This is a sort of overview of the changing of the guard.  As you can (sort of) see, it's a whole heap of red-coats with their funny helmets marching around and stuff. A big group of them play in a band as well.  We didn't have the best view, because we turned up late and there were already a million people there.

These two guys kept marching right up to the fence in front of us, turning around and marching right back.  They must have been pretty hot because it was boiling.  I think London has been having a heat wave for the last week or so, which just broke yesterday.  Anyway, they have swords.  They are cool. :)

Tram and Kelli in front of Buckingham Palace

These are the gates to the palace.  There were thousands of people on either side (you can see one videoing the ceremony), but you were allowed to walk past.  So, I took a photo :)

Ahh! The horsey is going to eat me!  They were telling everyone to get out of the way (this is just to the side of the gate.. no.. they weren't telling me to stop standing in the middle of the road taking photos :).  The horse moved forward, and everyone else moved back.

And the reason they had to clear the road?  So these guys could march around the square outside.

This statue is in the middle of the square.  They tend to have gold gilt on a lot of things.  Nice.

Here is a nice panorama of the palace that I stitched together.  Can you see the ghost of a tourist taking a photo?

After the changing of the guard, we went on the the Tower of London.  This is it from the outside.  It's pretty big.  We didn't finish going through it all, but we saw a lot of it...

The White Tower in the centre of the Tower of London.  They used to have torture chambers under here, but now they only have a gift shop. Figures.

Tram getting acquainted with the locals

This was one of the more interesting torture devices.  It's called The Scavenger's Daughter.  The text next to it goes thusly:

"Besides the Rack, the principal kind of torture in England is called the 'Scavenger's Daughter'. It is the complete opposite of the rack... The prisoner's body is folded into three, with the shins up against the thighs and the thighs against the stomach.  The torturer then forces the ends of two iron bows together and locks the prisoner inside, almost crushing his body with a hellish compression.  This is an inhuman torture, in every way worse than the rack...".

Sounds fun.

Is Tram trying to tell me something? Nah.  Anyway, in here were the crown jewels.  Very nice, gaudy and elaborate.  Unfortunately they wouldn't let us take photos :(  Some tourists who didn't know English almost got thrown out because they wouldn't stop.  I think there are two reasons: One is that the fabric etc might fade or whatever.  The second is that I reckon they are trying to make everyone buy the books in the gift shop.  Some beautiful stuff, some of which was in use as well.  We liked the giant gold "chip-n-dip" the best :)

Tram on one of the walls of the Tower.  Nice contrail in the background.

Some ancient graffiti by actual inmates.  There are bits of it all over the Tower, and they are all covered by protective plastic.  It's quite funny because they use old English and everything.  I think one of them said something like "He who endureth till the end shall be saved" or something.  They had some pretty famous prisoners.

At this point, my camera ran out of power :( Whoops, forgot to fully charge it.  Luckily Kelli brought her digital camera as well, so as soon as I get them off her, I'll put some more interesting ones up.

Tram is off to play Touch tonight, so I'll sneak my camera in and take a few action shots for you.  It's a bit rainy today, so it will be interesting to see how she goes.

In other news, I _might_ have an interview lined up! I called one of the more promising jobs that I applied for and the recruiter was impressed.  Got full marks on the test she gave me as well.  So, hopefully things are turning around and I'll be happily employed again.  I hope that everyone is doing well back home and I'll talk to you soon.

Paul