London prepares for a Royal Wedding ...

We had a great week in London watching as the country prepares for the wedding of Prince William and Kate. We had made our plans before their engagement was announced, and I was more than a little disappointed that we would miss the wedding by a little over a week! If Pat has been a "Russophile", I have loved British history and was looking forward to my first trip to London. It is a more beautiful and comfortable city than I had anticipated, and we enjoyed visits to the Natural History Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum and British Museum, all of which are free. We enjoyed walking through the city, and actually didn't even need to use the very easy to navigate Tube system.

One of the things that has been interesting for us is that the countries we have visited are all past British Empires - New Zealand, Australia, India, parts of Africa - and still bear some influence from the Brits. We got so used to the driving on the left side of the road that it almost seemed like the right way (no pun intended) to do it. We read a book about the history of the transition to independence for India entitled Indian Summer which detailed the history of Richard and Edwina Mountbatten's years in India (soon to be made into a movie starring Cate Blanchett according to some sources) with an interesting history of their relationships with Nehru and Ghandi and Ali Jinnah ... and then were walking down a street a few blocks from our hotel and saw a placard identifying the flat they had lived in while in London. That you can walk by their former home, Winston Churchill's former home, and so many other historical sites in a day's walk is really extraordinary.

We were close to Kensington Palace, the former home of Princess Diana, and visited her memorial fountain - picture to follow. It is a circular wading pool, filled most days with laughing children who have peeled their socks and shoes off to go wading. Wouldn't she have loved that? I have always thought she was a person of unusual resilience and grace, and I think most of Great Britain will be thinking of her with good wishes for her son and Kate Middleton this weekend.

The flowers were in bloom, Queen's cavalry were out doing their exercises, and every souvenir stand was filled with "Kate and Will" memorabilia. Portobello Road was no exception - an experience in itself! Just a great week in all.

A word about our travel planning - we have used Trip Advisor (www.tripadvisor.com) extensively during our walkabout and have had consistently great luck on lodging and places to eat. In London we stayed at a small hotel called Luna Simone near Victoria Station, and it was really a great and affordable spot in very expensive London. Great way to be your own travel agent!