Imperial War Museum and Parliament

Maegan and Enzo flew away this morning so we are all on our own. We are off to the Imperial War Museum. All the museums here are free entry which is great. It is a huge building consisting of 5 floors but the top two are school resources and an event space.

The first floor is dedicated to WWI and how the British won that. The second floor is WWII and how the British won that, the third floor is dedicated to the Holocaust, other foreign conflicts and terrorist attacks. We spent hours there wandering around looking at how the world had been involved in so many wars and conflicts and the really sad thing is that it seems humanity hasn’t really learnt much from any of these.

From here Dan went to visit Sherlock Holmes’ house and David and I went to visit the Palace of Westminster. The tours were all sold out so we thought we’d try our luck getting into the public gallery AND THEY LET US IN. After I got pulled aside for setting of the metal detector which turned out to be my knee braces.

We first went into the House of Commons where they were debating the High Speed train link to Birmingham. It was quite animated and just as boring as our Parliament Question Time but so interesting to see. There was no photos allowed in the chambers but we could take some snaps before we went in.

We stayed in the House of Commons for about half and hour and them went to see what was happening in the House of Lords. There seemed to be quite a few old gentlemen sleeping (that’s what it looked like) and this chamber was very different to the House of Commons. It was very ornate with lots of gold leaf on the beautiful walls and ceiling. The debate wasn’t as robust as the Commons, far more polite. They were debating child care and how it needs to be more accessible and affordable. It was such a fabulous experience to take in.

We caught up with Adam, Berta and Emi for the last time before we go home tomorrow. It has been such a wonderful couple of weeks and would love to stay longer but we can’t so it is off to Heathrow tomorrow to come home.Read more