Dawn of the Final Day: 24 hours remain

(The title's a video game reference, by the way. It was fitting.)

Today's plans were laid out very well. Unfortunately they didn't happen the way we wanted.

Breakfast as usual, no difference, followed by a quick runover of what we were going to do before heading out. Our plan was The London Dungeon right next to the hotel, followed the museums via the bus tours, then the Tower of London and catch a boat back to our hotel.

We left a little later than we wanted and headed right over to the London Dungeon, discovering that even though we got our tickets, we weren't going to head in until about 2 hours later. This wasn't enough time to do either of the two things we wanted, and instead opted for heading back to the hotel until it was time to go. This meant we gave up going back to the museums (which meant I didn't get the thing I wanted). But we still got to see the Dungeon.

The London Dungeon, once a famous place for prisoners, is now a scare house for tourists. Not only that, but its a great history lesson as well! We learned about the Black Death of course, as well as Guy Fawkes, Jack te Ripper, and Sweeny Todd. I'm next to impossible to scare, sadly. It was still fun either way, and they're effects were really cool! Most of the actors were into their roles as well, which is always wonderful to see and be apart of. They even had this ride-like thing that dropped you really fast a couple of feet called Drop Dead. (Our pictures were hilarious, but Mom was in a seperate one so she wouldn't buy them.)

Afterwards we caught a bus down to the Tower of London and got to watch the Tower Bridge open up for a ship. The Tower of London itself was really awesome, filled with cool bits of history. They kept pet ravens, beautiful large black birds that I enjoyed watching. One knew how to pose, standing on a rusted canon cawing at us. But the best part? The Crown Jewels.

On display are the Crown Jewels of the royal family, several gorgeous (and heavy) crowns worn by past monarchs, along with these ornate specters with diamonds the size of my fist, literally. I drifted toward the weapons of course, the maces and swords used in ceremonies. There was the Jeweled Sword of Offerings, a really heavily decorated sword. Like, it was crazy how many gems were on the hilt of this thing. Then there was the Sword of State, used for many occasions like the State Opening of Parliament and the Coronation. Then there were three other swords; the Sword of Temporal Justice, Spiritual Justice, and the Sword of Mercy. (Interestingly enough, the Sword of Mercy's blade ends in a square tip and looks to be not sharp.)

The smallest crown on display was Queen Victoria's, designed to wear with her mourning veil as her husband had recently died. The most ridiculous piece? The punch bowl. A king had it commissioned, but it was so crazy huge and detailed that he probably never got to use it before he died. The thing is huge! Apparenly it takes 144 bottle of wine to fill it, its so big. The ladle could have been my walking stick too. Still in use, surprisingly.

Once we were done we caught a boat ride back, returning to our hotel for packing and preparing. Along the way we stopped at a Japanese restaurant where these tiny dishes went by on a conveyor belt. (Heather, if you're reading this, you should send some mochi once I'm home. I forgot I love that stuff.)

Tomorrow we wake up extremely early, so I'll go ahead and sign off for now. One final update for tomorrow, and that'll be it!