Bombs, Canada Day, and Lord of the Rings!

Here's a quick recap of yesterday: saw the changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace, went to Harrod's, stopped at the Science Museum, where the most exciting thing was me spotting Natalie Maines (lead singer of the Dixie Chicks) outside on the sidewalk! I didn't bug her for a pic as she is on vacation with her kids. On to St.Paul's Cathedral for the 5 o'clock evensong service, which included organ and choir, very nice. Lastly we went to the Lion King live show, which was grrrrrrreat! The costumes and set were awesome, and the kid who played Simba was very impressive. Had an interesting night in a 20 bed dorm room, but we survived. Today began with a walk around Hyde Park with the intentions of visiting Kensington Palace, but it cost 13 pounds (nearly $30 CDN) so we opted out. Saw the Princess Di memorial fountain and other interesting things in the park. Stopped at Notting Hill and walked down the market place. In London, I've learned, it can go from hot, to pouring rain, to hot, to cloudy and sprinkling, and then hot again all in an hour! We took the tube to Picadilly Circus from Notting Hill and began walking to Trafalgar Square when we noticed all these vans with satellite dishes on top and reporters buzzing around, and then we saw police tape across several blocks. I asked a reporter what was going on and he told us about the bomb found last night in a car in front of a packed night club. Fortunately it was found before it went off, but it made for a really congested part of London. Trafalgar Square was looking very Canadian, as they had a huge dealio going on to celebrate Canada Day! There was a street hockey tourney, Moosehead beer, and then later on concerts headlined by Sam Roberts. It was fun to get in the spirit of Canada Day, as I'll miss our own celebrations back home this year. I saw Gill off at King's Cross train station (yes that is the one Harry Potter goes to platform 9 3/4 in!!!) then bought a ticket to the Lord of the Rings play for only 15 pounds. It was super, squashing all 3 books into just over 3 hours through a very cool stage and set. The acting was nothing to write home about, just the overall set and the special effects like the balrog the Gandolf duels with in Moria. So it is pretty late now and I will have to do some ingenious packing to get all my stuff to Africa tomorrow!