Alright. Time to finish this bad boy known as Day 3 of our London trip. Like I said, it was a beast. From the Tower of London, we grabbed some coffee at Starbucks (I know, I know but we needed a little energy boost after the Tower) under the Tower Bridge and then started walking towards St. Paul's. St. Paul's was probably my favorite church (and one of my favorite sites in general) on our trip. It was awe-inspiring. I thought I liked Westminster, but I had an "experience" at St. Paul's. We realized St. Paul's was where Princess Diana and Prince Charles were married.
The inside was beautiful with the dome and the mosaics on the ceilings. It felt a lot less crowded and more grand than Westminster. We went up to the dome (actually three separate domes) and walked up what felt like a million stairs. The first dome was called the Whispering Gallery. You could sit along the outside of the dome and whisper along the curved wall and because of the way the dome was built, you could hear what someone whispered from across the room. So cool! Sometimes you'd catch it just right and be able to hear a bunch of whispering voices all at once and it was kind of eerie. Here's the view from the first dome.
From there, we hiked all the way to the second and third domes. At the third dome, we got to go outside and see the great views of the city from the top.
On our way out, just before they closed, they started rehearsal for the children's choir and it was amazing. I have never heard anything like it. It was so beautiful. They were practicing hymns and just being there listening to the singing ring throughout the beautiful church was like nothing else. It was probably one of my favorite parts of our entire trip. We managed to snap a few stealthy pics on our way out...
From St. Paul's, we stopped by a little pub to get some beer and grub (we loved all the colorful pubs around the city). We kept walking along the Thames River, past Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (we didn't go inside) and saw some other cool things along the way. We walked past one wall of what was probably an old church from the 1200s that still had the old round window. A cool pub on the river. A sweet gothic church (I can't remember what it was called) that we happened to come across and popped in just before it closed.
We walked across the Tower Bridge on our way back towards the Tower of London where we met up with the London Walk group to go on a "Jack the Ripper" Walk.
This was our "Ripperologist" or tour guide that led us to about 5 different spots around the City of London and old London while explaining all the theories and conspiracies surrounding Jack the Ripper.
It was really interesting (and pretty creepy, too) to hear about Jack the Ripper and what actually happened. They never caught the guy! Luckily, it's been over a hundred years since the events happened so the guy is definitely long gone by now!
On the way home we stopped at the grocery store and bought some chocolate cake since we couldn't find any gelato in our neighborhood. It was tasty!
Day 4 (our last day in London) coming up!
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