I’ve been to London twice, with my trips almost exactly a decade apart. Both times I was struck by how modern the city felt alongside its historic landmarks, and by just how much there is to do here.
I’m not necessarily proud of it, but believe it or not, London was also the first place in my life where I got drunk! I was 22 years old and serving in the U.S. Marines. I had always refused to drink because it seemed like that was all everyone else my age wanted to do, so eventually I became almost rebellious about not drinking. After a six-month Mediterranean deployment aboard an aircraft carrier, London was our final port call, and somehow drinking just happened. I remember being amazed that it was physically possible to put that much liquid into your body, alcoholic or otherwise.
Before arriving, I had expected London to feel similar to the United States simply because we were both English-speaking countries. Because of that, it was actually one of the places I was least excited about visiting during the deployment. Instead, it ended up being by far my favorite stop of the entire trip.
One of London’s most recognizable landmarks is Tower Bridge, completed in 1894. Its two bascules were originally raised using a steam-powered hydraulic system, allowing ships to continue along the River Thames. The bridge still opens for river traffic today, although its original steam-powered machinery has long since been replaced.
I either completely forgot visiting Tower Bridge during my first trip or somehow missed it altogether. Either way, seeing it years later left an impression. For me, it’s easily the most beautiful bridge in London.
Despite the two towers that dominate Tower Bridge, its name actually comes from its location beside the Tower of London. Above are two photographs of the fortress, officially known as His Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress of the Tower of London.
The oldest and most famous building inside is the White Tower, begun by William the Conqueror in the 1070s. Over the centuries, the larger complex served as a royal residence, fortress, prison, armory and treasury. Today it’s perhaps best known as the home of the Crown Jewels.
The Tower is also associated with some of the darkest chapters of English royal history. Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, two wives of Henry VIII, were among those executed within its walls. Naturally, a place with nearly a thousand years of history also comes with plenty of ghost stories.
Unfortunately, I didn’t tour the interior during this trip, so that’s still on my list for another visit.
Across the river from the Tower of London I encountered a very different side of London’s architecture. The rounded glass building on the right was London City Hall when I visited. Opened in 2002, it served as the headquarters of the Greater London Authority until 2021. I definitely hadn’t expected such futuristic architecture from a building called City Hall.
Buckingham Palace is another of London’s most famous landmarks. I definitely didn’t have good lighting for my photograph, but even accounting for that, I have to admit that the building itself didn’t impress me as much as I expected. I planned to return for a night photograph but never made it back.
The building began as Buckingham House, constructed in 1703 for the Duke of Buckingham. King George III purchased it in 1761 for Queen Charlotte, and it became known as the Queen’s House. It was later greatly expanded and became the official London residence of the British monarch following Queen Victoria’s accession in 1837.
Of course, Buckingham Palace is also famous for its guards and the Changing of the Guard ceremony. The guards aren’t simply actors or historical reenactors—they are serving members of the British military carrying out ceremonial and security duties.
The building above is the Old Admiralty Building, part of the historic government complex associated with Britain’s naval administration. The statue on the left is actually farther away in Trafalgar Square and depicts Admiral Horatio Nelson.
Nelson has an interesting connection to my own military experience. I spent five years in the U.S. Marines, and many Marine traditions have roots in older British naval and military customs. One tradition we carried on was Mess Night, a formal dinner filled with elaborate rules, ceremonies and plenty of strange traditions.
Nelson himself became one of Britain’s greatest naval heroes after defeating the combined French and Spanish fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. He was killed during the battle, but the victory helped cement British naval dominance and removed any realistic prospect of Napoleon challenging Britain at sea.
Nearby is Horse Guards, which once served as the headquarters of the British Army’s commander-in-chief. Today the building remains an important ceremonial site and is associated with the Household Cavalry.
I had visited this same area during my first trip to London a decade earlier, and remarkably little seemed to have changed. The mounted guards were still outside, tourists were still crowding around them, and warning signs still reminded everyone that the horses could kick or bite. Probably worth taking seriously.
Here’s another part of London whose names confused me when I first visited. Like most people, I always called the famous clock tower Big Ben. Technically, Big Ben is the nickname of the enormous bell inside the tower. The tower itself has been called Elizabeth Tower since 2012.
