Flat Stanley - Visit to London

Flat stanley (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Stanley) reached London on 20th of December. It was sent by Eshan from Brazil. Since I had left for India by then, Flat Stanley had to stay locked within my mail box till 29th of December. On 29th of December, I came back from India. My sister (Shrutika), my neice (Sai) and my brother in law (Sunil) visited me from 29th December till 5th January.

We went and picked up Flat Stanley from the mail box and brought him home. He was very relieved to come home. After that we clicked this picture.

Along with Flat Stanley, Sunil, Sai, Shrutika and my self (Pratap), we visited Dover and places near Dover. Here are some photo's from Dover.

Dover is the place where ferries and underground train from France reaches United Kingdom. You can see a ship arriving from france in the distance

The ship from france is coming in

This is a picture of the harbour of Dover where the ship came in and docked

This is a picture of me agains the famous white cliffs of Dover. The cliffs are made up of Chalk.

After visiting the cliffs and the harbour, we went for a short ride in a tiny train. This is the only commercially running mini-train in the world.

See how tiny the train is compared to the height of the guard for the train

You can see people sitting in the train. See how tiny the train is.

There are two trains in this picture. We are going in one direction and a different train is coming from the other direction.

We are waiting for the train during the return journey.

This the train we used for the return journey. It is green coloured.

This is a picture of the engine of the train we saw being repaird. See how tiny it is compared to the engine man

The engine races away after being repaired

A close-up picture of the mini train engine

This is a picture of Sai and Sunil talking to Flat Stanley who was sitting on my side

We finally reach back where we started and get off the train. Now we returned to London and visited the Lords Cricket Stadium

This is a picture of the Lords cricket stadium in London. A county cricket match is going on.

After Lords, we visited Wimbledon, where tennis matches take place. This is a picture of one of the tennis court at Wimbledon, which is close to London.

See the sign of Wimbledon. This is the place where a large screen shows matches when the tournament is going on to those people waiting outside for tickets. Tickets are very difficult to get for the Wimbledon and some people watch the match from outside itself on these screens.

This is a plaque at Wimbledon about the longest match placed there. It went on for more than 2 days!!!

This is board listing who won Wimbledon in which year.

This is the famous centre court of Wimbedon where all the final matches take place

This is another picture of the centre court of wimbledon

This is another picture of the centre court of wimbledon

This is another picture of the centre court of wimbledon

These are the prizes given to the mens winner and the womens winner of Wimbledon singles. The plate is given to women, while the cup is given to men. After this, we went to the London Zoo.

This is a picture of a gorilla with his back to us.

There is a Lion in the background in this picture. Can you spot it?

Flat Stanley went and said Hi to the Tiger. The tiger replied GRRRR!!! Flat stanley was scared and we moved away to see the penguins.

This is a picture of penguins from the surface.

This is a picture of penguins from behind a glass wall

This is an underwater picture of penguins from behind a glass wall

This is another underwater picture of penguins from behind a glass wall

This is another picture of many penguins taken from the surface.

Here are some penguins outside the water.

Here are some camel like animals. I do not recall their names.

This is a picture of the zebra

We also met with the giraffe's. They were very tall.

The giraffe came and tried to eat up flat stanley. I had to quickly save him, else he would have been eaten by the giraffe thinking it was some leaf of a tree. Then we returned close to home, where there was ice skating going on.

Flat Stanley, I, Sai, Sunil and Shrutika skated on the ice.

One more picture of the skating on the ice. After this we came home.

Here is a picture of Flat Stanley with Sunil, Sai and Shrutika. After this, Sai, Sunil and Shrutika went home.

For the next few days, I took Flat Stanley with me to my office. Here is a picture of Flat Stanley with me in my office.

Again, I took Flat Stanley to my office. Flat Stanley said that he got bored in my office. So I left him at home for the next two days again.

