EIS – To London, last day in England (Day 24)

EIS – To London, last day in England (Day 24)

(9/10/2010)  Our last full day in England and this morning we have a late start.  Breakfast starts at 7:00am, but we do not leave the hotel (a Ramada no less) until 9:00am.  Carmen and I ate breakfast at 7:00am and when we finished went out for a walk along the boardwalk.  Nearly across the street is a gazebo which extends out from the upper walkway.

We walked down along the beach and we found to our surprise that the beach is not sand, but small stones.  Coming from a place where our beaches are mostly fine sand, I cannot see lying in the sun on the beach here.  Everyone must use beach chairs to sit on the beach.  There are a couple of piers, this one was about a mile away and we did not get to walk on it.  This one has an amusement park at the end, similar to the one at several piers in the US.

Near the gazebo, the remains of another pier remain in the water.  As told by the tour guide, a storm destroyed the pier.  We in the US would have had to remove the skeleton of the old pier for safety reasons.  Here in England, they keep their ancient ruins, apparently, whatever they are.

We left the hotel on time and drove to the Royal Pavilion in Brighton, not far from the hotel.  The Royal Pavilion, built for a seaside resort for George, the Prince of Wales in 1787.  As you can see, the exterior is built in the Indo-Saracen style prevalent in India, as seen at the Taj Mahal. 

The interior of the Royal Pavilion, which we did not get in to see because it wasn’t open yet, has Chinese influences.

The front, or back depending on where you stand, has columns covering most of the façade.  The Indian influence, clearly seen in the lattice work and the tops of the windows was extended and redesigned in 1801-1808.

The tops of the chimneys match the tops of spires.  You can see the chimneys, just to the right of center, six of them and five just above those, all have the same tops as each of the regular column spires.

We left the Pavilion and Brighton and headed to London.  On the way, we made a late morning break at Tunbridge Wells.  Here we find a district, housing clothing and other shops, restaurants and cafes, called the Pantiles.  Several restaurants, bakery and coffee shops provide shoppers with snacks and lunches.  Carmen and I bought a couple of pastries; we’ve been doing this for most of the trip. 

Some of the building architecture in the Pantiles is in the black-and-white design that we have seen throughout England.  This one, the Duke of York, is a pub and it has some new add-ons, the security camera and alarm.  It is in front of the “Corn Exchange” an indoor shopping area.

Before too long we are back in London and our tour ends.  We verify our airline information for the next morning and also our ride pick up, and then we headed out for dinner and a walk around before returning to repack. 

We have a portable weight scale (if you travel having one of these becomes real handy) and weighed our bags and also bags for some of the people on our tour.  They thought they were way over weight, but they were fine.  Tomorrow morning, 6:15am, our ride to Gatwick airport picks us up for our flight back to the US.

Carmen and I will post more pictures of our trip in a couple of more postings.  We’ll have more pictures of some of the Cathedrals, Stonehenge, architecture, castles and the countryside.

Until later, Bob and Carmen – EIS.