London tour de Grandpa

We contrasted our day of forest fun yesterday with a day in the city today - a trip to London, planned by my Dad.  He is quite an expert on all things London, especially new architecture and transport, so we were intrigued to see where he was going to take us.

Since the Olympics, the East End has been where it's at, so we headed there via rail, underground and Docklands Light Railway.  We spent a long time in the Crystal, a fantastic free facility sponsored by Siemens that explores all aspects of planning and building sustainable cities.  The kids were fully engaged by the interactive displays.  Over the course of a couple of hours I felt like I only absorbed a fraction of the information on offer.  We'd all like to visit again.

From there we took the spectacular Emirates Air Line cable car across the Thames, though the view was marred by constant rain.  So that's something else on the list to do again. 

A delicious late lunch at Wagamama restored our energy before we went to explore the O2 building, which the Man and I last visited (with a very baby Girl) in 2000, when it was still called the Millenium Dome.  Back then it was pretty much filled with generally disappointing exhibits.  It's now packed with eateries plus a concert venue and cinema.  A museum of British pop music should be opening soon.

Then we took the tube to London Bridge and explored that area - looking up at the newly completed 1000-foot Shard and eventually crossing Tower Bridge (pausing at the central crack) - before returning to Euston to make the journey back to Watford.

Even in the pouring rain, London is a cool city - and with new buildings going up and new attractions opening all the time, it just seems to get cooler with every visit.