Night Sights

Last night, we went out for a drive. Top down, wind in our hair, we zipped through the more expensive half of the Monopoly Board past 10 Downing Street only to go back to Westminster Palace and Abbey for a few night pics.

 

As I've already mentioned before, Westminster Palace is where the government functions from. I think what impressed me most tonight, was the security you feel outside this superstructure simply brought on by the lack of security here! Unlike anywhere else I've been, you can walk right up to the gates, pose with the Bobbies manning the posts, have a chat, and not be shooed away, while the government functions within. I was also impressed to learn that anybody, native or foreign, can go an watch the parliamentary debates! I've got my eyes on the calendar to see if I can make it inside for one. While tickets to the palace are an 18 Pounds that I don't really feel like spending, I (and you) can walk into the House of  Commons for free! So let's see how that goes.

Here's Westminster Abbey where the likes of Charles Darwin, Isaac Newtown, Robert Browning, Rudyard Kipling, Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Samuel Johnson find eternal rest.

That done, here are a few night colours courtesy the Thames.

And since this blogpost started with the subject of the British parliament, i thought it might be nice to pay honour to a much used and frighteningly abused cultural icon of Britain with parliamentary roots:

This was a poster created by the British Government in preparation for World War II. The poster was intended to raise the morale of the British Public in the aftermath of widely predicted mass attacks on major cities. Hoewver, the Blitz came and went but the poster never saw a wall until it was rediscovered in 2000. And the story, as you know it, goes on.... 

On that note fellow, the day is young, keep calm and carry on :)