This will be a short one for the day as my day was much shorter and I spent the remainder of my day planning out what I would be doing tomorrow, which will be a busy day out and about on my own.
Today the only place we toured was the Houses of Parliament, which are housed in the Palace of Westminster. This is something new I learned because I really thought that the building was called the Houses of Parliament. It's not. The building is massive though. Big Ben is a lot smaller than I thought it would be, but it was still really cool to see. We took the bus to get down there today. We passed by Trafalgar Square, which is a lovely place to look at. You can see a picture of that below.
The area around the Palace is quite bustling, as you could anticipate. A lot of people were stopped on the sidewalks taking photos. I can't blame them, I was one of those people. The building is amazing. I loved the architecture. Also around there was Westminster Abbey, which I got to see the outside of. I think I will be ceaselessly amazed by the architecture in this gorgeous city. Mostly everything is so old and I appreciate that.
Entering the Palace of Westminster, we came upon Westminster Hall, which is the oldest part of the building and survived the bombings in WWII, due to Winston Churchill's decision making. I believe that part of the building dates back to the 11th or 12th century. It saw the trial of King Charles I where he was tried for treachery (against his own monarchy...) and then executed elsewhere.
We took a walk through the entire Palace. We started over where the Queen walks in on the opening day of the session of Parliament, glanced at her robing room (where they definitely wanted us to know that she puts on her own "best hat", which is her crown), and then made our way to the House of Lords. This is where the Queen makes her opening speech. This is a very extravagant room and very impressive. Her throne is guilded in gold. I should also point out that you can't sit in most places. Red is the color of the House of Lords, because it used to be the most expensive color. There's a room where they debate and discuss laws. There are a lot of Lords, I learned, I think he said over 700?
Next to we saw the House of Commons. This area was bombed during WWII and thus the architecture looks much more different as it was rebuilt in the 1940's. The color of the House of Commons is green, because it was not as expensive. This area is still immaculate. Debates are apparently very heated and the rooms are jammed packed because there's never enough seats for all of the officials. I also learned the public can sit in on these. There's bullet proof glass where that gallery is though because I guess someone dumped a bunch of powder down onto everyone previously. Still very fancy looking. I also learned of the area where Guy Fawkes set up gunpowder to try to blow up Parliament before he was caught. Apparently they still go look down there now to this day. They also celebrate on the 5th of November and light off fireworks that are filled with gunpowder. So our guide said.
That was mostly it for the Palace of Westminster. It was interesting to learn about how bills become laws, somewhat similar to ours. They debate, they make changes, they have three reading of bills, and then it is signed with the Queen's name (but not actually signed by her). They apparently discussed the succession of the Colonies (in layman's terms, when the U.S wanted to be independent) in those very houses as well. Very cool to see. Not to mention, the wallpaper looks like velvet and the paintings are old and impressive.