Elizabeth Tower forms part of the Palace of Westminster, where the British Parliament meets. The present palace is largely a 19th-century building, constructed after a catastrophic fire destroyed most of the previous complex in 1834.
The much smaller structure on the right is the Jewel Tower. Built in the 1360s to store the personal treasures of King Edward III, it’s one of the few surviving pieces of the medieval Palace of Westminster.
Between Buckingham Palace and Westminster is St James’s Park, one of London’s Royal Parks. It doesn’t take long to walk through, but the lake, gardens and flowers make it a nice break from the surrounding city.
The park also has plenty of birdlife. Despite signs asking people not to feed the birds, plenty of visitors were doing exactly that. I was used to seeing the same ducks and swans in parks throughout Europe and North America, but some of the waterfowl here were unfamiliar to me.
Nelson’s Column stands in Trafalgar Square, but my earlier photograph didn’t show just how crowded the square was. The National Gallery also overlooks the square, making this one of the busiest tourist areas in central London.
During my visit, a large African festival was taking place and the square was absolutely packed. Moving through the crowd became a struggle. London in general felt considerably busier than I remembered from my first visit a decade earlier, although the beautiful early-October weather probably had half the city outside enjoying one of the last warm days of the year.
Walking around London I came across this historic-looking ship on the left. I never figured out exactly what it was, so rather than guess I’ll leave that mystery unsolved.
The building on the right wasn’t mysterious at all—it was deliberately designed to look impossible. Artist Alex Chinneck created the installation Take My Lightning but Don’t Steal My Thunder, which made a section of the building appear to have broken away while the upper portion somehow floated in midair.
There were so many people around the installation that getting a clean look at it wasn’t easy, but it was definitely one of the stranger things I stumbled across in London.
London is one of the most international cities I’ve ever visited. Walking around, I constantly heard conversations in languages other than English, and the city’s diversity was impossible to miss.
That also meant I encountered demonstrations concerning events far beyond Britain. The photographs above show two different protests I passed during my visit. The demonstration on the left concerned events in Turkey, although I don’t remember enough about it to confidently describe its specific cause. The demonstration on the right was directed against the government of Iranian president Hassan Rouhani.
I’ve managed public transportation in places like Pakistan, Nigeria and Bolivia, so naturally I assumed London would be easy. Everyone spoke English, the signs were in English, and the London Underground itself was incredibly simple to understand.
Then I tried getting back to my hotel late at night.
I needed to transfer from the Underground to a National Rail service, but at the time I didn’t understand that I was changing between separate systems. I wandered around trying to find a platform that seemingly didn’t exist until I finally realized what I had done. By then I had missed the train.
Someone at a ticket booth suggested taking the Tube to another station and catching a bus from there. That sounded easy enough—until I discovered I couldn’t simply pay the way I expected. I had to go elsewhere in the station, sort out the correct payment, then figure out where the bus actually departed.
By now it was approaching midnight and my patience was disappearing. I considered taking a taxi, saw the price, realized I didn’t have enough cash on me anyway, and abandoned that idea too.
Eventually I took the Underground as close to my hotel as possible and walked the remaining miles through London at around one in the morning.
When I finally reached the hotel at roughly 2:00 a.m., the lobby was empty and the doors were locked.
Perfect.
There was a number posted for late arrivals, except my phone was completely dead. I ended up sitting outside on the curb, pulling out my laptop and using it to charge my phone just enough to make the call and finally get inside.
What a nightmare. Somehow I had traveled through countries where transportation should have been infinitely more confusing and never had anything go this badly.
To be fair, the London Underground itself gets an A+ from me. It’s extensive, easy to follow and incredibly useful. My disaster came from combining several different forms of transportation late at night while not understanding how they connected.
One of the stranger things I encountered during my second trip was an invasion of zombies and horror characters.
This was only the beginning of October, so Halloween was still weeks away. There was clearly some kind of organized event taking place because I kept seeing people in elaborate costumes throughout the city and even on the Underground.
I couldn’t identify everyone I photographed, but there was no mistaking the character on the right: Pyramid Head from Silent Hill.
After two visits separated by nearly a decade, London had managed to give me two completely different experiences. That’s probably what I like most about the city. There are enough famous landmarks and centuries of history to fill an entire trip, but some of my strongest memories came from things I never planned to see at all.