The next weekend my other sister, Vaishali, brother in law Vijay and their Son, Arnav visited us. This is a picture of Flat Stanley with them. Flat Stanley liked Arnav a lot and enjoyed their company. They stayed with me for a week and we all had a lot of fun.

The weekend after that, Sai Shrutika, Sunil Came to meet Vaishali, Vijay, Arnav, me and Flat Stanley. Sai was missing Flat Stanley and Flat Stanley was also very happy to see her. This above is a picture when we went to drop Vaishali, Vijay and Arnav to the Airport. You can see the check-in counters in the back ground, where they did the check-in to go to India.

This a picture of flat Stanley with Arnav at London's Heathrow Airport. After dropping them at the Airport, Sai, Sunil, Shrutika and I came back home. Sai and Flat Stanley played a lot.

This is a picture of Flat Stanley with Shrutika and Sai. After this weekend, Sai went back to her home with Sunil and Shrutika.

Now its again Flat Stanley and me alone. For the next few days it was very cold and I stayed home with Flat Stanley. In fact it snowed a lot. The following picture is taken from our window.  See the snow on the ground and roads. Can you see the car travelling on the road and the man walking in the snow?

The following picture is of the snow over our small playground

 This is how the playground looks normally

It slowly became darker and darker (during the winter in the UK, days are short and nights are long). The following is a photo of the playground in the evening.

Then it became colder in the night. Flat Stanley was very cold and had to sleep with a strong duvet on. See the following photo.

 Next morning, I and flat stanley went for a walk around our building to enjoy the snow. The following are some pictures of the snow around our building. See the snow on the ground in the following picture. One has to be very careful, because it is very slippery and one can fall and hurt oneself easily.

Next day the weather was better and I took flat stanley to show him the Buckingham palace, where the queen of UK stays. We went by train from North Acton station. The following picture is taken at North Acton station.

We went from North Acton to Bond Street Station using the london tube by the tube train shown in the following picture. The doors open automatically when the train stops and one has to get in quickly before the doors close again automatically. 

A map of the tube railway system of london can be found in the attached link

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/standard-tube-map.pdf

The following picture is taken underground before boarding the train from bond steet to the green park station where Buckingham palace is located. Bond street station is under the ground.

The Buckingham palace is visible in the Distance. It is a huge and lovely building. All these people are going to see it.

                                      
                                         This is a close-up picture of Buckingham palace.

This is another picture of Buckingham palace. During the winter, it is closed to visitors, so we could not go in. We could not go in, but I have included the following two pictures taken during the summer about how the interior of the palace looks. The queen is very rich and all the furniture in this picture is very very expensive and beautiful

The following is a picture of the guard outside the queens palace. He is carrying a gun. This is neccessary to protect the queen from any danger.

On the way back, this is taken at the underground Bond steet station, while waiting for the tube train to go to North Acton station.

Next day Flat Stanley and I went to meet Joanna Melstrom and her 3 sons. Two of them are twins and the third is elder to them. They knew about Flat Stanley, because their teacher had told them his story. They have a book of Flat stanley at home. So they were very happy to meet Flat Stanley. The following is their picture with Flat Stanley.

Next day I took Flat Stanley to show him the London bridge and Tower of London. The following is a picture of London Bridge

The following picture is of london bridge taken from the side showing vehicles traveling on the bridge.

The interesting thing about the london bridge is that it opens in between to let large ships pass through. This happens once or twice in a day. Fortunately I and Flat Stanley were able to see this when we were there as shown in following picture.

Now for the most important picture. I am sure you have heard of Harry Potter. Harry Potter boards the train to go to to his magic school (Hogwarts School of Magic) from Platform 9(3/4)th at the Kings Cross Station in London. From this platform, I am now sending Flat Stanley back to Brazil to eshan, his friends and his teachers.

Hope you all enjoyed the journey with Flat Stanley and hope he reaches home safely. Let me know if you have any questions about London, Dover or UK.