We took advantage of Chris being home for Good Friday to go explore a part of London that we hadn’t been to yet . . . Greenwich, home of Greenwich Mean Time and the Prime Meridian Line.
Greenwich isn’t the easiest of places to get to, as we took the train, the tube, and then a separate light rail train. But, it was all worth it. The town of Greenwich, itself, is very cute and enjoyable.
Our first stop was lunch, which is always a treat. Gourmet Burger Kitchen is always a favorite in our books.
Full tummies are always a must for being happy tourists, at least for our kids.
Caleb Devouring His Burger
Our first tourist attraction was the Cutty Sark, the last clipper ship to be built as a merchant vessel. It was built in 1869 and has been here in Greenwich in dry dock since 1954.
It was damaged in a fire a few years ago so has been undergoing renovation work. It reopens for touring at the end of the month, so our extent of viewing it was from the outside.
We really wanted to get to the Observatory and the Planetarium so we quickly walked through the Old Royal Naval College grounds and the National Maritime Museum.
On our quick run-through the museum the kids found some fun little kids’ displays.
Pirate Cami
We also got to experiment hands-on with how ships communicated through time. It was a very kids-friendly museum.
Emma Talking to the Ship’s Captain
We made the trek up the hill to the Observatory and Planetarium. The climb was steep but the view from the top was beautiful.
Greenwich from the Hill
Right now they are getting the grounds set up for the Olympic Equestrian Events so it looks a bit different than normal.
At the top of the hill, we were able to set our clocks to the Master Clock in Greenwich. We weren’t too far off.
We really wanted to be able to straddle the Prime Meridian in this exact location (we had straddled it at the O2 Arena when we went for the London Prepares Gymnastics events).
We stood in the queue for an hour . . . just so we could have this picture:
Straddling the Prime Meridian
The kids look less than thrilled, but we were so happy to finally be at the front of the queue and mindful of everyone else waiting to take a similar picture. Chris did hop in quickly to get a picture of his own feet straddling the line.
Chris Straddling the Prime Meridian
Once finished at the Observatory, we walked over to the Planetarium. There were so many hands-on exhibits in here as well, but we had bought tickets for a show so went directly to the theatre, which had just reopened that day!
Planetarium
We had a great time watching the planets and an informative film about the Voyager Space Probes that were launched in 1977. It was really interesting to see what had been learned from them. The seats in the theatre were so comfortable as we leaned back to see the screen above. Cami was even enthralled. It would be fun to go back for different shows, as it’s the only planetarium in the London area!
Our last stop of the day was for something to munch on while we journeyed home. We love these little sweet shops!
Sweet Shop
A fun day out in London . . . with another thing ticked off our ‘to-see-in-London’ list!
Cami’s Lolly
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