorials for some of the most important Britons in history, including many royal figures, authors like Chaucer and Shakespeare, war heroes, and even Charles Darwin (go figure).

After my sight seeing I met up with Bruce and a couple guys he works with, as one of his colleagues is a former muay thai fighter (trained in Thailand for a bit and fought semi-professionally for years) and trains at a place in East London. I went along and it was awesome. Great to workout, and while I was definitely a bit rusty I held my own with some of the aspiring MMA guys in the gym when we sparred for 45 minutes at the end. My shins have the bruises to prove it.


I'm off to Paris this afternoon to meet up with my Mom and grandmom. Very excited.