GO WALLABIES! We played sooooo well last night and defeated England 33-13! Jamie wasn't as happy as me as you can imagine. Throughout the game me and the other Aussies kept up a constant "AUSSIE AUSSIE AUSSIE - OI OI OI!" And even sang Waltzing Mathilda at the end. So we've now knocked England out of the World Cup and made them the first host nation to not progress past the group stage in rugby World Cup history. Oops!
We had a huge lie in today as I've been unwell and yesterday was such a big day. Then Jamie went home, I got a few things done and next I set off walking. My plan was to go walk around Southbank, but once I got there I realised I had a golden opportunity in front of me. Back in March I wrote a London list of things I wanted to do, and as of today I had three things left (out of about 60!). One of them was a boat ride down the Thames. Today was brilliant and sunny so I decided to have a look at the wharf! Coincidentally there was a boat leaving as I arrived, and I saved £5 with my student card.
For the next 90 minutes I sat in a T-shirt soaking up the sun and London's sights from the river. We had a hilarious guide who had such a funny sense of humour. I laughed a lot!!!! Noticed some things I hadn't before too and then also saw the typical things - parliament, fire monument, walkie talkie etc, Tower of London, tower bridge....
Our guide pointed out an obelisk on the bank of the Thames that was a gift from Egypt for beating Napoleon. It's 3500 years old - older than London itself! We saw the HMS President which is a ship graffitied so it would dazzles periscopes. We also found out that the actual "City of London" is 1 square mile. The 32 boroughs of London surrounded by the M25 make up Greater London. And, the shard is 1019 feet tall!
The end of the first half of our cruise was at Tower Bridge. We went under the bridge, and then something absolutely amazing happened. A bell sounded, and I did wonder but I told myself not to be silly. But then our guide said what I had hoped - the bridge was opening to let a bigger boat through! Apparently this is really rare and he said we were extremely lucky to see it. It was great! It opened in 60 seconds and let the boat through then closed again. I love those 'right place right time' moments.
We headed back along the river and ended at the Eye. Sitting on the boat I noticed some colours on the bottom of the Eye pods. And I must've been in an observant mood today, as it turned out the 20 World Cup country's flags were on the bottom of the pods. There are 32 pods, so each pool (5 teams) was in a row followed by 3 blank ones. I took lots of photos for the kids at school! Speaking of the rugby World Cup - saw so many people in wallabies tops today. I kept saying 'go wallabies!' And high fiving them haha.
I headed home for a bit and got some groceries. Had some pasta and garlic bread for dinner, then set out again. I got the bus to the river and walked to the Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. The original globe was erected in 1599. Unfortunately it burnt down in 1613 during a performance when a stage cannon ignited the thatched roof. It was rebuilt but dismantled, but then rebuilt due to a dream of American actor Sam Wanamaker and it opened in 1997.
I met my friend James outside the theatre and we queued. I bought the tickets in March this year, and they were £5 for standing room only. We queued up to get good spots for an hour and I'm so glad we did! We were about 10th in the queue and got spots to stand right up against the stage with a fantastic view. Also it meant we could lean on the stage!
Originally when I booked the tickets for 'Richard II' I didn't expect much. I thought it would be a good experience but I would get bored. I was wrong!! It was 2-3 hours of laughter, funny props and a storyline that I could actually follow. At school I found Shakespeare hard to follow but tonight I understood what was happening! I spent the first half of the play staring at the guy playing Richard wondering why on earth he was so familiar. At interval it hit me....he played Michael Gregson in 'Downton Abbey'! He and some of the other actors at times were literally 20cm from me, their clothes sweeping right past my face when they walked. He smiled at me at the end too! And before the play started we also spotted John C Lewis who played 'Amos' (AKA Renee Zellweger's husband) in the movie 'Chicago' in the crowd! The play was fantastic and it was so wonderful standing as people would have hundreds of years ago. I'm so happy we could actually understand and enjoy it!
After a huge weekend I'm really tired but I'm watching 'The Amazing Race' while I type this. It's making me realise how quickly this year is going - they're in Rio de Janeiro and have been to Copacabana Beach and the hang gliding place I went to! Can't believe that was over seven months ago now. Crazy!!
Love to all
Claire
Xoxox
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