The London Tower!

GINORMOUS.  That's what it is.  And quite beautiful :)

We ended up getting to the Tower probably around 11:30ish this morning, and spent the day until 17:00! (-Aka: 5pm.  Haha ;) )  Long time.  But good time :)

When we got to the "Tower Hill" tube stop, we walked out of the station, saying "Ookay.  Now the question is where to go from here."  Then as we looked across the street, Ariel pointed out the GIANT fortress of towers.  And said "That's it!"  Haha... If I had a £ for every time we've said something like that, and it's been RIGHT IN FRONT of us -- I'd be pretty rich ;)
As we were walking up the stairs to get over to the Tower, we ran into a few things...

A GIANT SUNDIAL!

AND this creeper-killer-statute-mime man.
I was afraid that if he saw me taking a picture of him, he would chase after me.  Therefore, for this picture to come about, I pretended to take a picture of Becca :)  Ha. And instead zoomed up reallly close to him.  Good times!
We left after that... so.. I'm still not sure what happens when he does move...

And, of course, the Tower - which you see right after walking out of the tube station :)

The towers are crazy cool, pretty, beautiful, and CRAZY OLD.  It's so amazing to think that these things were here so long ago.  

Closer up, left

to right!

SO PRETTY!!!

Closer-up of the sweet lions.  They're made out of wire!!
(ish-material.  It kinda looks like chicken wire.)

Catapult! 

Inevitable that I take a picture of a bird?  Yes.  But he was kinda cute!

Bear!

Close up, so you can see the texture...

See??
The chicken wire (or whatever it is) is what give it the texture to look FURRY!  SO COOL!

 And now, a few things inside the towers :)

A re-created room.
The fireplace (left) was even "lit," complete with crackling noises ;) ;)

Throne

Tomb of Henry VI

Some of the towers were demolished, then rebuilt - this one more "recently" (19th century)

A Chalice!  In the Lanthorn Tower :)

Cool sculpture Axe Man :)

Built in 1240!!!  And I walked through it!

Weapons!

Wearing the armor :)

Fortress Health and Saftey

Another cool statue weapon man :)

This was in one of the towers that showed different types of war uniforms and different ..."accessories"? used by the soldiers.  It started with early, and made it's way closer to now.
This backpack?  Not too heavy -- but I definitely couldn't carry it for very long.  And....

...the backpack was only a FOURTH OF THE WEIGHT of what it normally is!
CRAZY sauce!  I.  Would.  Die.  Just from carrying the backpack alone.

And that brings us to the White Tower!  Which included a bunch of armors, swords, and other misc cool things from the kings, their horses, and other "war men."

1080!!!  Can you BELIEVE THAT??

White Tower!

King Henry VIII's armor 

Jubilee Crystal Diamond and The Queen's Diamond Jubilee Beacons --Giant! 

GINORMOUS BOOK.  From 1914!!!
Filled with 914 pages  of detailed lists of items in the Armories and Weapon House at the Tower of London.

Super sweet swords!

DRAGON!  Made from multiple different weapons/shields/etc.

This I just found kind of funny.... 

The "Bloody ToweR" was originally "The Garden Tower"  Ha!
Then the sons of King Edward IV went missing there...

So... at the Tower of London are the Crown Jewels.  Aka:  All the amazingly beautifully gorgeous crowns of past kings, queens, princes... and things that get passed from royalty to royalty...etc, like swords and such.  This was definitely another one of those things that you're not allowed to take pictures of, and I really really really wish I was able to... but, alas.  But they were gorgeous.  Just know that much. :)

This is the tower that had the Crown Jewels inside!!!

The Crown Jewels!

Becca likes taking pictures...really close-up pictures ;) Haha.

Same Axe Man as earlier, but this time with me!  

Swooning over the Axe Man. ;)

And, of course, there's the Tower Bridge.  Which, throughout this entire endeavor of being at the Tower of London, I took a million pictures of.  Really.  But I'll spare you, and only make you look at a few. ;)

So pretty!  Right???  It's just so artistic!

Just across the street from the Tower is the Tower Hill Memorial... so we jumped over there before headin' home. 

And... on our way home, there's this indian food place we walk by nearly every day... Ariel, Becca and I were hungry-- so.... we decided to stop in.  SUPER GOOD.  Ha.  But... the restaurant ended up being a bit... more "fancy" than we expected.  Regardless of how tiny small it was inside.  Haha.  They brought out food out and set it on silver platters, gave us a plate of toothpicks, and some sort of ...spice mixture/ at the end of the meal while we were waiting for our check... AND they gave us warm towels to wash our hands!  Haha.... Good times, good times. :)

Little India!
--It was the NEON sign that confused us -making us think it wasn't going to be super fancy....

Mmmmm :)

Becca & Ariel :)

Becca, confused as to what to do with her warm towel.  ;)

 And... that's the day :)  A Tower, Monument, and some Food.  Doesn't sound like a lot.... but it definitely was!
P.S. Is it weird that this was day 9??  Cause... it's definitely weird to me.