Sunday at the Tower

It's been a long time since I went to the Tower of London.  After Saturday's walk I decided to sign up again.  They do tours in the castle but this groups gets you in without waiting in the long lines etc and you have a smaller private group.  She didn't take us into any of the buildings - we can do that on our own when the tour ends.  It's impressive how much these people know with dates, names etc.  Of course, if she was spouting crap I wouldn't be able to call her on it, so who knows for sure.

I like all the beheadings and torture so I was happy to start outside the castle in the spot where the more public beheadings took place.  This is where Thomas More was axed, among others.  If you were a public figure/blue blood you were beheaded in this square.  The rabble were hanged nearby.  Only 9 people (several queens and other more royal personages) were actually executed in the tower. 

 There have been some changes since the last time I was here….including a lot of these animal sculptures.  The Tower was where the original menagerie lived before they moved it to Regent's Park and called it a zoo.  It all started when the King of France gave the King of England an Elephant.  Is this the original white elephant gift?  (I just googled it….It's not.)  There was also a polar bear who had an actual fishing license to get it's meal from the Thames.

 Tower Bridge is right next to the Tower so I couldn't resist taking a million shots...

 The Traitor's Gate…Prisoners would float out of the castle with a guard to parliament where they would stand trial.  The guard would hold an axe - - if it was pointed towards the prisoner on the return trip it meant he was due for the chopping block.  If it pointed away - acquittal.  This is before everyone got their news via Facebook.

The White Tower…it used to be white washed but now they leave the natural stone color. Being imprisoned in the Tower doesn't sound so bad - since the upper class was kept here they were allowed to roam the castle and just had to be back in their cell when the curfew bell rang.

One of the other changes since the last time I was here - the Shard! 

After WWII Rudolph Hess tried to escape to Scotland but was captured and held here in one of the Tudor buildings for a few days and had the nerve to complain about the early morning bagpipers.

 This is where they keep the Crown Jewels.  No photography allowed - I'm sorry Diane! 

 Did you know ravens are carnivores?  The legend has it that there has to be 6 crows at the Tower or the White Tower will collapse and the monarchy with it.  They keep 6 with 2 spare at the Tower at all times to be safe.  (Clipped wings prevent them from flying away - they can just do very big hops.)

It's hard to give you a full picture of the castle since there is a lot of open space in the different circles around the white tower.  It was all very impressive even my 3rd(4th?) time around.  However, despite being a beautiful sunny day and the fact that I was wearing gloves, I was battling Raynaud's phenomenon in my hands the whole time.  This is my only selfie of the day.  Those fingers were white for hours but eventually came back to life.  Part of the joy of hypothyroidism I guess.  I know I'm not the only one who gets this.  I was thinking of you, Chi!! (Not only because of my cold hands.  I used the walking tour group that you told me about when I was first leaving for the UK - it took a year and a half but I finally took your suggestion!!)

Rather than end with cold hands, I'll add these shots from my walk across Tower Bridge with special guest appearances by Shard and Gherkin.